The Art of NOT Being so Darn Lazy

 

Sometimes I’m lazy. I’d like to think it happens to us all. Maybe it’s human nature, or maybe sometimes I just can’t be bothered.

This is something I’ve been thinking about recently in my quest to be more productive and to get my writing career back on track. I realize that there are many times when being lazy is NOT at all justifiable. Go figure. Although, sometimes it is, just ask any cat, but I digress.

Lately I’ve been exploring different themes for this humble site of mine. I found several that were nice, but there was a problem. Most of the ones I tried needed a picture in the post. Otherwise, a gawd awful ugly photo placeholder with an even uglier camera image is inserted when no photo is present.

The description of one theme I looked at even said, requirements:

• At least one image per post
  
• At least one label per post

Really? Well, that’s asking a lot. Especially when you’re feeling like a lazy slug.

But then it got me to thinking, is putting a photo in every post such a big deal? I have a few posts I wrote on the fly that do not have photos. If you’ve been following along, you already know that.

Blogging experts say to put a photo in your posts because those posts draw more readers than the posts without photos. As I look at my stats on this site (who knows how accurate they are) that doesn’t seem to hold true. Some posts with photos have the lowest reads, while a couple of posts with no photos have the most. Whether a photo draws readers could be up for debate. But I guess that’s not the point here.

Cruising the stock photos sites to find pictures for my posts doesn’t take long, few minutes, sometimes longer, it all depends on what I’m looking for. Sometimes, it’s fun. Pictures do make the site look better, and if they draw in readers like the experts say, then it’s a win.

Putting labels on posts only takes seconds. However, I often forget to do that. I honestly don’t know why. It isn’t till after it’s published, sometimes for several weeks, that I see I forgot to label a post.

After thinking about all of this, I realized that finding a photo for a post isn't work. Adding in links to previous posts isn’t hard either, it just takes a little time. Labeling posts is super easy. To simply not do any of this, I realized, is just plain laziness.

I don’t want to be lazy.

Maintaining this site isn’t work. It’s fun. So why on earth am I being lazy about something that is fun? That is the question I pondered. And if I’m being lazy about things I find fun, what else am I being lazy about?

A lot of this has come about because I am attempting to be more productive in life. In the past couple of months, I’ve read some self-help books to help give me a gentle push forward on a road to what I hope is a better life.

Even those books basically say that with little effort, the things you want to achieve can be done. It’s a matter of resolving to do them. And that seems to be the secret of the universe, to be honest. Just take the time to do the things you want and/or need to get done.

How often have we put off a task because we didn’t want to do it? Or we thought it was going to be hard? When we finally set off to do it, more than likely, it turned out not to be such a big deal after all. In fact, after the task is complete, a sense of accomplishment sets in and we wonder why we put it off.

Sadly, this is all too easy to forget in the course of our hectic lives. It is something I’ve been trying to remember. Which is why I’ve been more active on here lately. This is my little space on the web. I enjoy it, so why not put the effort into this site that it deserves?

Maybe if I put more effort into this, that will give me the push I need to put more effort into other parts of my life.

While I want to make a few more design changes on here, right now I feel some general housekeeping might be better instead. Maybe insert some pictures with the past posts that don’t have them? Make sure everything is labeled properly, etc.

Most importantly, I’ll keep writing and keep posting. Already, with only writing a couple posts these past few days, I’ve noticed a change for the better. And I’ve not been feeling as lazy as before. My cats, however, are a lost cause and will continue to be lazy. Because that’s what cats do.

As for the design changes to this site - I’ve realized that’s just another form of laziness. It’s me procrastinating instead of doing what really needs done, the writing.

We learn and grow as we go along, but only if we are not - you guess it - being so darn lazy. Who knows, this little effort might bring about big results one day. If it does, I will write a properly labeled blog about it, with a nice picture to draw your interest.