Unfinished projects

Unfinished projects. We all have them. Sometimes they come falling out of abandoned shelves in closets or they are found stuffed between old photos and files. Sometimes they sit right in front of us on top of piles of “to-do” items each day and mock us.

What I find most frustrating about my unfinished projects is not that I’ve chosen not to finish them. I usually know exactly which ones I will eventually finish and which ones are worthy of abandonment. But what really bothers me about my unfinished projects is the self-doubt that the reminder of them creates inside me. I am so ambitious, I want to take on so many things and am constantly creating new goals and new ambitions for myself. Then suddenly I am reminded of that unfinished project sitting on the top shelf in my closet.

And I think, what does this say about me? What does it say about my ability to complete all these *new* ambitions if I can’t even finish up my old ones? How will I ever achieve this new goal…? Look at the last time I had such high aspirations!

Self-doubt is a form of fear, and one that I am ready to look in the face today and admit that it does scare me. It scares me that with my new ambitions that I will simply start them and never finish them. How do I ensure that I follow through with my ambitions and that I don’t let this fear grab hold of me?

I have been more motivated than ever to work on the unfinished projects that lie around my house and speak to me – the ones that say “you *must* finish this before you move on.” Something about our trip abroad this summer helped me feel the desire to seize the moment more than ever before. So I have taken up a process, side-by-side with my new ambitions, to finish up some of my old ambitions.

My current old unfinished project that I am determined to finish: creating scrapbooks for each of my kids. I have a very lofty dream for these scrapbooks – and the loftiness of these books has held me back too long. Each book will include photos from milestones in their lives: birthday parties, vacations, school photos, sports teams, and more. The book will be sorted chronologically and my intent is to catch up through all 8 years of my son’s life to date. When (not if) I complete that, I will allow myself some time before I dive into the girl’s books.

This will feel great to get this completed! I’ve been thinking about these books for years, I purchased the scrapbook albums over a year ago when I finally decided to make them myself versus using digital books, and I plan to continue adding to them each year as my children grow up. My fear has been, that if I didn’t get this project off the ground soon, that I would never do them. My kids would grow up without any real photo albums to capture their unique memories.

I will forgive myself from finishing, at least for the time being, other unfinished projects — this includes my wedding album (!!), a charcoal drawing I started earlier this year that just doesn’t seem to be going the direction I wanted it to, my wedding invitation website, and more.

A drawing I started a few months ago. I’m not sure I will ever finish it… so much for plans to make beautiful charcoal drawing of all my kids. Well, maybe one day, but I got to a point where this no longer was fun, and I’m not sure I like how it was turning out.

I have to embrace that our goals continue to change as we learn and grown, and that old goals do not have to hold me back from new goals. I have to accept my unfinished projects as a natural part of the discovery process about what’s important to me. The ones that are still important, I will make time for. The ones that aren’t, I will forgive myself for leaving incomplete and move on.