2008: Use a Paper Calendar

Technology is a wonderful thing–most of the time. I love my iPhone. I love my Mac. I love my paper calendar. What? I still have an old-fashioned paper calendar? Yes, and I say it without guilt.

An electronic calendar shows you your appointments for today. But most of them, on the monthly view, simply show dots for days you have something planned. And if you use an electronic calendar connected to your office’s schedule, people will schedule meetings into your life wall-to-wall. You will drift from one meeting to the next, growing your to-do list to unmanageable lengths, or spend a lot of time blocking out work time to avoid being swamped by meetings.

That’s where a paper calendar comes in handy. I use one that shows a month at a time. Time passes too fast for me to use a week view. I need a whole month overview. Good monthly calendars are almost impossible to find, so I get mine at Levenger’s--big squares, starts each week on Monday, nice heavy paper, pre-punched for the Circa (Rollabind) system I use.

Using a paper calendar has the advantage of showing you when you aren’t busy as well as when you are. Like an analog clock that show you what time it isn’t, letting you know, for example, that you have half an hour to go before your conference call, a calendar shows when your day is in threat of being overloaded. A paper calendar shows you that you have a meeting with an important client first thing in the morning and another important client last thing in the day. Few people are both morning and afternoon people, so one of those meetings won’t be at your best time. Maybe now is a good time to switch one of them.

A paper calendar shows that you booked yourself through lunch three days in a row. That you have two days to write that summary. That your anniversary is at the end of the month, with a little wiggle room to find out what would delight your spouse most.

My iPhone is vital to me, my Mac is a constant companion, but I’m not giving up the paper calendar. I need to know what day it isn’t.

Image: www.amazon.com

–Quinn McDonald teaches communication skills to people and corporations. See her work at QuinnCreative.com (c) 2007 All rights reserved.

Creative To-Do Lists

To-do lists can nag you or make you crazy. There are many ways to handle them, and the one I learned in the corporate world is my least favorite: I was taught to create three columns, one for most important, one for medium important and one for things that are good to get done sometime this week. Didn’t work for me, although it must have good uses for some people.

First, I have to admit that I use a paper to-do list. Yes, I have post-its on my Mac. Yes, I have a calendar that lets me generate a to-do list. But for the same reason I keep a paper calendar, I use a paper to-do list. It’s easier for me.

Here are two ways to use a to-do list. Both involve 3 x 5 index cards, or 4 x 6 cards if you write big.  (I turn the cards and work on them portrait-orientation.) I work on several projects at a time, so I use one card per project. Each project’s name is written on the top of the card, and the to-do list underneath. That way, I can put all the project to-do lists next to each other and see how much work I have and which project needs to take priority. When I have a lot of projects going at the same time, it’s wonderful.

When I get really into projects, I assign one color to each project, and color code the cards to match the project. (You can also use different color cards.) Color coding gives me overviews and helps me draw conclusions faster. (”A lot of blue cards, do I need to farm some of this out?” “The yellow project is due in a week. Why so few yellow cards? Am I done early, or is there something missing?”)

Then there is the worry list to-do list. When I wake up at night, unable to sleep and busy worrying, I make a list of things I’m worrying about. Having written down the worries, I go back to sleep. The next morning, I tackle the things that need to be done.

The last to-do list is called the tag-cloud to do list. Because I use the same method as tag clouds–the more important a task, the bigger I write it. Because I have small handwriting, I draw a box around each item on the list. The bigger the box, the more important (or worrisome, or pressing) the item. That gives me two facts at once: the item and the importance, all in one glance.

You can use a mix of these methods. Color-coding works with tag-clouding very well.  Tag-clouding works with worry-list well, too. And no matter what method I choose, writing down all the things that need to get done helps me free up more memory cells.

Image: www.ontimesupplies.com

–Quinn McDonald is a certified creativity coach and a trainer specializing in communicating. That includes Writing for the Web and Giving Powerful Presentations. See all the topics at QuinnCreative.com (c) 2007 All rights reserved.

Working Way Out of the Office

Running your own business is hard enough, finding time and space to do it is a tricky business. When I worked in an office, I had a to-do list. Most days, I’d arrive at the office, and by the time I had a cup of hot coffee in my hand, there was a line of people and my email beeping insistently.  My to-do list became the coaster for my coffee, and the day was filled dealing with the people at the door and on the other end of the email. My to-do list remained undone.

