AADD - Artist's Attention Deficit Disorder

I'm one of those distractable persons that will start on a mission like going through the contents of my old cedar chest to thin out, toss and organize the contents.  Then I find myself digging, wondering...where did I stuff those autographs from Bucky Dent and Jonathan Cain?  Where is that magazine with my photo when I was 16? Oh, here it is!  I'd better scan it before it turns any more yellow.  Ooh, then I'll put it on Facebook to share with friends with whom I used to attend these goofy events...then I'll yap with my friends on Facebook for a while.  Now the room is a mess, the contents of the cedar chest are scattered and as I try to put it all back (later, much later) less stuff seems to take up more space.  How did that happen?

A similar thing happens when I go into the studio to work.  My husband loves Picasso and, of course, we can't afford to buy one (and I just don't go for posters since his grad school days), so I decide I'm going to paint one.  I get the Picasso book out, let him pick one and figure out how to enlarge it to fit on a canvas that is NOT the same size or shape.  I go to get my paints, and I see the canvases from the art co-op project along with my sketch book of ideas.  Then I see my Mac.  I turn on the Mac...I'll just check email real quick and jot down more ideas for the co-op project.  Then I see magazines and books I didn't put away, so I start to shelve them, then see the one on dollhouses....oooooohh!  Not actual doll houses, but more like collages-in-a-box that add up to a house.  Hmmmm.  Ideas.

I started on the painting, I didn't get all the magazines put away (I had to drop them and run before I read them all) and remain distracted by other projects that I want to try.  I'm still thinking about that sort of family tree of paper dolls idea that I've been knocking around, and the quilt for which I've bought the fabric, but haven't started. 

Is it just me?  How do I stop my mind from going a million different directions on a million different art projects and actually get focused?  Today, I'm going to try to focus on the painting.  It's supposed to rain tonight and tomorrow (someone didn't tell the weather dude that this is Southern California and the business was supposed to be wrapped up in February!) so I've got a day to myself.  I need to put parts of the brain on pause, figure out how to center my attention and just get something done.

On that note, I'm going to have coffee and then paint.  We'll see how many times I'm distracted and my attention wanders.  Focus, focus, focus!!!