“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” – Barack Obama

This post is going to be about change, uncertainty and aim to give you all a bit of a life update. Hopefully starting said post using a Barack Obama quote tricks you all into thinking I know what the hell I’m talking about. I’m feeling pretty fancy about it.

This week I’ve started a new job, in the next month my girlfriend moves in with me and before the year is out we go to Vietnam, leaving Europe for the first time. It sets up the second half of the year to be exciting, busy and rewarding all at the same time. Change is constant, and it’s for all the right reasons.

The Blog

This blog goes against what I usually stand for in consistency. With the gym I go at least four times a week and with creative writing I try to write or read every day. I’ve spoken about it in posts before, but long-term consistency beats short-term intensity from my experience. So why isn’t this happening with the blog?

The reason is that it’s not been a priority of mine. With all the change I’ve had to focus on different things. If I had to pick between this creative outlet and my book, it’ll be the latter every time. If I have a spare evening, I’ll always pick a date with my girlfriend, a weekend with friends and family or taking care of myself first.

At the start of the year I promised to aim for a post a week and this will be the ninth. Hitting the original target is as likely as Theresa May making a political comeback in the next week. Unfortunately, you’ll have to hold back the tears.

What About The Book?

I promise any time spent not doing this blog are on one-hundred percent productive pursuits. Allegations that I watched Robocop 3 last week on Netflix, where he flies and fights ninjas, are without evidence. I allow for only disciplined creative output and hard work in my free time. I’d also like to add the film’s three percent score on Rotten Tomatoes is without merit.

So that brings me to the vague update bit of the blog and my book. With all that has been changing, I’ve continued to chip away at the project, rereading, editing and buffing out any inconsistencies. The third draft complete it’s hit the point where I can’t take the story much further without getting some outside perspective on it. On Sunday night I took the big step and shared it with six people. What I’m hoping is that with their collective help I can transform the manuscript from mediocre to excellent.

In the interim, this allows me a break from the slog of rereading and editing a book I know inside out. I have a stack of books to read, half finished blog posts to finish and months of moving, planning and change to contend with. The change brings a tonne of questions with it. Is my book the next Fifty Shades of Grey? How will my girlfriend cope with my cracking banter on a daily basis? How similar is Vietnam to Leeds?

Ch-ch-changes

There’s no stopping the changing makeup of my life at the moment, but I’m very much in the driving seat for it all. It’d be easy to sit on autopilot, park a finished book or delay a big holiday for another time. Yet the fun stuff causes the chaos, and why would I want to pause that? Come the end of the year I’ll be living with my girlfriend in our own place, we’ll have visited Vietnam and pursuits like my writing I’ve worked hard over will (hopefully) be a step closer to completion. I might even have published a tenth blog post…

Should I end this rambling and vague update blog with another pretentious quote? This one from N. R. Narayana Murthy? Go on then. “Growth is painful. Change is painful. But nothing is as painful as staying stuck where you do not belong.” Ooooo. Look at how much I clearly know what I’m on about.

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