Trouble organizing or reading myself, or setting priorities.

[Owls12]

I sometimes over-think things obsessively no matter what. Not to mention I can almost or always never organize myself in a way I'm happy with. I'm constantly rearranging things in my room. I always re-position my game consoles - my PlayStation 3 used to be at the right-hand side of my desk, now it's at the left, and soon I predict I'll change it back to the way it was. I'm constantly moving objects weekly, if not daily. Relatives often comment that my room already looks neat as it is, but I can't help but disagree. Note that it isn't just about room rearrangements, I can over-think just about anything whether it's academic subjects or how video games work, or anything if possible. Because of all this, I never find myself feeling secure or happy about myself.

Also, I have trouble setting my priorities to a suitable way. Sometimes my top priority can be something completely minor, while my lowest priorities could be important stuff I always neglect when in some cases I shouldn't. Plus, I always compare myself to the past and ask myself "How could I've become much worse than I was before"?. I always think I'm inferior to the way I was before. This may sound silly, I know, but I can't help but always find myself thinking that for some reason.

I also struggle to have a fixed or consistent perspective or viewpoint of things. My perspective altogether strangely changes and shifts overtime for no good valuable reason. They're not exactly minor changes that only happen for a day or so, but they're kind of long-term changes, and some of them I believe affects my future too. I have absolutely no idea why this occurs though, I find it hard to analyse. I sometimes find it difficult to read myself as a person in general, so I have trouble pointing what I'm doing wrong, and what I'm doing that's right.

As an example, I'm currently working on a leisure comic, divided in 4 parts actually, doing the art and the writing by myself, and I'm always picky. For example, if I feel that the characters' personalities and lines don't match with how I pictured it in my head, I start over, or decline production rate and make it even slower. I'm picky on the way they're drawn, I sometimes think I add to much shadows, push my pencil too hard against the paper, or even draw too lightly.

I hope I've explained this in a way that can be understood. I'm sure many of you can relate to this and I'm not the only one.

 

[King_Oni]

Heh, sounds like a serious case of "perfectionism" and the best way to deal with it is by letting go a bit of that. Easier said than done.

But getting stuck on something being perfect while at the same time not exactly knowing when it is perfect (since you keep changing it all the time) doesn't really progress things a lot.

I can relate to this, I'm a bit like this myself, especially when I'm working on music. But at some point I just have to realize that it's done. Working more and more on it eventually gets back to me and will make it worse, only to hastily look for a back-up from a while ago rendering all my work I did after the date of this back-up totally irrelevant. Yes, I know what I don't want, but I'm not sure if that's what people should look for. Better to look for what you don't want than to explore the possibilities of unwantedness.

What might help is to sit down an make better plans and have perseverance to stick with them. As much as it's more fun to change things because you feel you should change them, it often slows down processes more and leaves you open for "well, if I changed this, why can't I change this as well?" and that's where it's a downward spiral.

 

[Berianireth]

I do similar things with data and with artwork. I've spent three or four minutes on corners of peaks, or hours changing the look of a graph before when I have very serious deadlines. I kind of know that I'm doing it, but I can't stop... or I will stop before I get as into fixing it up as most people do. It ends up looking like I'm always a beginner, but I really end up achieving more depth than most people can tolerate eventually. Obviously you have to make sure there is some balance to things though... I have had to start avoiding some of my hobbies more frequently because I can spend an even longer time drawing fingers onto a cartoon than I do finishing a project at work, but I'll never be able to prove that to anyone if I don't show up on time. ^.^
I think as long as you're still managing to pin together a life for yourself you're all cool.

 

[Owls12]

I like to re-read this post and the replies altogether to remind myself about what to do whenever I feel I once again have trouble organizing or reading myself or setting priorities. It helps personally for me