Category: Productivity

Writing is like Baseball: You Gotta Swing for the Fences!

Writing is like baseball. Most of the time, you recognize the pitch coming in and you manage a solid single when you swing at it. Occasionally, you strike out. Every once in a great while, though, you hit a grand slam. Or, if you’re new at it, like me, you dream about hitting a grand slam and when it’s your turn at bat, you give it everything you have and swing for the fences.

Between now and April 9th, I’m going to try to crank out an entire novel, start to finish. It’s okay, coach told me to do it.

Here’s the Pitch

I just got back from my amazing, energizing, mad-capped Residency at Lesley University. This was my fourth and (almost) final trip to geeky writer’s camp for grown-ups. That means I have officially entered my fourth semester of a four-semester-long program. This is it, folks. Everything else was just practicing in the batting cages. The lights are up, the bleachers are packed, it’s the bottom of the ninth inning and the bases are loaded. I’m going to use a bunch of baseball metaphors in this post in case my Thesis Advisor, Chris Lynch, catches wind of this post and reads it. You know him. He wrote Inexcusable, Irreversible, Killing Time in Crystal City, Little Blue Lies, Gold Dust, and a bunch of other incredible award-winning novels.

Anyway, residency is a mixture of seminars, panel discussions, and workshop sessions in which a bunch of us sit around and give critical feedback to each other on pieces we submitted at the beginning of December.

The workshop sessions are one of the highlights of residency for me. I absolutely love reading other people’s writing, digging into it deeply, and then discussing it with other serious and passionate writers. I also love receiving feedback on my stuff. Even when folks point out more problems than positives in my work, I find the experience hopeful.

This time around was a slightly different workshop experience for me for a couple of reasons.

First, I’m entering my “Thesis Semester.” On May 7th, I must turn in between 100 and 120 pages of a “finished” piece of writing to someone who has never set eyes on it before–Jason Reynolds. Ever heard of him? Of course you have, you’re using the internet and you’re reading a blog about writing.

So, yeah. No pressure, right? Riiiiiiight. [takes a moment to breathe into a paper bag] Okay, I’m good.

Most students entering the Thesis Semester have a working draft already completed, or at least a very solid chunk of it.

The second reason why it was a different experience was because Mr. Lynch pitched something at me I was not expecting.

A Curve Ball

Six days before my residency workshop pieces were due (we need to write two pieces, each between 3,000 and 6,500 words long), I contacted Chris Lynch with a question. It was via email, but this is how the conversation sounded in my imagination (I may have taken extreme liberties with the details).

“Hi, Chris.”

“Oh, hey, Kathy. Great to hear from you. I’ve heard so much about you from my colleagues. Can’t wait to work with you!” (He said none of that, by the way.)

“Thanks, Chris. Same to you. So… I’ve got two different books going right now.”

“Okay.”

“One’s a fun MG steam punk piratical fantasy adventure story. I’m enjoying it, but it’s not quite your style, I think.”

“Uh-huh.”

“The other is a gritty YA post-apocalyptic wilderness survival story. Totally up your alley, but it’s a hot mess at the moment. Needs a ton of work.”

“Right.”

“Maybe I could submit some of one novel for my Large Group Workshop and some of the other novel for my Small Group Workshop, and then you could tell me which one you like better, and we could use that for my thesis.”

“Hmmm… when are they due again?”

“Six days from now.”

“Yeah. Okay, so, why don’t you make up a completely new story from scratch and submit that for both your workshop pieces.”

[Eyes bulging with terror] “Are you sure?”

“Definitely. That’s what I want you to do. I’m your all powerful Thesis Advisor. Do you really want to say no to me?”

“Hahaha, no. No, definitely not. I mean, yes, that sounds great. I will totally do that for you. New story. Six days. Not a problem. Thank you so much.”

