Listen to me whine about how I don’t know what I want to do #firstworldproblems

Image adapted from Flickr via the CC license.

“Focus,” I tell Colum. I am forever begging him to focus on what he’s doing, stop getting distracted and stay organized.

Holy cow, am I ever a hypocrite.

My life has been like the Russian nesting dolls of distraction for the past several weeks. I’ve lost focus on every level. Big picture, long-term career and life goals? They’ve become shattered into a dozen sparkly shards, each beckoning me in different directions. The same goes for the mid-range goals I thought I had so clearly laid out for myself. And so on, as you peel back the layers and I find myself sitting down to write a blog post, but unable to remember what it was I so urgently wanted to say.

So I check Facebook and Twitter, reply to a few emails, pour another coffee, start unloading the dishwasher, mindlessly eat a few crackers and then return to my computer. The effect of all these stratospheres of distraction has me reeling. The house alone, my god. Toys, games, books and assorted craft supplies litter every surface. Yes, the floor is a surface. I just can’t keep up with the trail of destruction left by my kids — not when I can whip out my phone to quickly research every passing thought and then fall down another rabbit hole of notifications and messages until I look up 15 minutes later and walk out of the room, leaving the dishes undone once again.

I guess I am busy. I always have a deadline or five looming on the horizon. I have three kids with all the homework, extracurricular and daily feeding demands that go with that. Weekends are jam packed and … oh, look! The Mindy Project is on Netflix.

What was I saying?

Oh yes, FOCUS.

Here’s my theory: My kids are getting older and I actually do have more time than I did when I was dealing with babies and toddlers. I can spend an hour cooking dinner and ignoring their whining. Two of them are in school from 8:30 to 3:00 five days a week. I consistently get enough work to pay for preschool and a babysitter for the three-year-old during half that time.  And if I do have a slow month, we’re not going to miss a mortgage payment or risk going hungry anymore. I don’t have to keep my head down just to get through the day/week/month/year, like I did not very long ago.

So my problem is that I have options. Oh, woe is me! I have too many choices about how to best actualize my personal goals. I am not stuck working a low-paying, go-nowhere job while my kids are cared for around the clock by other low-wage workers. I have to take my kids to hockey and piano lessons. Poor me! I’m not sure if want to pursue a creatively fulfilling yet poorly paid path or work my way up a more conventional career ladder. WHAAAA!

Okay, so this was good. Amazing what a healthy dose of perspective will do for you. Thanks for being the sounding board for my privileged hand-wringing, dear readers.

Now that’s off my chest, I can go back to, er, whatever it was that I was supposed to be doing in the first place.