I'm having a moment, please bear with me. Don't feel the need to comment as most of this is just me venting and spitballing into the blogosphere.
In January I went on a lovely weekend writing retreat and poured out 7,000 words of a fully planned story. I felt energised and ready to crack on with it. Since then I've managed 500 words and the feeling has gone.
I'm starting to doubt what I'm doing this for. I struggle to maintain a routine, I flit from idea to idea never finishing anything and I doubt that I have what it takes anyway.
So far so normal.
Yet... But... However...
I know that my procrastination is strong, perhaps the strongest force known to mankind. I could have a PhD in procrastination if I could be bothered to study for it. So I am well aware that I am procrastinating. Even sitting here writing this blog post is a form of procrastination. And I'm pretty sure that it all stems from a fear of failure. All through my life I have avoided doing things because I'm afraid that I will fail. And if I don't even try, well I can't fail then can I? So I am aware that I am avoiding writing because I am afraid that I'm really not as good as I would like to be or even think I might be. And if I don't sit down and write, well there's nothing to share is there? So no-one will find out I'm not that good really.
Round and round and round I go, procrastinating again.
But I really want to succeed, whatever that means. I want to have at least one finished, edited piece of work that I am proud of. And I'll never have that if I don't finish something. And I'll never finish anything if... I think we all get the drift now, don't we?
I've read all the advice, I've agreed with all the experts about the importance of a good writing routine and yet I still faff about, not turning the laptop on and not writing anything.
So, what am I doing it for? When I actually do it, of course. That's the question I've been asking myself and so far myself has failed to come up with a satisfactory answer. I still have the fantasy of wishing to see my name on a book cover somewhere. I'd also rather like to submit a successful entry to a writing competition. But is that all I want? Surely at the heart of why most of us write is the desire to tell our stories, even if no-one else ever reads them. And I do want to tell my stories.
It's a conundrum.
The end result is that I have to strip it all back to the bare bones, to get to the heart of why I write. And if that means I never share another word or another tale... so be it. I have to tell my stories but I don't have to decide just now who I'm telling them to. Maybe I don't have to have readers? Maybe the telling is the point. However, what's the point of a story that no-one ever reads? I wish I had the answers but I don't. I'm lost and flat and lacklustre, as a writer and as a person. It's hard and I worry that it'll just get harder unless I manage to find my writing mojo again.
