See, here’s the problem with sharing an idea. If you say aloud, you’re giving it one more atom of realness. Willing it into existence. Pulling it from the sterile confines of the theoretical into this world, and breathing life into it, such that it may take root and become something, either to you or the person to whom you mentioned it.

Twelve12s has not yet happened as conceived. To be honest, it’s barely happened at all. I haven’t even finished defining my original twelve projects to pursue, let alone gotten going on them, taking pictures of them, making notes about them. That said, a little bit of the inspiration has been with me since I started making gestures toward the larger goal.

At its essence, tweve12s is simply culling down the overwhelming of world of possibility, desires, dreams and demands into specific actions, quantifying them, and ultimately doing them. Over the past year I’ve successfully added a few habits to my life, such as flossing, running, weaving in ends and finishing lingering knitting projects, posting more regularly here. I’m pretty darn proud of myself for them. They are proof of my NOT being an utter and complete failure. Of my agency against the tide of the easy way out or the stress of the day-to-day. A glimmer of hope that I can set out to accomplish SOMETHING. A little bit is better than none, and eventually they add up.

I shared my theory behind the twelve12s project with Kristine, an inspirational friend over the year-end winter break. She is a kindred spirit in an overachieving, driven, artistic kind of way. We both want to leave a mark on the world and live creative lives and grow and give back and be mindful and all that good stuff.

On twitter today, she mentioned she had been using my “12 x 12 methodology” and loved it. (Mind you, there is no methodology, nor have I been “doing” it myself, rather lamenting I haven’t given it a proper go.) She said, “It’s really helping my perfectionism.” I totally get that, in the same way the kernel of the idea has helped me embrace baby steps of my own. That was kick enough in the pants for me to dust it off once again, try the motor and see if I can get it to run this year.

Mention an idea, and it just may happen. Learn more at twelve12s.com.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 28th, 2013 at 7:05 pm and is filed under life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.