Now that I run my own business, it could be the same. But it isn’t. My to-do list is the stuff I need to do. Today. So I use the perks of life in a connected world to my own advantage.

Need to do some research? I grab the laptop, go to the library, and while I’m there, get work done using the free wifi at the Tempe Library. (Check your library for wifi access by going to Maps.Google and clicking on Businesses, then typing in “free wifi” in the first search block and your city in the second.)

Visiting a client? While I’m at checking how to get there, I’ll also check for wifi spots close to the business. (See the method above, type in “free wifi” in the first search block and the address of the business in the second search block.) When I leave the client, I head for a wifi spot and create two documents–a summary of the meeting and what I agreed to do and entries on the to-do list to start the project. While I’m at the wifi spot, I’ll check for emails and answer the pressing ones.

Ready for lunch? I rarely eat between noon and 1 p.m. The restaurants are full. Eating after 1 p.m. at a free wifi spot makes it more likely to find a spot where I can use the laptop and phone.

Sometimes I do work from home all day long, but on days that are filled with client visits, I get work done without missing a beat. And getting out of the office is often a great way to get a little social time in. And yes, I have talked to people at lunch or in the library and walked out with a new client. It doesn’t happen often, but often enough to include the laptop’s extension cord in the carrying case.

Free wifi spots in the Phoenix, AZ area.

–Quinn McDonald develops and runs training programs in business communication skills. See her work at QuinnCreative.com

Poem: The Hunter

It’s raining, spattering drops across the dusty road.  Walking, head down against the rain, I see a scrap of heavy paper stuck against a mailbox.  It’s wet and torn, covered with handwriting. It invites a look. Was it dropped, thrown away? I won’t know.

Curious, I bend to pick it up with both hands and my backpack slips off my shoulder, toward the muddy street. My shoulder lifts and the leather straps hit my elbow, sending sparks of pain flying up my arm into my shoulder. This piece of paper better be good. It’s hard to read the cramped handwriting. The ink is not smeared, although the paper is soaked. The author is Jane Greer:

The Hunter

Deep in his muddy memory, something makes
A ripple on the smallest space of thick
and enigmatic water, something breaks
a thin stiff shaft of reed, grazes a stick
with wing or fin; disturbs the mist. He wakes.
The pre-dawn clamor in the fluent air
cannot drown out the subtle sound that aches
In his hollow cattail bones, and rattles there.

What could it be, this sound or rushing where
There are no wings, this snap of twig in rain,
Startling in the eye’s white corner, hair
Rising on the arms again and again?
Nothing. An absence: losses beyond repair,
Forfeitures, white arms that would not stay
Warm while he learned what early cold he could bear.
The sound he hears are the ones that got away.

—Jane Greer

Why did someone copy this poem? Did they intend to send it to someone? Was it a reminder? I’ll never know how the paper got there, but now it’s in my journal, a message from an unknown writer. Months from now, I’ll find it, read it again. Maybe it will spark something interesting. Maybe I’ll just read it again and again.

–Quinn McDonald is a writer and a certified creativity coach. She teaches journal writing classes, among other things. To see it all, visit QuinnCreative.com (c) 2007 Quinn McDonald. All rights reserved.

Home is Where the Growth Is

“You must be happy to be coming home,” the lady at the coffee shop said. I was standing in a small space on Hillhurst Ave., off Los Feliz, a coffee shop that I’d frequented 33 years ago, when I lived in Los Angeles.

“Well, I didn’t live here long enough for it to be home,” I said, in that irritating way I can have when perfectionist precision beats out big-picture acceptance.

Later, as I continued my walk, I thought about it. No doubt, the short time I spent in Los Angeles had echoed changes through my life. I came into my own here, accepted myself as a writer, realized that not wanting to become a nurse did not make me the bad person my mother insisted, and basically, grew up.

I’ve lived in many places in my life, and made a home in all of them. Contrary to surveys, that only allow you one home, you can have many. Is my son’s home Georgia because he was born there, even though I left when he was less than a year old?

There have been homes I’ve loved and hated to leave, and homes I’ve lived in because it is where I wound up. Each has contributed to the life I’ve led. Each home has a story and leaves a mark.

