I said I wanted to write...

...and along came a friend who wanted to start a writers' group. She brought a friend who wanted us to come up with three monthly goals for ourselves to further/better/support our writing.

Be careful what you ask for.

I'm excited and happy and scared to death. The scared part is rooted completely in the fear of failure, of not being good enough, not doing enough, letting someone down (myself or others), looking foolish, being foolish, sucking wind...you get the idea. And the weird part is that I know I can write...that I have something to say and can say it well...that there are people who will enjoy and benefit from reading what I have to say. And still I find myself wondering what authority I have to say anything of import...who am I to think I have anything anyone else needs...the same questions I've always asked.

Self-doubt sucks.

Arrogance sucks, too.

Where's the happy medium?

I'm looking for it...honest...and I think I've hooked up with the right group of writing friends to help me find it.

Yay, friends. Yay, me.

So here goes...my three monthly goals, subject to revision in future months...

• Write at least fifteen minutes every day.
• Start compiling writing samples from my current collection of work.
• Start a list of article, essay, and workshop topics; add to it as new thoughts come to mind.

Three goals...done.

Now comes the hard part.

Yes! Do this...do this do this do this!

Precycling - what a great concept!

Precycling refers to the process of reducing the amount of trash, recycleable or otherwise, on the front end...

...avoiding excessive packaging;
...refusing what you don't need;
...reducing what you do need;
...reusing what you can't reduce;
...recycling what you can't use;
...rebuying recycled material whenever possible.

When I was growing up, my parents did this all the time. I just thought they were stingy and tight with the little bit of money they had, which was cool in itself - they made a little do a whole lot. What I didn't realize is what good stewards they were. When I left home, I gradually drifted away from those practices, but I'm relearning them now.

For more good information, visit http://www.summitrecycling.org/html/prere.html (where the precycle list came from) or their parent site, http://www.highcountryconservation.org/.

Do this...this matters.