“You’re so welcome. Glad you called. Take care now. Bye-bye.” [click]

Did I freak out after I got his email reply? You bet your buttons I did. I wrote a post about it, actually. But then I did what he asked me to do and cranked out about 7,000 words of a brand-spanking new story. I wrote that sucker so fast and in such a panic that I didn’t stop to question anything. Setting, characters, plot, dialogue, point-of-view, nothing! I put my fingers on the keyboard, cleared my mind, and wrote Ouija-style!

Swinging For the Fences!

Turns out, the thing that fell out of my brain was… kind of cool. It feels a little weird to write that, but there you have it. Once I got over the shock of what I’d produced (a militant feminist world dominated by psychic women who are into all kinds of stuff our society has deemed taboo), I had to admit to myself that I kind of liked the story. Okay, I fully liked it.

I think all my pent-up rage from the past two years of… I’m not going to that dark place…came bubbling to the surface when Chris was all, like, “write me brand new stuff NOW!” My beloved called it my “man-hating” story. Chris called it a “black-widow feminist” piece. I’m calling it The 42nd Queen. Eh, it’s a working title.

Chris also told me I should make it my thesis project. In all fairness, he didn’t order me to do it. He’s not a monster, for Thor’s sake. I might even go so far as to say he’s a pretty awesome, inspiring, and kind guy. And, if I’m honest, what I wrote at his request (though I cursed him as I wrote it) is one of the first things I’ve written in a long time that gave me the feels as I was writing it. That means something, I think.

So, yeah. I’m going to make it my thesis project. Fourth semester shall not be my revision semester. It shall be my militant feminist, Ouija-style writing semester.

And if I’m going to take a swing at this, I’m going to swing for the fences.

120 page? Pshaw! Too easy.

Let’s try for a grand slam. An entire draft of a novel. In 82 days.

If I’m going to take a crack at this, I’m going to swing for the fences, Babe.

I mapped it out and it’s definitely possible. Assuming (perhaps naïvely) that I write 810 words every single day between now and then, I can hit 75,000 words (about 350 pages) by April 9th. There’s no guarantee they’ll be good words, but that’s beside the point.

The pitch has been thrown. It’s a curve ball breaking to the inside corner, and I’ve got a bead on it. The bat’s beginning to come around. My hips are cocked. Body weight shifting off the back leg. Here it comes.

Think I can do it?

January 17, 2018
The NaNoWriMo Debate: Are You “For” or “Against” It?

The Debate Rages On: Is NaNoWriMo a good thing or not?

Emotions run high when this question is asked. I mean, folks get seriously heated. Fans of NaNoWriMo start heating the tar and gathering the feathers whenever someone suggests that maybe NaNoWriMo isn’t the best thing ever. Critics of NaNoWriMo sharpen their pen nibs in preparation to eviscerate the works produced by anyone during the event. It’s a little crazy, to be honest.

NaNoWriMo Explained

Okay, let’s pause for a moment. If you don’t know what NaNoWriMo is, let me explain. No, there’s too much. Let me sum up. The acronym (which I’m too lazy to type yet again because of the annoy placement of capital letters) stands for National Novel Writing Month. Folks can go to the website, create an account, announce a novel project, and then attempt to write 50,000 words of material in a single month. That averages out to 1,667 words a day. I won’t bore you with the history of how this international phenomenon got started. For that story, click here.

For or Against?

I am FOR!

With some qualifications.

I agree with many others that NaNoWriMo is not a good fit for everyone. Justin Brouckaert articulated my feelings pretty well in his guest post on the Submittable blog titled A Case Against NaNoWriMo. Despite what the declarative title suggests, Justin is not vehemently anti-NaNo. He just wrote a horrible piece of trash (I’m paraphrasing him) in NaNo and thought he was going to go nuts from the pressure.

Different people have different writing processes.

Some folks absolutely adore extrinsic motivators, which is pretty much exactly what NaNo is. Other folks fold like a wet napkin in a high wind at the first sign of pressure.

Some writers thrive on establishing a rock-solid daily writing habit. I like to write every day, no matter what. (Not that I always get to do things the way I want to. See my earlier post about my kids for more details on that front.) Other people tend to write best when they produce work in a more accordion style, with long stretches of empty pages followed by rapid bursts of prolific words.

