Deltas, you can probably relate to my current dilemma, at least you IEEs can for sure.

I am doing so bad lately with distraction and procrastination. I just keep putting off settling down and working toward goals. I read somewhere that IEEs kind of need structure imposed from a job. I worked really extra hard this school year where every moment of the day was structured at work and was complaining by the end of the constant daily work responsibilities and coming home tired to more at home. I blamed my lack of free time for the growing pile of disorganization and undone at home, and its true, I had very very little free time at home and when I was home it was Mom's "sun-downing" time and she interfered with anything I tried to start.

So my long-awaited summer break is finally here. I needed rest time when school got out but now its been two weeks and I have overdone take-it-easy. Yet I still procrastinate. I feel like I did the first time I had a real summer off from teaching, as my Masters was finally done. It was such a shock to have free time I was immobilized and actually uncomfortable with it. I don't remember how long it took me to get going.

I made plans to rectify the bad pace this year by next fall being my own "paid caregiver" at home for mom 30 hours a week next school year (I do it free all the time, but her funds can pay me rather than someone else those hours) and I'll sub one day a week to stay current and to get out of the house. This way I can be with Mom in her mellower time of day, and get things done here, and I'll have more patience with her in the evenings when she is not mellow, as my own stuff will be taken care of. Its a good temporary solution for me, especially since next year is a transition year as Lordwilling SLI and I marry. So I am really looking forward to a different pace next fall, and this is really the start of it. Its like I got a big gift of time to use in all these ways, and I am not using it.

But I haven't started to establish any pace yet. Its just a lot of procrastination activities. I will work on a scrap of this and a scrap of that but I can't seem to settle down with direction. Its like I am flitting about. Kind of like a guilty butterfly. I have lots of ideas of what I ought to/want to do, tons, but I can't decide where to begin,so I don't begin.

What do others do to pull themselves together when they get like this?

Years ago in college I read an old paperback, "How to Manage Your Time and Your Life" and underlined the whole thing and strictly lived the principles and instructions therein and this hauled me out of such a funk, a funk akin to what I am in now. I got quite productive. Only maybe too productive; I don't want to get borderline-obsessed like I was, so, I have not felt called to look up that book again.

Anyone have ideas or know a good resources for stuck people??

[Remember we IEEs are resistant to being told to push ourselves through it. We need some other kind of approach. If I knew what, I would just do it! Actually its inspiration we need I think.]