Slow Progress is STILL Progress

On my desk, I have a shelf where I put my laptop so I can see things on the screen and so I can have the camera at eye level for filming things that all that stuff. The shelf itself is something I rigged from the extra shelf from a old bookshelf and empty Pringles cans that I will eventually cover with decorative elements or something but that just sit on the desk, keeping the shelf up high.

All that just to tell you that I have a post-it note that is on the far right side of that shelf. The note has (in my sloppy handwriting reserved for writing things quickly) the following statement - "slow progress is STILL progress." I'm not sure where I saw this first, but it really has been a good thought for me in the past several months. I often find myself looking at it when I am sitting in front of the computer, wondering if I will ever find something to write about on my blog or as I am trying to think about my future. (Expect lots of these types of thinking posts this year - I'm getting close to a BIG birthday, and I'm a bit freaked out about it!!) ANYWAY - this little piece of paper has kept me going, bit by bit, and baby step by baby step.

This thought has kept me company for a couple of months now, and it helped me figure out a bit about how I work and how I want to work on things like webinars and CMTE courses and Teachers Pay Teachers things and sharing Therapeutic Music Experiences with other people. It led me to create something new for me - a way to track that slow progression from thought to project completion. It's a combination of a mind map and progress tracker, and it is working well for me.

This is one of the trackers that I came up with this weekend. This one is for a particular part of my job that I like doing but never really seem to get all the steps finished at a time. This allows me to keep track (hence the name, "tracker!") of where I left off during a project. I get to color in the little bubbles and dots when steps are done. It may look like a waste of time to some folks, but it works for me, so I do it!

I've scanned the trackers into my computer, and I've formatted them so they fit inside my project book. This keeps all the information together. I paste it inside the book on specific pages. When I get REALLY organized, I'll put these on sticker paper so I don't have to use the glue stick at all. It's good to have goals in life, isn't it??

This small strip of paper links in with the post-it note. It helps me make progress on the things that I want to do. I can add a specific date or time at the end to act as my timeline. I can see what I've accomplished and what still needs to be done.

In the meantime, though, I am going to make that slow progress towards finishing the projects that I want to finish. Time to head back to sing about february - release date: December 5, 2019!