Monday, December 31, 2012

just gopher it

After my recent moan about productivity, or the lack thereof, husband suggested that I try picking a project (off the list of many), declaring to the girls that that's what I'll be doing for the day, or weekend, and just going for it.
He had a theory that, if forewarned, they'd respect my 'work', and give me the space to do it.
I rolled my eyes.

But then one Monday morning in early December I did just that. All the walls in this house need painting, but there's a little alcove wall in the dining room which was particularly bad, and I decided to paint it.
I announced at breakfast that it would be so.

And by later that day, much to my astonishment, it was.


Lesson: threshold anxiety is a real thing. The proximity of small children is a handy excuse to justify that anxiety. Women are, I think, more prone to this than men - what if it doesn't work out? What if it's not perfect? What if it was the wrong choice? What if someone needs a poo halfway through?

In my experience men are more likely to just ... gopher it ... and as Julochka noted of her husband's ambitious and very successful sawmill project, we should take a lesson from this: deciding what we want and then going after it.

I too will try and remember this in 2013. With the amount of unknown this year holds I think it'll be a good one to arm myself with.

3 comments:

julochka said...

i so envy husband's ability to do that (at the same time as it at times makes me think of smothering him in his sleep). it's what i mean about believing...he just believes in his abilities and his projects and he's completely unafraid to redo something if it goes wrong, which it does, but he just backs the screws out or makes a creative adjustment and just goes for it. i AM determined to do more of it and i'm glad you are too (so remind me of it, would you?)! :-) girl power!

Sally said...

Hi, just scouring the internet in the search for goodies. love your blog & soooo love the animal print sofa. I WANT ONE. x

Molly said...

Thanks Sally, yup - that sofa is pretty wonderful ;)