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+---
+title: '#reverb10, day 17: Lesson Learned'
+date: '2010-12-18T20:26:05-05:00'
+permalink: /reverb10-day-17-lesson-learned/
+tags:
+    - '#reverb10'
+    - reflecting
+---
+
+<del datetime="2010-12-19T04:22:36+00:00">Today’s</del> Yesterday’s prompt:
+
+> Lesson learned. What was the best thing you learned about yourself this past year? And how will you apply that lesson going forward?
+
+The thing about me and learning lessons is that I have to learn them over and over again. Every time I’m having trouble writing, I have to relearn how much easier it is to *keep* writing than to *start* writing, and that it’s easiest for me to keep writing if I set aside [the first half-hour of the morning](/back-at-it-2/) to write. And every time I relearn it, it feels like a revelation.
+
+So I’m not sure exactly what I’ve learned about myself this year, and what I’ve just relearned. But I do know, at the midpoint of this sabbatical, that I will never, under any circumstances, accomplish as much in a period of time as I think I ought to, but that if I’m honest in my accounting, I’ll actually accomplish more than I think I have.
+
+I also know that it’s easier to keep running than it is to start running again. And I know that it only takes a few days off for me to lose the gym habit.
+
+I know that I’m increasingly touchy when I feel as though I’m being condescended to or dismissed or ignored. And I know that I probably need to do a better job of drawing a breath and assessing whether I’m being condescended to or dismissed or ignored before I respond.
+
+I know that I tend to say yes to things way more than I ought to, and that I get myself in trouble that way, and that I need to say no way more often. I also know that a lot of amazing opportunities are coming my way, and that many of the service-oriented opportunities are extremely important to me. And I know that balancing my desire to help make things in the profession better with a concern for my general well-being is increasingly important.
+
+I haven’t yet learned how to do that, however. That, I’d really like to learn in 2011.
+