Some folks are communal writers. They love talking shop with other writers, joining up at coffee shops or in library meeting rooms to sit and write together, posting updates on all the social media platforms. Hooray for the global connectedness that is the internet! Other writers, though, are solitary people (when they’re creating, at least) and find the whole social, communal aspect of NaNoWriMo repellant.

My Own Experience With NaNoWriMo

All I can say is this: for me, there are more positives than negatives in participating.

For starters, participating in my very first NaNoWriMo taught me that I have the capacity for self-discipline needed to write an entire novel.

Also, the stamina. I mean, people! Writing a novel is like running a marathon. That might be too gentle an analogy. It’s like taking part in an Ironman competition. I went into that first NaNoWriMo all, “Yeah! I’m going to write a whole novel in just one month!” Well, that’s not what happened. I did “win” the event by writing 50,000 words in the month of November, but I was startled to discover that my book was far from finished. I continued writing (every day, thanks to the habit I’d cultivated during November) and proudly finished up my book in March of that year. It topped off at just over 96,000 words.

It was a disgusting beast of a first draft. In fact, I’d go so far as to say it was a horrible piece of trash. But it existed. I’d done it. I’d written a full draft of a novel. If nothing else, I now knew that I had the sheer stamina necessary to write a book. I tucked that draft away in the bottom drawer of my writing desk, where I shall probably keep it until my dying day.

See, I think of NaNoWriMo not as a chance to pen a masterpiece, but as an opportunity to simply practice the art of writing. It inspires me. It excites me. Heck, it bolstered my confidence enough join the North Shore Writer’s Group to apply to the MFA in Creative Writing program at Lesley University. NaNoWriMo exposed me to new people and new ways of thinking and new opportunities.

So, yes, I think NaNoWriMo is a positive force for creativity, despite what some might say.

What do you think about NaNoWriMo? Have you participated? Will you again? Why or why not?

October 9, 2017
I Teach, I Write, I Parent, I Busy!

Excuse me, Miss Granger? Could I borrow that time turner for a moment?

Yeah, Yeah, I know. We’re all busy. We all wear a lot of different hats in life. I teach, I write, and I parent. It doesn’t always happen in that particular order. Priorities shift daily. Time bleeds out of my as if I’ve severed some existential artery. Last night, I fell into bed at 9:00pm like a corpse. This morning I woke feeling not much livelier than an awkwardly reanimated corpse. Why in the name of Odin am I so tired?!

That was the question I had on my brain when I sat down to do my morning pages. [side note: I’m back at Julie Cameron’s self-guided course The Artist’s Way. Journaling daily in the mornings is part of the program]

…anyway, I just could not understand the level of fatigue plaguing me this morning after getting an amazing eight full hours of sound sleep last night. Is my thyroid slowing down? Am I developing a vitamin D deficiency (again)? Could low-grade depression triggered by the start of a new school year be the culprit? What? What am I missing?

So, I recapped this past week, I wrote everything out on paper. Once I saw it all, I was flabbergasted but had my answer. I am busy! Like, Hermione Granger with her time turner level busy.

Between lesson planning forward a few weeks (necessary to keep me from completely losing my mind) for three different high school science courses, scoring varsity volleyball games, prepping way too many solutions for a diffusion and osmosis lab, doing one-on-one check-in’s and phone calls with my new advisees and their parents, attending my bi-monthly meeting for the North Shore Writer’s Group, getting my eldest to Scouts, and meeting my Friday submission deadline for the Widgets & Wizards novel-writing class I’m taking as part of my graduate studies, I was in near constant motion. And, like a complete goober, I decided to start lightly restricting the ridiculous volumes of food I was shoving into my face so I might stand a chance of losing a bit of the weight I put on during my first year of grad school (you know, so I can fit back into my work clothes and not look obscene).

