126 - Stressed

I'm really stressed and I don't know why. I mean, I know why, but I don't know why I give myself that stress. Now, I feel burned out emotionally and physically.

In two days, my mother is coming from Hong Kong to visit me here in the UK. We're planning to head up to Edinburgh for a couple of days, and booking tickets and accommodation for us has been mentally taxing. In the past few days, I've been trying to research and brainstorm all the things we could do in Scotland and in Kent, and I'm just very, very tired now. You would think that her going to visit one of her old students in Exeter for two days would help lessen the burden, but I actually have a test the day after she comes back. My break-from-Mom gone, just like that. In the next month, I'm also planning to meet up with two of my closest friends, three times, separately, in London. I have two essays due and a lot of computer stuff to do too. I've also had to search for accommodation for next year, and it's been a complete nightmare so far...

I actually have plans to open up another blog... on the 15th of February in fact. On top of getting that ready, I also have to prepare posts on this blog and Do you hate it too? for each day that I'm with my mother, from the 10th to the 20th. It's all just snowballed, and it's all really, really, really working me hard, but I just have to power through it, I guess.

There are two times during the year that have notoriously been very busy times for me. One is around February/March, the other is around May/June. Every year during these times, I'm so, so stressed out and I just cannot feel relaxed. In the past, there have been plays to perform, examinations to take, orals to do, 4,000-word essays to hand in, presentations, reports, and so many birthdays and anniversaries to attend...

I'm so tired. These two times of the year I always see coming my way, but I never have any defense set up to protect myself from it. This year, it's going to change - it has to change. I need to quickly pick up my efficiency so that I can deal with things faster and more effectively, hence prevent stressing myself out during these times again.

And now, I'm a little bit hungry.

Okay, actually, I'm very hungry. So I'm going to go make some pasta. Toodles.

123 - The idea process and guest posts

I have a little notebook, with a space for each day, in which I enter my blogging ideas, and what I write down in this journal ends up being what I talk about on my blogs throughout the week. I spend about an hour or two every weekend, and think about what might be good to discuss on Do you hate it too? and "If you're going through Hell, keep going." I do this to prevent cases of writer's block that may come up if I instead wrote my entries on the spot, in the moment, each day. After a year of not planning ahead for my posts, I really understand how hard it can be sometimes to think of something to say, and what a detrimental effect it can have on the quality of my blog.

Also, there may be some instances when I'm simply too busy or too tired during the week to sit and think of my ideas slowly and carefully. So, in the weekend, I spend time jotting down titles, and then some bullet points underneath each one, as a general guideline I can follow when the date arrives. It makes my writing easier, makes me more efficient and organized, and guarantees better content, because I actually spent time thinking my topics through, doing research if necessary. Plus, on the actual day I come to put these ideas on Blogger, it's kind of like my second chance to self-critique my ideas, and I feel like I've got a little bit of an editing process going on.

If there's one day you go on Do you hate it too? and don't see new content, that means I'm not doing the job I intended, because I ultimately aim to do one entry every day. When I miss one day, it can only mean I was too lazy to blog that day, even if it meant I had an idea written down already. In fact, I already have ideas written down to last me 'til the end of February. I have no excuse to miss any day, so if I do, I'm slacking off, and I apologize for that. Trust me, I hate the lazy pig I am just as much as you do.

As for this blog, my personal blog, I give myself Tuesday and Wednesday off, a bit of a holiday on the busier weekdays. So if I'm missing some days out, it again means I was being slothful, and if I'm blogging on the Tuesday and Wednesday, it means I had some thoughts/feelings I really wanted to publish.

I can't say it's easy to come up with substantial subject matter. In fact, brainstorming interesting stuff is more often difficult and time-consuming than it is fast and smooth. If I didn't go through the process I outlined above, I'd be lucky to even produce just more than five posts in a whole thirty days.

Someone told me that I could ask people to do guest posts on both my blogs, more so on Do you hate it too? as it's the more popular one. As difficult as the idea process can be sometimes, I still don't think I'm going to open that door of opportunity any time soon. These blogs were started by me, all by myself, and it would be like I was giving up a part of me, my own integrity, and in my mind, ownership, as the sole author of all the posts that have been written so far. I'm proud of what I do by myself, and as much as I would like to share the space on Do you hate it too?, I don't think I'm ready to welcome anyone else's work - that of my friends, my family members, my fans, the people I go to school with, and all the bloggers I've come to meet through Blogger.

Some day, maybe, I'll be open to offers, but I'd like to see how much more I can do by myself. I'd like to really be confident in my own style, and have the appropriate mindset for sharing, before seeing if anyone would be interested.