What’s Next?

I’m not much of a planner. Never have been.

I might make a list or two. Maybe even work with some kind of very loose plan or outline, but mostly I just like to follow along with my intuition.

Generally, I’ll just ask myself “What’s next?” as in “What’s the next step?”

This goes for life as well as writing.

Because I prefer to follow my intuition (that lovely N in INFP) and because I prefer to keep things open to possibilities (the P), making concrete plans often makes me feel a little constrained. Using the “What’s next?” strategy, I keep myself moving along, while staying open to possibilities — often things I never saw coming (which I love).

Even with a large project or task, simply asking yourself “What’s next?” works just fine, because, if you think about it, you can only ever take the next step. I can’t take the step four steps from now. I’ll take that when I get there. I only have to worry about what’s next, because steps, by their nature, build upon one another.

The beauty of this is, is that while you’re only taking the next step, steps add up. Faster than you might think.

If you take one step every day, by the end of the week you’ve taken seven steps, and by the end of the month thirty. That can really add up.

So, if you’re like me and you don’t work that well with traditional planning methods, maybe you don’t need to. Maybe you just need to ask yourself: “What’s next?”