The start of a new school year always knocks me down for a few days. It’s the sudden shift in mental alertness that does it. This year, though, this year I feel like I’ve got a brutal case of jet lag mixed with seasonal allergies and a touch of the flu. And the load doesn’t look like it’s going to be lightening up any time soon. This coming week is even busier than last week was. Tonight it’s a PTO meeting. Tomorrow I’ll be back at the volleyball scoring table, and Thursday night I’ll be leaving the house at 7:00am and returning home from my teaching day at 9:00 pm thanks to it being “Parent’s Visiting Night.”

If I’m going to make my next submission deadline, I’m going to have to be on my organizational A-game. Part of that means MAKING TIME TO WRITE! Parenting might have to take a back seat to the teaching and writing this week. Thank Thor I’ve got a loving and supportive spouse who, because they’re a creative individual who went back to school to study their specific creative medium, understands and supports me and is willing to step in and pick up the slack when necessary. And this week it will be very, very necessary.

Last night, I added another 800+ words to my WIP. Today, I need to match that or do even better. I got a very encouraging note from my mentor this morning saying I’d nailed my MC’s voice in my last submission, so I’m feeling optimistic that I’m on the right track.

As for writing, [deep breath, cracks knuckles, swigs coffee], here we go.

What times in your year do things tend to pile up on you?

September 12, 2017
Life: It Happens to the Best of Us

It’s been my experience that a creative person’s goals–fragile, beautiful little things that they are–frequently crash headlong into the mercurial realities of life.

This morning, as I sit at my kitchen table to do my morning pages, I can’t help but catch sight of the wall calendar opposite me and notice that August 28th is a mere sixteen days away. Time appears to have sprung a leak this summer. Just a moment ago, it was June 16th, and I was attending the end-of-year faculty party.

Ah, summer vacation. The kids would be in camp all day. Hubby would be hard at work with his stuff down in his studio. I’d have two

A visual representation of my mental image of summer in all its leisurely, creativity-inspiring glory.

months crank out as much work for my graduate studies as possible. Heck, I might be able to knock off every third-semester assignment before the end of August when I had to return to my full-time job of teaching science to high-schoolers. The future looked bright.

Now, I have less than three weeks before I’m back in the classroom and my creative endeavors become relegated to a dimly lit, neglected corner of existence. What the heck?!

Scottish poet Robert Burns wrote in 1785, “The best laid schemes of Mice and Men go oft awry.” Isn’t that the truth?

Now, sitting here, faced with irrefutable evidence that yet another blissful summer of writing has snuck by me, shielded by the dust kicked up by the mocking chaos of reality, a couple of thoughts spring to mind.

First, I spend perhaps a bit too much time cursing J. K. Rowling for thinking up that damnable Time Turner from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Why, J. K.? Why did you have to tease me with that thing? I’ve never been good at math, but even if I were a genius with numbers I still wouldn’t be able to count all the times I’ve wished for things that don’t exist: the ability to fly, a non-evil and therefore helpful clone, a sable-coated prehensile tail… and now, I can add a time turner to that list. Garr!!

Additionally, I find myself thinking yet again of the first episode from the 1980’s reboot of the Twilight Zone. In “A Little Piece and Quiet” (directed by Wes Craven), a housewife with way too much stuff in her life and no time for herself digs up a necklace/amulet in her flower bed that gives her the power to stop time completely. It’s fantastic until nuclear war breaks out, and then it’s not fantastic anymore.

There she is, realizing that her fabulous discovery has just ruined her life.

Hey, it’s the Twilight Zone. Nothing ever ends well in the Twilight Zone. That’s what I loved about it and still do. The thing is, I first saw that episode as a rerun when I was fifteen or sixteen. That was… a very long time ago, yet it’s still with me. A magical necklace that can stop time! Not unlike that half-alien chick from the TV show of the same era, “Out of This World” (which, in stark contrast to the Twilight Zone, was terrible) who could stop time by touching her fingers together. The time-stopping amulet was way better because of its mysterious and potentially sinister origins.

