Just go to the shed

On befriending what you fear....though this looks like a very friendly shed!

As I write my 99th blog post (I haven’t been counting but Squarespace knows how many I have sent out!) I reflect that I have tried to give some behind the scenes insight to this podcast project. Sharing the lows…like the microphone package that turned out to contain cat-litter, to the highs, like getting a mention in the Radio Times.

Normally the blogs kind of write themselves…something that has been happening during the week, a recording or an episode. This week has been a little different, in fact a little difficult and I think it may be tied up with ‘just going to the shed’. But to explain this we need to go back a little bit.

For about 10 years I was hooked on a column in the Guardian’s weekend magazine, written by Oliver Burkeman. It was called ‘This column will change your life’. He was working on discovering the secret of human happiness! I would still recommend reading his final column from September 2020, it is particularly useful if you are contemplating making a move in life as I was back in September 2020.

He went on to write a book called 4000 weeks, I’ll save you the trouble of pondering the number 4000 - its the average number of weeks we humans have to play with. And once you get over that slightly scary number its a really good read. His latest book, published about a month ago is called Meditations for Mortals. By now you may be realising that I am something of a groupie! The guiding philosophy in the book is ‘imperfectionism’ which is quite powerful for those of us who have a perfectionist streak. It begins: “This is a book about how the world opens up once you realise you’re never going to sort your life out”.

So where does the shed come into it? Well this is about the things we ‘haven’t got around to’ as though its just a failure of organisation as opposed to things that make us anxious, so we just don’t go there. He points out that “this is also known as ‘staying in your comfort zone’ which is ironic because there is nothing comfortable about it”. What Burkeman is advocating is just go to the shed! To change metaphores he quotes another writer who talks about the bits you are avoiding as ‘gnawing rats’. But rather than attack the rats (and who wouldn’t want to avoid that) you should befriend them. Which means, if we go back to the shed, popping in for a short while just to assess the situation; observe and take stock. When you befriend the rat you defuse the anxiety you feel by transforming the relationship and apparently…"it becomes a ‘white sheep’ - a harmless, docile, fluffy creature that follows you around until you decide to do something about it”.

So I think at this point I do need to reveal some of the gnawing rats around the podcast. Over the past few months I have had some sessions with a wonderful woman called Sarah who specialises in both SEO (search engine optimisation) and podcasting. Those sessions have been incredibly helpful and I have a technical and onpage audit of the website, an SEO episode checklist, a sponsorship template. But I just “haven’t got round to them”. I realised in the shed chapter of Oliver’s book, that my comfort zone is researching, recording and editing plant stories. SEO and sponsorship and analysing numbers and trends - these are the gnawing rats or fear inducing challenges.

The trick is apparently to ask yourself what you’d truly be willing to do to address the fear inducing challenges. One way to start is just maybe give them some attention. So bear with me as I try to turn those rats into fluffy white sheep just pottering along behind me.

Have a lovely weekend

Sally

x

ps with thanks to Hilary for the loan of her shed again!