Whoops. NOW, Let's DO THIS!!! :)

Oy! The last couple months have been insane. Since my last post, I decided to take a break from working on the book as I had to shift focus to one of my favorite parts of my job... helping people plan their upcoming year. I have been doing annual planning on my own since 2016 (in preparation for 2017), and in 2020, I facilitated my first ever retreat (in preparation for 2021). Of course, it was pandemic times so we had about 11 people on zoom for an entire weekend plotting out the upcoming year. We just had our 3rd retreat, at a house in Carlsbad, CA, and just locked our house for 2024. So this past few months was preparing for the retreat, conducting my own annual planning, facilitating the retreat for others, recovering energy from the retreat, and then getting reset on my routines. I was pretty brain tired to do any heavy strategy thinking, that I spent quite a few days in the classroom as a substitute teacher at my kids' school for most of October and early November.

Now, the challenge on this and why it's taken a long time for me to refocus on the book is because I had to implement all the new initiatives in preparation for 2023. And because i LOVE facilitating this retreat, I burn TONS of energy. Not to mention that I had another race, 15k, at the beginning of November, AND had a social vacation planned the weekend after the retreat. All of this lengthened my recovery time. I spent a lot of the last couple months moaning and groaning about how I need to fix this for next year, adjusting run race plans, things to conserve my energy during the retreat, and making a commitment to plan NOTHING heavy for at least 2 weeks after the retreat.

But the last few weeks have been solid productivity, so I'm ready to work on the book again. One of my goals with this book was that I only wanted to work on it in GOOD SPIRITS - and not burn myself out the way I did with FSIB (Finding Success in Balance). Which means this book can take a helluva long time to finish, but I'm convinced it will allow me to showcase really great work.

I've decided to do weekly updates on the blog moving forward at the minimum, so you'll see that moving forward starting today; my first steps are to get started on my initial interviews, which includes nailing down the interview questions (done), identifying some initial people to interview (done), come up with a strategy to get a diverse subject base (work in progress), and prepare the recording mechanism for the interviews (likely youtube videos).

I am also going to go over the outline feedback from my editor, and I am scheduling myself to write the preface and possibly first chapter of the book during the last week of December.

Simultaneously, I'm doing a massive cleanup of my business, a reboot of sorts, that has been delayed heavily due to the pandemic. I've been busting my ass, and I'm staying focused, and none of this sounds really sexy or interesting, but I am doing ALL of this with little to no stress, and I'm SUPER EXCITED about this. I'm feeling super healthy and happy, I have solid routines that prioritize my wellness and family first, and I don't think I've honestly ever been this clear-headed.

Anyway, off to do some legwork - just wanted to provide the update!

-A