Anyway, I think about Hermione’s time turner and that doomed housewife’s time-stopping amulet all the time. If only…

Well, I’ve finished nursing my cup of coffee. The tea kettle just whistled to let me know the water’s hot and ready for my post-coffee cup of Constant Comment. The kids are awake and ravenously ready for breakfast. And the home-repair project that ate up my entire day yesterday sits waiting to be finished. If I’m to be honest with myself, this day is probably already spent, and I shouldn’t get my hopes up regarding being able to sneak in any creative writing. That said, you never know what might happen. I could be picking roofing nails out of the lawn and stumble across the uncovered corner of an ancient rune-encrusted box containing a mysterious golden amulet. Hey, a girl can dream, can’t she.

What do you dream about in the harried moments when life devours your creative goals and spits out their shattered little bones at your feet?

August 12, 2017
Finding Time to Write (or, My Endless Struggle)

I swear my kids want me to flunk out of grad school. They also might be psychic, because when I sit down at my desk to check email or indulge my Facebook addiction, they happily find quiet and unobtrusive ways to keep themselves occupied (okay, I have time management and procrastination issues). The moment my fingertips touch my keyboard for the purposes of doing some actual creative writing, the little demons arrive at the office door and demand my undivided attention. True, my six-year-old is my primary antagonist in this battle. My ten-year-old less so, but he is not an innocent bystander by any means.

Do I want to build with Legos? Do I want to play a board game? I’m bored. There’s nothing to do. I’m hungry. Can I get them something to eat? No? Well, then, let’s up the ante. How about a game of chess, Mommy? It’s educational, my youngest will point out to me in angelic tones. Do you know how hard it is to say no to a kindergartener pleading with you to play chess, for goodness sake?! You instantly feel like a terrible person for saying no to that one, and my evil little demon knows it.

If by some miracle, I manage to stay strong and say no to all of these requests, there’s always Plan B. Commence with Operation Escalation. They will begin to fight, loudly, about anything and everything. You’re on my side of the couch! I’m using that blanket! I was playing with that! You knocked that down/destroyed that on purpose! You’re cheating at this made-up game that has no rules! You’re punching too hard! The point of the argument is irrelevant, only that the battle escalates until one of them is injured and crying. Oh, yes, they are devious, diabolical strategists.

My husband does intervene on my behalf… sometimes. At other times, though, he retreats to his art studio in the basement and pretends not to hear what’s happening. I don’t begrudge him this. That’s a lie. I totally begrudge him this. In fact, I want to murder him in those moments, even though I simultaneously understand his reasons for it. The problem is that by the time I get home at close to six o’clock from a long day of teaching science to high schoolers, he’s already been on kid duty for three and a half hours, and our kids are human tornadoes in the afternoons. They’ve been pent up inside an elementary school classroom all day. Even the mile and a half walk home does little to vent their pressure-cooker energy. He can boot their butts out into the back yard on days when the weather permits it, but even then, he has to stay alert for sounds of outraged or injury-induced screaming. So, I get why he succumbs to the temptation to go “off-duty” when dinner is done, and the kitchen is cleaned up. That doesn’t mean I don’t mentally curse him to eternal damnation from my spot at my writing desk when I’m looking at a blank page, and my kids are screaming in the other room.

I want to yell at people when they lament that they can never “find the time” to write. Yeah? Well, neither can I. Why? Because it doesn’t exist. There is literally no time to write, no magical empty block with nothing going on where I can sit down with a steaming mug of cozy chamomile tea and put on some relaxing classical music and snuggle in my fluffy PJ’s and write. Nope. If I’m going to write, I must MAKE time to do it. I must set boundaries, barricade the door, and defend my selected hour like the violently seized territory it is. If I let my guard down, that time will be taken right back from me. There are 101 articles and blog posts that offer use struggling saps tips for carving out time in our busy lives for our writing. Here’s a good one from Writer’s Digest. I’ll let them tell you what to do, because (if you haven’t figured it out yet) I am a hot mess and shouldn’t be giving anyone suggestions on how to do anything.

