Some thoughts about living life - kind of long

Preface:
This post turned out to be long-winded and full of some disconnected thoughts about the last few months of living. Feel free to skip to the 'Things I've learned' for a summary or to just give this post a miss altogether.

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A blank screen is intimidating to me when I'm trying to write. Once I get a paragraph, a sentence, or even a few words down, the rest usually seems to write itself. But those first few minutes, staring at a blinking cursor and nothing else, cause me to worry that I won't be able to think of anything to say.

That's how I feel this morning about my life. At the start of a new day, when there's nothing but a blank 'screen' in front of me for the next 18 hours or so, I wonder how I will fill it. Before the plans start to kick in, the driving begins, or the workday starts, I wonder if I will do anything useful with the time I have before I go to bed again.

When I write, I tend not to brainstorm much before I begin. Some writers start with an outline, a free-association mind-map, or at least a solid idea of where they want to go with their thoughts. Instead, I tend to latch onto the first idea that seems viable and start writing about it. I think I sometimes live life that way, too. I might have a vague idea about what I want to do, but I often let the day take me where it will. Sometimes that works out for me and I end up with a great day filled with a lot of new experiences that I wouldn't have had if I'd had a defined plan. But sometimes it just leads to a wandering day where I look back at the end and wonder if I really accomplished anything.

I think that the last 8 years in the Navy with all its structure and control have left me wanting more time that I can spend how I wish. The jobs I had before the Navy left me at least my evenings and weekends to spend as I chose, but I haven't even had that for a long time. Instead of managing the little time off that I do have well, I've just drifted along through it, trying to relax by 'doing nothing.'

I think I really only came to grips with this in the last several months, and it's been a work in progress. I've been trying (mostly successfully, I think) to actively 'do things' in the time that I do have. Instead of coming home from work and heading straight to the computer to 'relax' and 'just not think about work for a while', I've been trying to get out of the house with my lover-girl, see the sights, read more books, have more real conversations, and think more thoughts. It sounds kind of dumb when I write it down, and like something that normal people do all the time, but it's really something that's been difficult.

Things I've learned:
1) Relaxing by doing nothing is not really relaxing at all. The things that need to get done just pile up and the longer I put them off the more difficult it is to get them done, and the more stress they create.
2) Getting the 'must-do' things done first allows for way more time for the 'want-to-do' things.
3) The brain in 'consume mode' instead of the 'produce mode' quickly shuts off, making it very difficult to remember how to really live life.