The Joy of Small Accomplishments

Life will sometimes reach an occasional plateau. Periods of feverish activity are followed by doldrums where nothing much happens. Sometimes this is good, because it gives you time to recuperate and regroup. But sometimes those stretches of inactivity extend so long that the whole project is derailed.

We'd reached this point with the church renovations. Four years of frenetic work was followed by a year of nothing much being accomplished as we let the bank account (and our bodies) rest and recover. But lately we've discovered we've become used to the construction debris and had adapted to living around it. The same pile of damaged wood trim remained in the same spot, and we were merely living around it, as if it was a permanent fixture. There was the possibility that we'd grow so used to it, we'd stop seeing it. Recuperation was threatening to become inertia.

So...this week we decided to tackle just a couple of small, bite-sized projects, so that we could see some progress. We had kept a big, heavy cupboard that was left in the old laundry room. It's metal lined, with mesh shelves, and weighs a ton. It's been on its side, acting as both an island and a roadblock, for five years, but we've talked about turning it into a cheese-curing cupboard. This week we finally bought some wheels, reinforced the bottom, and got it standing upright and moveable (and out of the way). Relief! The whole room looks huge now.

We spent a day cutting out styrofoam to block the upstairs windows when we're away (heat block in summer, insulation in winter). It's an inelegant solution and won't be permanent, but it works for now.

We bought some trim to finish off the windowsills in the basement (not installed yet, but ready to tackle on our next trip up). 

We finally framed the Ikea print we bought four years ago, and now it's on the bedroom wall and looks amazing. Turns out the colours are perfect.

And last night we dragged out the damaged trim that goes in the front stairwell, set it in place, and spent half an hour debating how to restore it. Again, not completed, but in place and ready to tackle on another trip.  

It may not seem like much got accomplished, but the barrier has been breached and creativity is flowing again. Sometimes you just need to start, to spend that five minutes getting going again, to break through the inertia. When a project looks too big to tackle, pick one small piece of it to focus on. Tell yourself you're allowed to stop after that initial step. You may find you can keep going once the momentum kicks in, or you may allow yourself to stop after that step, and either one is okay. It's progress, and no one says you have to sprint to the finish line. And sometimes there may not be a finish line, because it's all about the journey, and that's okay too.