Sometimes I literally leave. I pack up and head to the local library or to a coffee shop. That works, but it breeds resentment and strains marital relations, so I leave those trips to do-or-die deadline situations. More often, I will abandon my office space for my bedroom, which has a lock on the door and is upstairs from the chaos. I will put on my headphones and drown out all attempts at Plan B that may erupt below. My husband feels better because he knows that, should a genuine emergency occur, I am still close by. My children seem to be slowly adjusting to the fact that mom is in grad school and that grad school trumps their need for my undivided attention.

Maybe this will be good for all of us. My kids might finally learn how to self-sooth. My husband is learning the fine art of reheating leftovers (though let’s give credit where credit is due: he does 90% of the cooking already because I’m not so great at cooking things that are edible). Who knows? I might actually get my MFA in creative writing. I’ll let you know how it goes, but right now I’ve got some writing to do.

(I’ve been told that bloggers are supposed to end their posts with questions designed to jump-start a discussion in the comments thread. I’m pretty sure no one has stumbled across this secret little blog, but I may as well engage in best practice blogging, right? After all, when I’m a successful and famous YA author, I’ll probably have to keep an actual author’s blog where I can interact with my thousands of awesome fans… sigh. We have to dream, folks. Anyway, here’s the leading question(s): are you in a similar position as me? What things in your life vie for you time and pull you away from your writing? Are you able to resist? If so, what are your strategies? Do share!

August 9, 2017
Scrivener: It Helps Me Produce

There are tons of writing platforms out there, and I’ve found that writers have some seriously strong feelings about them. I’m no exception. For me, it’s all about Scrivener.

For a long time, I wrote my stuff in Google Docs, and I couldn’t understand why anyone would pay extra money for some fancy-schmancy writing program. Google Docs was good enough (said my inner crotchety old geezer). But then, in 2015, I took part in my very first NaNoWriMo event. I won it, too. Aw, thanks so much, imaginary reader. That’s so sweet of you to say.

Anyway, as part of my “winnings” I received a 50% coupon for Scrivener, which is already a pretty inexpensive piece of software at full price. At $20.00, I figured I had little to lose, and I’d heard plenty of people rave about its functionality, so I gave it a try.

Let me be clear. I will never give up my fountain pens and my notebooks, both of which I collect like someone with a problem. Whatever. Some people collect Hummel Dolls. Some people collect Beanie Babies. I collect fountain pens and notebooks… and a few other things, but that’s a whole different post. When I am feeling stuck for ideas or just creatively drained, nothing greases the hinges and swings wide the doors to my imagination like writing with a gorgeous fountain pen loaded with some of my favorite ink in one of my favorite notebooks. So great of an advocate of this strategy for breaking up creative writing blocks am I that I regularly buy and distribute fountain pens (pre-inked with some of my favorite inks obtained via the Goulet Pen Company). If you’re ever in Boston and you’re a pen enthusiast, by the by, you must treat yourself to a trip to the oldest pen shop in the country–The Bromfield Pen Shop.

My obsessive love of fountain pens aside, however, I get most of my writing done on my mac, and since my 2015 NaNo win, it’s all been done using Scrivener.

I love the corkboard feature for organizing my chapters. I love its pre-generated templates for character development. I love its split screen, its compile feature, and its project analytics. Holy cow, do I use the words “look” and “gaze” and “glance” a lot in my first drafts. There are hundreds of other features embedded into this program that are also super wicked lots of awesome, but the feature that caused me to fall in forever love with Scrivener is its Project Target feature.

I can set a total word count for a project, a deadline, and tell Scrivener which days of the week to include in its daily word count calculations. When activated, it gives me those two lovely progress bars that you can see in the featured photo at the top of this post.

This feature won’t motivate everyone. My husband looks at it and groans, “That would drive me nuts.” Different strokes for different folks, buddy. I’ve always responded well to extrinsic motivators. Plus, my brain loves watching that bottom bar change color from fire engine red to grass green over the course of a writing session. It fills me with a sense of accomplishment.

