Franklin Covey Saves the Day

This week's quote was deliberately selected.

"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."

--- Douglas Adams

I knew I was tempting fate by aspiring to one post per day. Never mind that I've had words coming out of my ears all week and have thought of an endless variety of subjects and rants that I might have shared. As soon as there is a deadline to meet, I clam up. It's all terribly psychological, isn't it? A sort of rebellion. "Tell ME when to write, will you?!" That kind of thing.

Plus I'm psychotic about organizing my time. I've been using day planners since I was in high school and had to juggle school, work, and doctors' appointments [see This Queen's Throne]. So I've always kept a calendar of some kind and referred to it, obsessively. Which means that I should be able to schedule in a Writing Hour of some sort and give myself some discipline about the whole thing. But writing was never about structure for me. I've never seen it as something to sit down and do. Writing, for me just happens. Anywhere. At any given moment. Be ready.

Writing doesn't make a date with me. It doesn't respect the dates I've attempted to make with it. I've been stood up enough times to know better. And now I know better: Always carry pen and paper. ALWAYS carry pen and paper. Be ready. As it turns out, it's my Franklin Covey planner that has become my default recipient. Since I carry it with me everywhere anyway, I've taken to jotting in it when the moment strikes. My Notes pages are filled more with my writing than with lists of things to do. It's all there: pen and paper.

So no, writing is not to be scheduled or fabricated for the purposes of deadlines. Writing will happen. So I am always ready.