I was at a convention this past weekend and while that writeup is coming (short version: it was the nerd version of being wrapped up in a soft warm blanket fresh out of the drier), I am actually writing today about something that happened while I was there. It came up during one of the panels I was on, in response to the question of “why have I not finished this nerd show?”
Short answer: I was getting around to it, it was on the list, but I wasn’t going to be able to watch it live and I knew that going in. So I did what I do for several of my shows and I plotted out time for it in a couple of months. The moment stuck with me though on how true that is. Or rather specifically about how when you become a professional creative person and you start making appearances at one of these things, you come to the realization very very quickly that scheduling is not only a necessity but also a blessing.
Not just for your actual creative works, but also for the ways in which you creatively recharge. I am a writer and while I deeply love to write and I love the act of writing stories and creating new worlds and cultures…I can’t make that the thing I do for ALL of my spare time not used for sleeping/eating/the day job.
Burnout, my friends, is A Thing that comes for us all. So it is good to take the time for watching movies or shows or reading books. It’s feeding your brain and your imagination while also giving yourself a bit of a break from the heavy lifting of the creative work you’re pursuing. Even though it’s fun and it doesn’t always seem like work, it really is.
However, there’s the flip side where feeding your brain and imagination is all you do and you never really get around to the writing or painting or recording and that’s no good if you’re serious about trying to make this a career.
Balance and scheduling are the keys that have worked for me the best. So I have my day planner and my online calendar for the house and I just start plotting out blocks of time here and there. For example, the last couple of months, the house has been going through the five seasons of Fringe during the weekdays when we’re not feeling like watching the news. We’re almost done with season 5 and after that, we’ll pick up another thing we’ve been meaning to watch and start that.
I’ve got on my list to finish Black Sails seasons 2-4, the first season of Star Trek Discovery, The Clone Wars, and Star Wars Rebels. Westworld Season Two is currently airing and I also have the last season of Orphan Black waiting for me and two seasons of the Librarians. And those are just the shows that I would like to have finished by the time Dragon*Con rolls around.
That is also not counting the movies that are coming out in the next six months or the book releases. My to be read pile is actually taller than me at this point. But since I don’t have a Time Turner or an Amulet or infinite time, I have to schedule things out in such a way to where I’m making progress on the writing front and yet also balancing that with watching and reading here and there.
Some days it works better than other. Sometimes not. That’s life.
So for all of you fellow creatives out there, what do you do? How do you keep the balance between work and recreational stuff?