Well, let me just say that some things happened over the last couple of months.
My son’s remote learning went well until the third time he spilt milk on my Chromebook. My back-up computer was dying; some unseen hardware malfunction was causing the Windows auto-repair to loop and fail and all attempts to reinstall Windows would stop abruptly about 80% of the way through consistently. It was bleak, productivity was out the window. Nearly all of my writing stopped, save for the few bursts of inspiration that made it to the Notes app on my phone. Sure; I was knocking out two thousand words in a short sitting, but my motivation was so sporadic that my confidence took a hit. Huge chasms of time spanned between sessions of successful writing in any amount. My novel/stories/poetry/etc collected digital dust, put on an imaginary shelf to wait an untold amount of time until the day I might return.
Between juggling the kids, the technology failures and the slow-grinding pandemic fatigue setting in, my productivity and goals flat-lined. I felt adrift, useless. What little time I could find away from my responsibilities turned into a head first dive into escapism. Job searches were fruitless at best, comically bad at worst. Depression started to get comfortable in the space it used to inhabit in my 20s. How was I going to fix this? I was watching myself open Scrivener (on my gaming desktop) and then never add a single word except to copy and paste from my Notes. I have a novel half written that I wasn’t sure if I was going to trunk or not and half a dozen other stories in progress. How was I going to get started again? Where to even begin?
The good news came in the form of some self-indulgence. I broke down, replacing all the damaged equipment and got a new laptop. I still feel really underserving and uncomfortable with the purchase; I didn’t get the cheapest option and I was trying to future proof as much as one can with portable technology. As for the ‘where to start’, I thought the first thing that I needed to do was go back to my blog, start writing there again about the processes that I used to use to motivate me further. I needed the regular reminder that writing takes practice and effort; that (gasp) words don’t write themselves.
Okay, so: you’ve dropped the ball. You stopped your daily writing routine. You didn’t meet your word goals. Life happened. Stop chastising yourself. Enough self-flagellation. These last 15 months have been somewhere between inconvenient and Dante’s Inferno for most people; you are allowed to cut yourself some slack here. Discipline is important, yes. So is your mental health. Adding guilt for not completing goals just acts as another negative feedback loop to preventing yourself from getting the work done. Just write something. Download a daily journal app that sends you notifications to your phone as a reminder. Leave a small notepad in the bathroom and have a writing dump (hehe). Use the notepad/Notes app on your phone. Get pen and paper. Just make writing a habit, a priority again. You literally have to just do it.
Take the opportunity to celebrate what writing you were able to get done. Maybe you didn’t meet word count targets but you were able to keep up writing something daily. Maybe you didn’t write everyday but you were able to get in some writing sprints. Maybe you did no writing but you made some plans to tackle the projects collecting dust or tying up plot holes, dialogue reworks, or story revisions. All of this is progress and progress is not necessarily linear; it is not always constantly moving forward. True progression is ebb and flow. You’re going to have days where you get a ton done and other days where you are scrambling at the last minute to finish the bare minimum. Find joy in the work you are able to do. Congratulate yourself for the inspiration you can find when the mind feels arid.
My biggest goal for last year was to complete my first fiction novel; I wish I could say that was successful in that. I wasn’t. I was, however, able to spend more time with my children. I found renewed strength in my decision to continue trying to become a better writer with the long-term goal of becoming a traditionally published fiction author. I started playing Dungeons & Dragons again; I’m running a short campaign for friends to break up the monotony of quarantine and to flex an old muscle to see how strong it might still be. More good news: no atrophy was found; instead, I rediscovered my passion for story-telling. This is actually the main reason I broke down and bought the laptop. I felt the lights click back on, the path becoming clear again.
I’m going to get back up and try again. I’m going to finish this novel. But first, I need to finish this blog post. Thank you to those who have stuck around during my unfortunate hiatus; and for those few followers who joined during the break: WELCOME!
–V. Raylean
A Portly Bard's Stage 