For years my husband has been extolling the virtues of spreadsheets. Whenever I felt overwhelmed with tasks, he’d calmly say, “Why don’t you make a spreadsheet?” I’d groan. To me, that was just one more task, one I didn’t quite know how to do, as simple as it seemed to my logical-thinking spouse.
To be sure, I can accomplish quite a bit on the computer. I design things, navigate forms and apps and taught myself drawing programs. When I want to learn something, I learn it. But for whatever reason, I balked at spreadsheets.
Sometimes we make these decisions early without even realizing it, and then we resist, no matter what.
Maybe it traces back to high school in the 70s, when counselors pushed the “girls” to take typing. I resisted because I didn’t want to be anyone’s secretary. (I’m glad now that I gave in to that class because it’s useful to know your way around a keyboard when you become a writer.)
How I Became a Spreadsheet Person
But then a few months ago I started a street team for my upcoming novel–a team of cheerleaders, co-conspirators, dedicated early readers. I found a terrific article by David Chesson on how to organize one.
And guess what he suggested? A spreadsheet.
…if you are organized, and keep up communications throughout the entire process, you’ll see a much higher percentage of your ARC team members come through.
So, how do you herd cats…I mean readers? By creating a tracking method:
So, what the hell, I made a spreadsheet. It wasn’t nearly as hard as I’d imagined. I used Google Sheets, but you can use Excel or any other numbers sheet.
When staying organized means visuals
More recently, the sheer volume of things I need to do to push my coming book into the world has begun to press in on me: Marketing and publicity involve contacting podcasters and book reviewers. Keeping track of finished essays on writing to submit to publications. People who reviewed my first book. Bookstore events. Library talks. Author fairs. Conferences. Contests to enter.
There’s so much, and it needs to be organized!
My weirdo brain is processing this in its own special way. For several nights now, I’ve had the same dream: I’m at a conference that’s ending soon, and I can’t find the right room or floor. I can’t find my friends. The conference ends, and I don’t know how to get to the airport. I leave papers behind. I get lost in elevators. And where, exactly, is my effing suitcase?
I wake up with that familiar feeling of being left behind and slightly panicked.
Suddenly it came to me: spreadsheets!
I got to work and created two–one for submissions and one for outreach. I even used colors! Colors appeal to my artsy side. Soon I had six different spreadsheets. I’m sure there will be more.
All those tasks no longer swirl in the air like loose papers in a storm. They sit calmly in rows and columns. Everything suddenly looks doable. Mostly.
I learned a spreadsheet isn’t a trap. It’s a map.
The moment of discovery didn’t come to me because the spreadsheet itself is remarkable, but because my assumption about it had been wrong. The barrier existed mostly in my mind. Figuring it out wasn’t the burden I’d imagined. The greater burden had been carrying everything in my head while avoiding a tool that might help.
How often do we resist trying new things because we assume they will be confusing, tedious, or beyond us? We assume they belong to someone else, someone more organized or more logical. But sometimes the only thing standing between resistance and relief is the willingness to try. I can’t tell you how many times I hear intelligent friends say they can’t deal with computers, or even their cell phones. Have they really put in the effort, though?
Not every new tool will change us, but some will surprise us. Sometimes the thing we avoided becomes the thing that steadies us. Sometimes the unfamiliar becomes useful. We discover that what we resisted was never the enemy at all.
Have you ever resisted learning something, only to discover it wasn’t nearly as awful or as impossible as you’d imagined?
Thank you for visiting!
My upcoming novel, Love and Other Incurable Ailments – An anxious overthinker’s fixation on a stranger pulls her straight into chaos, heartbreak, and the inconvenient unraveling of her carefully constructed life.
Maybe she just needs spreadsheets! Too bad I didn’t give her any.
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