Much of it depends on the decisions you make, the mark you leave yourself. I will always love Los Angeles for the growth I experienced here. There are other homes I love for other reasons–places where I was happy, sad, understood, rejected–all of which taught me something new and pushed me into shape.

Now I’m in Phoenix and that will be home. Not because I chose to live there, but because I’m making a life there, a life that will take me in a new direction of growth.

–Quinn McDonald is a certified creativity coach who develops and teaches communication programs. See her work at QuinnCreative.com (c) 2007 All rights reserved.

The Community of Writers

If you are a writer, you know the truth: writing for a living is tough. You are expected to write for free for the Web, where sincere people tell you sincerely that the Web is free, and this is a great opportunity to have your writing seen. Their sincerity is so powerful that it’s hard to remember that the very same voice who is telling you this is not connected to a body that is working for free. And as of this blog post, people still need to have shelter, food, and clothing.

Turn around, and try to join a writing organization, and an equally sincere voice says that you can’t join unless you have been paid for publishing something.

So you hang in the middle, feeling alone.

First, get some self-worth, mix it with a bit of self-wrath, kick yourself in the butt and demand payment for your work. Then join the Authors Guild. This is a long-standing group of professionals that help you navigate contracts, understand what you sign, and help you find grants, contests, and other places to publish. It’s informative, creates that all important community to help you stick together and get paid.

Yes, the Authors Guild costs money (about $90 a year, depending on your salary from writing), and you have had to been published, but the terms are generous.

If you are a writer, you need to belong. If your computer doesn’t let you connect to links (like the one above), I’ll post the website: http://www.authorsguild.org

–Quinn McDonald is a writer and certified creativity coach, who also develops classes for people who want to write and speak clearly. See her work at QuinnCreative.com (c) 2007 All rights reserved.

Writing Across the Desert

Yesterday, I crossed the desert from Phoenix to Los Angeles to visit an old friend. This is a friend, who, if we haven’t seen each other in years, will sit down and begin to yak as if we had been on the phone yesterday. That’s a rare friendship, a gem of value.

The trip was amazing, in a visual sense. I-10 is the direct route, but it is not the freeway of the East Coast. There are not gas stations at every stop, and you have to plan. I started with a full tank of gas, and kept it at around half full. As the journey was new to me (aren’t they all?) the sights were incredible, and the trip an awakening to the isolation (at least for people who drive) to the cities on the West Coast. At some point, people walked this distance, and settled in a place isolated and alone. And free of the conventions they walked away from.

I left the bowl of mountains that creates The Valley of the Sun, in which Phoenix sits. It was a clear day, cool, with that big bowl of blue sky. Culturally, the color blue and blue stones, like turquoise and lapis, represent the eye of the divine. Those who grunge against the idea because it seems Western European need to stand in the desert and let the understanding seep into them–the big blue roof above you isn’t about Western European culture, it’s about nature.

[Pictures will be here shortly. I'm on someone else's computer and can't transfer pictures from my camera.]

I cross the mountains and drive through mountain ranges. Once I have gone through Quartzite and Blythe, the desert changes. The sand is dust fine. I see a line of smudge in the distance and as I get closer, it is sand blowing across the road. For about 50 feet, there is no road, just blowing sand. I follow the tracks of the car in front of me, realizing that I am suddenly grateful for the view-blocking truck that provides a track for me to follow.

Then I’m through it, and notice the different look of mountains. They are sharper here, more deeply etched, sharply defined. The mountains in Phoenix were caused by volcanoes, and the Sonoran desert was once the bottom of a deep, warm sea. These mountains were caused by shelves of earth pushing past each other, mountains pushed up out of the ground to be weathered by the wind.

The first mountains appear with snow on the top. I cross the San Bernadino range and drive through a giant wind farm. Huge, whirling turbines catch the wind through the pass and make electricity. It’s a scene from science fiction.

About an hour out of Los Angeles the traffic starts. I’m back to real life. And for today, life is good.

–Quinn McDonald is a writer, certified creativity coach, and a trainer in the communication field, which has nothing to do with phone companies and a lot to do with words and getting clarity. (c) 2007 All rights reserved.

