(as an aside, it looks like one of the search terms that led readers to my blog this week was “definition of utter ego”. Thanks for calling me egotistical, internet.)

I don’t know if you feel the same way, but I have a tremendously powerful aversion to failure. Despite my belief in the learning opportunities brought on by trying and failing, I still clench up occasionally in the face of a challenge. It’s becoming easier to just step forward and take a chance, but it’s still an up-hill battle some days. I’ve been going toe to toe with just such a situation recently, after I volunteered for the vp of communications role in my local political organization.It turns out, they haven’t had a communications guy for…well no one is really sure, but it’s a long time. So, I’m going into the role with no real guidance or previous documentation to crib from. On top of that, the organization is generally disorganized and low on energy (being third place in a bunch of elections will do that to a group).  On the other hand, I’m raring to go. I have 8 hours a day to plot and scheme while building sand castles with the little dude. I am chock full of ideas and motivation. This leads to the challenge: I can either sit and wait and get approval for every step I want to take, even though that approval may take weeks (communication between executive members is also a problem), or I can try my best to follow the rules I can find, and just go for it. Will I end up breaking some rules/duplicating effort/cheesing people off? Oh, probably. But if it’s a choice between doing nothing and being bored, or jumping in and taking some flack if it goes wrong, well, might as well jump.

In mostly unrelated news, I had a chance to chat with another parent of a clever 3-year-old at a barbecue this week. When she was talking about her daughter and the idea of having any other children she said “it would feel like gambling, and I’ve already hit the jackpot”. Exactly. My little dude is so entertaining, so clever, so wonderfully perplexing, and so full of potential, that I want to devote all of my energy and time to helping him become the amazing adult he’s going to be. Also, I’m almost sleeping all the way through the night again, and I look forward to that blissful return to grownup sleeping patterns  each and every day.

 

You would think that, by my erratic blogging schedule, I don’t like doing it. Totally wrong. It’s another way for me to go on at length about whatever topic strikes my fancy, and I love to give my unsolicited opinion to everyone. I imagine that someday, I will be the old man in front of you at the grocery store, regaling the checkout girl with a story about the high cost of lemons as you go mad from beign made to wait. I apologize pre-emptively.

So why do I blog so infrequently? I’m acting out. We all have responsibilities and a long list of obligations that we’re not terribly happy about (laundry, cleaning the cat box, doing a job you don’t like, etc) and sometimes we choose one thing on the list to fail on purpose. You know you’ve had those moments, when you’ve walked through the kitchen and shouted at the dishes “I DON’T CARE HOW YOU SMELL, I’M NOT WASHING YOU.” It’s a bad choice and it makes your life slightly worse, but you make the choice anyway for the sake of control. It’s a rebellion against determinism and expectations.

And so, to spite the world and myself, I skip my blog post. There are other minor worries and anxieties that encourage me to skip, but the need to be bad and do the wrong thing is the main culprit. Luckily, I’ve muscled my urge to rebel into a really weak position, so my outbursts are limited to giant slurpees and missed blog posts. If I had no control over my self-destructive urges, I’d end up doing something really bad, like voting conservative.

Having some level of insight into my own bad behaviour is pretty helpful on the little dude’s wild days. I can recognize that look in his eyes when he’s about to dump out a bag of sugar, or knock over a pile of books for the third time. He’s announcing his autonomy and self-determination by making a jackass of himself. We’ve all been there.

I have to change the order in which I do things. Leaving this here lil ol’ blog until late in the evening encourages a ‘bah I’ll do it tomorrow’ reflex that isn’t helpful. But, blogging in the morning feels unnatural (and I would have to work like a speedy demon to finish a post before the wife heads off to work and I start my day with the little dude).  This blog is the main voice I have to you, my audience, and when I neglect the blog, I neglect the audience. Bad writer, naughty!

Here is today’s “daily meaningless benchmark of Max’s development that caught me off-guard”: The little dude can look straight out of the front windows without assistance.  I hope his basketball skills start developing, because this fellow is going to be a tall guy. He can also pour liquids carefully, without upending the container and flooding the counter with milk or juice or what have you. Yay, fine-motor skills!

But back to me yelling at everyone. When I post/tweet/email something that I’m really passionate about, I tend to get slightly over-dramatic. I’m pretty sure that sometimes my enthusiasm comes off as shouting. It’s a hard line to walk, being excited and passionate without being too intense and off-putting.

On the other hand, I suspect that my moments of unbridled optimism are misread as naive.  It is possible to be both optimistic and fully aware of the negative obstacles standing in the way of progress.

Self-published author update: It’s been a month and a half since the book went up for sale (for sale here, for anyone who is late to the party). Sales have slowed down, since everyone I am in regular contact with has purchased a copy. And, for the record, thank you wonderful people. The next challenge is to find new opportunities to put the book up for sale: local bookstores, artisan’s markets, etc… This is the kind of stuff that an actual publisher would take care of for me, but until I can build a loyal and sizable audience, I have to go it alone. And no, ‘sizable’ does not refer to your weight. I love you all just the way you are.