Sick of not writing
I’m not writing lately. I had a minor breakdown about it yesterday (to Brett’s exhausted distress). But there isn’t any time. Between work and life (you know, feeding and clothing and otherwise making sure people are able to walk around upright) there really isn’t time. Or space in my head.
- Our cable is gone so I’m not watching television.
- The election is over so I’m not obsessed with political blogs.
- I AM trying to get back with my exercise routine but I figure that’s not negotiable seeing as how if I drop dead from a heart attack there won’t be any writing anyway so I probably should try to get and then stay fit.
- I’m neglecting the kids about as much as I feel comfortable with in order to get the work and working out done.
Oh I don’t want to do this — list the reasons I haven’t been writing. I wanted to whine about NOT writing. Because I’m not. And I’m frustrated.
Here’s the more positive part of it — I’m back in touch with some of my writing friends who went missing when their own busy lives took over and I’m meeting some new ones. I’ve got a writers event to go to on Wednesday (thank you Lia!), which I’m really looking forward to and hopefully the peer pressure will do me good.
For me, a lot of writing is a head game. I can find time even when there isn’t any when I have time to think. I’ve been jacking up my work efforts so much that all writing thoughts tumbled right out of my mind. Brett says I should pull back on the networking/marketing a little bit and focus on writing but damn, it’s hard to do. I get worried that I won’t be able to make my financial goals and the holidays are staring at me with their greedy little eyes. (Not to mention Noah’s birthday just a month after.)
Oh me of little faith!!
Take a sanity break, you deserve it. Make the children workout with you, for fun. Anyways, sometimes its good to just turn everything off and think. I am sure writing for money must be stressful. I have faith you. You are really talented.
Aww, Cindy! (sniff sniff) You’re the best!!!!
I haven’t been getting to my writing either - feeling blocked - living in Wisconsin - onset of annual SADS (I am trying to be more active and proactive using the lightbox this year) - felt exhausted after the election even though the outcome couldn’t have been more thrilling and satisfying, I guess on some level I didn’t realize how much tension I had been internalizing during these Bush Years and I suddenly feel like I can relax my shoulders again - am frustrated at not having the technical know how to figure out how to get my blog operating with plugins for email subscriptions and reader feeds (even though I have been employed as a programmer/analyst at one time in my adult life) (I am one of those middle aged Moms who has to ask her teenager to put the sim card in her cell phone the right way - all I’m really trying to say here is: I feel your pain!
Balance is a bitch! I have similar issues, and I know it feels like if you pull back, it will all fall down. Can you schedule it, somewhere? Just a little is better than none at all.
There have been a lot of days when I wished that I was an x-ray tech or a carpenter or a dog trainer or something that didn’t give my brain a word hangover, just so that my writing space could be this protected, sacred time. As it stands, writing for a living often makes me complacent about “my” writing.
I’m sure you’ve tried all the things I do - shaking up the habits by working in some space outside of the house or abandoning the computer and writing longhand or just reading something spectacularly inspiring. Maybe the holiday gift you should ask for from your family is two afternoons of uninterrupted Dawn writing, beginning with coffee and B12 vitamins.
Terry, you’ve already got a feed because wordpress automatically generates one! But you should install the feedburner feedsmith plugin:
http://www.google.com/support/feedburner/bin/answer.py?answer=78483
Then route all your feedreaders through there. Feedburner lets you offer an email subscription, too. You handle all that through the feedburner site. Very nifty!!