Nature Knows

“All that nonsense about signs in nature, that’s just old wives’ tales,” the guy at the hardware store said. “You can’t tell nothin’ from looking at the sky and such.”

I grinned to myself. Really, don’t get involved, I thought. Then my mouth leaped ahead of my brain. “Say, the Redskins are playing today. You know, every time they play on a Thursday and it rained the day before, they win. It rained yesterday. Who do you like in the game?” I asked.

“With those stats, they might win today,” the guy said.

I nodded. “It’d be nice.”
Now I understood him. He was a causal believer. Sport statistics can make you do that. The rain was no predictor of a win. In fact, it has nothing to do with the game. It’s not even a statistic, it’s a fluke.

But predicting the weather by nature is an old wives’ tale because the old wives’ were right. The mare’s tales scattered across the sky, followed by the clouds that look like farmer’s rows are a sign of a change in the weather. They mean a drop in temperature, maybe wind, and that combination often means rain, too.

Yesterday, with a brisk wind sweeping the desert, I noticed old palm fronds falling off palms. Not fun it if hits your car–they are big and hard, but necessary for the palm to thrive.

We’ve gotten away from paying attention to nature, and it’s a shame. There is a lot to be learned my standing outside and looking up at the sky. At night the stars form stories to remember; during the day, you’ll know what weather is coming your way.

And at this time of year, it is not bad to remember stars that pointed to important events. The guy in the hardware store, disparaging old wives, I’ll bet he believes the Christmas story–that a star indicated Jesus birth, and called shepherd’s to attention, guided kings with gifts. Even then, we knew that signs of importance came from nature.

Sometime today, when you are racing through life, look up at the sky. Maybe it has something to tell you.

–Image: new moon: www.wintertime.com Clouds: quinn McDonald Star rise: www.cosmicharmony.com

–Quinn McDonald is a certified creativity coach and develops training courses in communication. (c) 2007. All rights reserved.

Happy Birthday Blog

Last year, Heather Blakey asked me if I’d like to contribute to a blog on daily writing. I’m busy, and I hate to commit to things I won’t fulfill, but I loved the idea. Heather runs the Soul Food Cafe, an imaginary place in Lemuria (the equivalent of Atlantis), and a daily writing practice seemed liked just the thing to keep my skills going.

“You have to start your own blog,” Heather said. Ugh. Sounded like work. It was, for about 30 minutes it took to set it up. Yes, there are days I struggle to say something meaningful. And now, 310 posts and 365 days later, a year has passed. I’ve met people through the comments section, I’ve discovered other people’s blogs, I’ve come to share a community with people I don’t know.

It has made the time easier. There are many days a writer feels helpless and sad, knowing what’s going on in the world and knowing there is nothing that can stop the progress of envy, greed, anger. We can witness it, we can do what is in front of us to do, we can create a bit of cheer. And that is enough.

Thanks to all of you who read (more than 37,000, not counting the other blog I abandoned because WordPress works better) and left comments, who made me think, who pushed my buttons in every way. Thanks especially to you, Heather, for giving me a push that made me a better writer and a better informed person.

I’m raising a glass to all of you and will keep writing. There is stuff to be said.

–Quinn McDonald is a certified creativity coach and training developer. See her work at QuinnCreative.com Image: (c) 2007 All rights reserved.

Sunup

This was the shortest day of the year, and now it’s over. We can all exhale, and know that even though it is still cold and dreary, the days are getting longer.

I love the tempting tease of it–the days don’t jump ahead, no, they get longer a few seconds at a time. In January, it’s hardly worth noticing, but we know. In February, the time gets longer seriously, by a minute, then two, each day. You’re driving home from work and suddenly you notice that you don’t have to turn on our lights at all.

These are tiny gifts to celebrate. They can’t be hoarded, just enjoyed. An important lesson that’s hard to learn–some things are meant to be enjoyed at this moment, and then let go. No scrapbook, camera, or card can hold them. They are meant to be tucked into your memory and enjoyed in hard times.

So tomorrow, have a secret smile because you know there is a little extra sun coming your way. The long, dark days are almost over.

–Quinn McDonald is a writer and certified creativity coach. See her work at QuinnCreative.com (c) 2007 All rights reserved.

Image: birdwatchersdigest.com