Honk If You Like Being Busy

My life is like a gaggle of geese. Ever tried to herd geese? Ever tried to walk across a yard full of geese? It's chaos. It's loud and noisy and somewhat scary because the geese sort of look like they're going to charge you then they back off then they honk and holler and squawk.
All of sudden, they figure out you're not there to hurt them and they waddle off to find someone else to harass for forty seconds.
Geese are odd. I love them.
My life has taken an odd turn but I've never been more content.

All summer, I've been waffling about taking an online course at the Atlantic School of Theology, a foundations course, the starting point of -- whatever (but not a career in ministry, I know for sure). At the same time, I felt pressured to take a program that would license me as a lay worship leader but the schedule was inconvenient.
So there was this pressure, like a gaggle of geese coming at me across the yard, to do these courses just as I'm about to embark on fulfilling my life's dream of becoming a published book author.

Curiousity and a love of learning won out, however. I signed up for the AST course then promptly read the first 100 pages of the textbook.
Just last week, when I had accepted that, yes, I can do this course and no, it won't interfere with my writing, an email popped up in my inbox offering an online Licensed Lay Worship Leadership course.
Interesting. I want to be licensed because it's my calling to help rural communities but I resented the "this is the way we always do it" insistence on weekend retreats. So not being one to ignore signs or gift horses, I signed up for that LLWL course as well.
From zero to two online courses in less than a month! Seems extreme, perhaps, but this is my country reality: I haven't done much in the way of further education in part because I'm not keen on the travel involved (the other part was that I couldn't decide what I wanted to do). Can't very well say no to opportunities for self-directed schooling when they present themselves.
Even if they descend into my life like a gaggle of geese spying an intruder across the yard.

Crazy, you say. You ask if I really need these distractions just when I'm about to launch a book and set out on some kind of book tour (whatever that means for a first-time regional author)?
And my answer is...a shrug.
Online is the answer, actually. It's possible to do everything from my house.

And here is what I've remembered already in a week that added a grant application and a presentation to an Alzheimer support group into the usual mix of textbook reading and worship service planning: The greater my creative output, the greater my creative output.
As long as I make time for walking and yoga, I can juggle it all for the next three months.
Ever seen geese juggle? Perhaps I'll still resort to forty seconds of honking and hollering and squawking whenever I feel overwhelmed.A good gaggle never hurt a girl.