Butterflies and Trains

This morning while journaling I once again compare myself to a butterfly flitting from flower to flower. I then think that I’m more like a fat bumble bee. No. Although physically I am not as fragile as a butterfly, my ego is very delicate. One wrong move, look, or negative criticism can leave me feeling as if someone has pulled off my wings.

I go from project to project never staying on one any length of time. Like the butterfly, I may go back to that same flower to do more work, but I still feel like I am all over the place. Even when I move on to another project, I am always thinking of all the other ones, thinking that I’ve got to go back and finish getting the nectar off those others. Then again, there are the ones I’ve not reached yet.

I think about those unfinished projects wondering how I’m going to get back to them when there are many more coming up. Each one is still on my mind even when I’m working on something new. It’s like my brain is taking on more weight as I feel I add more and more without accomplishing much. (It’s called stress.)

Nan and I were talking about multi-tasking and when is that a wonderful ability and when is it detrimental to the psyche. We live in a society where that ability to multi-task and the measurement of accomplishments are the determination of success.

I think about how I think and all the work I’ve done in my brain. I think so much that I feel I’ve done six months’ worth of work in one day. When 85% of the work is in the mind, who will know? Our accomplishments are measured by what can be seen and thoughts are unseen. I may feel I do 12 hours worth of work and look at the clock to see only three hours have passed.

In those cases, it seems that a railroad runs through my head. Freight trains rumble through noisy and non-stop carrying a myriad of ideas and thoughts. Some are like passenger trains giving me glimpses in the windows. I want to remember faces, but the train goes by too fast. Sometimes, the train stops and ideas get off, but if I am busy and don’t meet the passenger at that moment, he gets back on the train and that memory is gone. I feel like I’ve missed the train too many times.

When I’m working (whether writing, doing jobs for the paper, drawing, editing photos, etc.,) or driving or cleaning the house, my mind is constantly going. If I don’t meet the train, those thoughts disappear. I can’t write them all down. I can’t try to know everyone on the train and I keep feeling disappointed because I’ve lost those opportunities.

I just think way too much.