Your Own Cheerleader

Be Your Own Personal Cheerleader

I had been struggling to write a newsletter in July. It just did not happen. I heard myself saying, “Life is what happens when you make other plans.” It made me realize how often I have these pep talks. When I don’t do something that I know I had every intention to, I am often very hard on myself. I start to think about the reasons that I am procrastinating. Procrastination stems from many things. Was it a lack of motivation or interest, was I feeling overwhelmed, or was it fear of failure? Nope! This time, that was not the case. I decided in my one-on-one that I would call my little break from action a respite. If I called it a full-on break, I was just being lazy. A respite, however, is a short period of rest or relief from something challenging. That was a more accurate description. These last few months have been hard. I was sick for almost a month, I had a loss in my family, and I took on a few responsibilities that I should have said no to. The Summer is almost over, and even though I celebrated my birthday in May, I haven’t done anything fun since. Now, during my respite, I cannot say that I did anything of significance. Work got done, parties were catered, deliveries were made, and normal business duties were completed. Nothing extra. Now I realize, all too late, that August is kicking my butt.

I've taken on some new corporate clients who are already gearing up for the Fall. Since they are new to me, there is a lot of going back and forth until we get a rhythm. That may take a little while. I also have my first international customer, who I now know speaks French. Although she speaks English, it came to my attention that some things were getting lost in translation, in email. I decided to call for a better explanation of what she wanted. When I called to speak to her, an answering machine started saying words I hadn’t heard since I was a teenager. I was totally thrown off. I hung up because I thought that I had the wrong number. I called back, still French. All those classes in high school were of no consequence. I left my quickly crafted message and hoped for the best. After we spoke, I was once again cheering myself on. “Get ready for your next convo, you need to buy Babbel!” Is it too late or too early for New Year’s Resolutions?