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Hello there! Alright so first order of business, I’m coming in juuuust under the deadline here of posting my third blog post in three months (the challenge I set for myself in June). As a procrastinator by nature, and someone who’s been in one heck of a funk lately, I’m calling this a mega-win!

In my last blog post, I posed another self-challenge to finish the book I started from my 2015 NaNoWriMo challenge and it’s time for a status update with a side note:
– I didn’t mention in my last blog post that I have three incomplete short-book projects from before launching Picture This Clothing in August of 2016. Three.

So my status update: Incomplete BUT…
In my practice of trying to make my procrastination tendencies productive, I finished a completely different book!

What?! Yep.
It’s a super-small book (54 pages in 5×7″ format) and not the one I meant to complete, but I still feel like this is a win! I started this project when I was coaching tech teams inside big corporations. This little booklet is the aggregate of 15-years working in various roles in the tech industry, fumbling, and figuring things out (often the hard way). One of my favorite things to coach tech teams on is interpersonal and communication skills. These are skills that actually translate over time, into creating better products. I’ve done variations of talks on this topic at conferences all over the world, and every time I’ve given the talk people ask afterwards for my slides or if I have any information they could take back and share with their teams. I always meant to make a little, easy-read/easy-share booklet but never got around to fully investing the effort it takes to put it all together, even in its smallest, simplest incarnation. I started many times but never closed the loop. And there it sat.

As I started to organize for my self-imposed challenge from the last blog post, I looked at my three incomplete book projects and decided, “How to be Better to Work With” was the closest to completion and an excellent starting point. I buckled down with where I’d left off, I wrote, and wrote and wrote. I finished.

I had a whole vision for this book, that eventually it’d be part of a series of little tip books and so it’s now in the hands of a great designer who’s helping me make it look great. I’ll share those specific details as soon as it’s ready to rock!

While my writing endeavors aren’t always Picture This Clothing-specific, all these things formed my experience before bringing PTC to life with my partner Ken. All my work comes from learning, failing, and figuring out how to recover, then sharing it all out-loud along the way, with my whole heart. I like sharing stuff I’ve learned in hopes it might be useful for someone out there.

If you’d like to read my 21-post “NaNoWriMo 2015 daily journal” mentioned in my last post, I’ve made it public here.

I’ll post an update about the booklet when it’s all done, because I’m really excited about it!

All this said, and acknowledging my ever-challenging procrastination-based personality, I’m still tackling the original challenge, but I may end up following the smaller “booklet” format to start… it’s helping me find my writing rhythm again which feels amazing!
My self-imposed deadline for working title: “How to Conquer Life Burnout” is October 31, 2021. Send me good vibes! Your encouragement helps more than you know.

Are you working on something you want to share? I’d love to see what it is!

<3
Jaimee