Cyclical habits

As writers, we all have habits that we wish we were better at fixing, habits that interfere with some aspect of our careers and our lives.

Mine is, lately, getting behind on the week's writing assignments.  It means that I end up playing catch up over the weekend -- or, more dangerously, on Monday -- and as a result, I end up feeling burnt out by the time I'm ready to start on the current week's work.

The burnout brings about the cycle: I feel mentally tired from rushing to get a whole bunch of work done the previous day (or even earlier that day), and end up not working for a day or two.  Then I have to scramble to try to catch up again, and my week's work ends up spilling over into the weekend or the following Monday yet again.

I'm in the throes of the burnout/procrastination period right now.  Every week I say it's going to be different, but I'm hoping this week will be the one where I succeed where I've failed before.

This week, today is my Friday, at least with my nanny and babysitting work.

That will mean, first and foremost, that I will have an opportunity to catch up on my sleep, which has been a bigger issue the more behind I get.  I'm hoping, however, that it'll also give me the opportunity to get caught up on my freelance work.

With that hope in mind, I'm off to work on some client work now!