Now, that might strike some folks as vacuous and stupid. It’s quality, not quantity they could argue. True, but if you’re not getting the quantity, what are the chances of getting any quality? If something helps me be more consistent and more productive in my writing, then by gum I’m going to use it, and Scrivener’s Project Target features does just that.

Do you have favorite technique or strategy for generating more words when you write? Is it a piece of writing software? A favorite spot you like to go to write? A favorite music playlist? Perhaps a favorite pen and notebook? I’d love to know what other writers find motivating.

July 29, 2017
Morning Pages, Procrastination, and Creativity

As part of my master’s program, I’m required to take an independent studies class each semester. It can’t be a course that is directly related to my primary area of study, which is writing for young people. Lesley University offers courses that run the gambit from travel writing to poetry to writing for stage and screen to memoir writing and more. They also offer a class that isn’t about writing, specifically. It’s about creativity, and the point is to help folks knock down mental barriers and find creative solutions.

It’s called The Artist’s Way, and I picked it as my very first I.S. class to take. Am I ever glad that I did! To help you wrap your brain around what it is, let me quote Carrie Battan from her 2016 article in the New Yorker about the book (the class I took followed the book to the letter).

“…the book is a program designed to help readers reject the devils of self-doubt on their shoulders and pursue creative activity not as a profession but as a form of therapy.”

That’s as good a summary as any. Thank you, Ms. Battan.

Part of the course, a big part, is engaging in daily journaling, what The Artist’s Way creator Julie Cameron refers to as the “Morning Pages.” The goal is to increase creativity by connecting with the dark places in our heads, facing them down and disarming them of their power. While taking the class, I sat down each morning and wrote three pages of mental stream-of-consciousness stuff into a notebook. I chose to write in cursive because more and more scientific studies show that longhand writing, and cursive writing, in particular, is super good for the brain.

Since taking the twelve-week course last July/August/September, I’ve continued to write my morning pages. My spouse joined me, too, since he’s a fine art photographer and generally creative individual. Together, we’ve worked morning journaling into our lives as a way to boost creativity and also control our general anxieties and stress levels.

Last night, I couldn’t fall asleep because I was worried about this blog project. How much time is this project was going to eat up? Time is my most limited resource. I am stretched more thinly that I can actually see. Only when others point out to me all the stuff I have on my plate do I realize the madness of it all. Parent to two young ones, both of whom were involved in town-league sports this spring, high school teacher, member of a writing group, member of an environmental group, student in a master’s program…

On top of all of that, I am a master of productive procrastination.

When I get overwhelmed, my brain resists dealing with the work that NEEDS to get done by finding and focusing on non-essential work. Sometimes “non-essential work” looks like cleaning my kitchen, or getting caught up on laundry, or vacuuming and dusting the entire house, or re-organizing the bookshelf, or (and this was the thing that was keeping me from my Z’s last night) figuring out WordPress and putting together a personal blog. It feels like a form of creativity, and I suppose that it is (in a way), but it’s not the primary form of creativity that I’m hoping to nurture.

Did I just generate yet another thing to add to my already ridiculously over-packed plate? Did I unintentionally create a thing that makes me feel like I’m doing something that will help me achieve my goals as a creative writer, but that actually pushes me further away from those goals by siphoning off a little of my most limited resource?

Ah-ha! Solution!

Rather than add this blog project to the long list of things I’m already doing, maybe I can make an even exchange. I can use this as my morning pages, and that way, I won’t be adding anything, just continuing something that I’ve been doing in a slightly different form. Not every day. I can’t give up my long-form writing altogether. It makes my brain feel too good. But a few times a week, in the morning slot that I’ve already carved into my daily routine for journaling, instead of grabbing my fountain pen and my notebook, I’ll grab my laptop and generate my three pages of stream-of-conscious gobbledygook here. It’s worth a try at least.

Do you find yourself crunched for time in your life? How do you make room for it all? Do you ever sabotage your goals by procrastinating? What does that look like for you, and how do you get yourself back on track?

July 28, 2017