It’s time I was forthright about what’s going on.
I’m struggling, but determined.
The fact of things right now is that I’m very much a creature of routine and, sadly, I’ve been trying and failing to build one for some months now. One of the biggest problems is that I currently have too much freedom— too much free time— that I can’t seem to make writing take up a lot of that time.
Let me explain. For years, during the highest-productivity eras of my writing career, I have made words regularly, religiously, and well, but that was largely because I was… sort of stealing the time for them. Customer-facing jobs (like the 3 years I worked at as a bank teller) and administrative office positions had me away from comfort and freedom for determined hours of each day. I mean, that’s the nature of a full-time job. Thing is, while in those jobs, I took pleasure in stealing minutes when I could and jotting down sentences or paragraphs. I had one call center monitoring job for a few years that was very low-interaction. We really only “did” anything when there was an issue. It was during that job in particular that the ENTIRE Deadly Studies series was written and published. I pretty literally didn’t have anything else to do, so I wrote. I could pretty much devote at least 10 hours a week to writing. It made me look industrious, typing away.
You know, the whole corporate “keep your head down” form of working.
Since the combination of burnout and covid work-from-home, I lost both the drive to write and the sort of office-imprisonment excuse to write that much. Now, the burnout is gone, but I’m very much out of practice in sitting and focusing on writing. Or even the stop/start nature of stealing time I used to be so very good at.
Being aware of these issues is a start. I’ve been straining against the inactivity for a while now, especially in the month since I stopped working at the game store I was at, which gave me a bit of the same reliable routine. I was doing all right with these blog posts and everything.
That’s dried up, and I’ve been treading water, barely scraping by, particularly with these free posts. Yes, I have plenty of ideas, but weekly free posts, even as short as these are, is a drain that… should be one. This should be easy, especially since I try to keep them fairly short.
I’m not venting all this to engender pity, or to make it an excuse to cut back on frequency. I really don’t want to do that. But the fact of the matter is that even with my paid content, the vast majority is older material. Even the sequel to Criminal From Birth is material I wrote years ago finally getting attention. Yes, it’s been an editing project, but I’m not putting new words down as much as I’d like, and I am trying to put this out there as a way to make myself accountable. To brainstorm with myself on how I can get that desired productivity back.
Because when I do manage to sit and write words, I feel like I’m writing better than ever. I just… don’t have the metaphorical vice on me making it the primary option of passing time.
So I just really need to convince myself somehow that writing is the best way to use so much of the time I have available.
To be fair, it does fight with chainmail and string art crafting. I’ve already acknowledged to myself that distractions are an issue, but… I know I can fight those. I’ve been lazy on that front, and I’m putting a lot of effort into pulling away from those bad habits.
This is really only a matter of needing to put more effort into sitting down and making the words. Not when it’s convenient, because there are a lot of convenient time. Just… when I choose to do something time-wasty, I need to reinvestigate my own motives and choices and priorities.
I have so many stories to tell. I need to stop giving myself the bare minimum. I can do better.
For you, my dear readers, and for myself.
Your patience and understanding, your love, mean so much. I appreciate you more than you know. Shooting for success. Not perfection.
I’m struggling, but determined.
The fact of things right now is that I’m very much a creature of routine and, sadly, I’ve been trying and failing to build one for some months now. One of the biggest problems is that I currently have too much freedom— too much free time— that I can’t seem to make writing take up a lot of that time.
Let me explain. For years, during the highest-productivity eras of my writing career, I have made words regularly, religiously, and well, but that was largely because I was… sort of stealing the time for them. Customer-facing jobs (like the 3 years I worked at as a bank teller) and administrative office positions had me away from comfort and freedom for determined hours of each day. I mean, that’s the nature of a full-time job. Thing is, while in those jobs, I took pleasure in stealing minutes when I could and jotting down sentences or paragraphs. I had one call center monitoring job for a few years that was very low-interaction. We really only “did” anything when there was an issue. It was during that job in particular that the ENTIRE Deadly Studies series was written and published. I pretty literally didn’t have anything else to do, so I wrote. I could pretty much devote at least 10 hours a week to writing. It made me look industrious, typing away.
You know, the whole corporate “keep your head down” form of working.
Since the combination of burnout and covid work-from-home, I lost both the drive to write and the sort of office-imprisonment excuse to write that much. Now, the burnout is gone, but I’m very much out of practice in sitting and focusing on writing. Or even the stop/start nature of stealing time I used to be so very good at.
Being aware of these issues is a start. I’ve been straining against the inactivity for a while now, especially in the month since I stopped working at the game store I was at, which gave me a bit of the same reliable routine. I was doing all right with these blog posts and everything.
That’s dried up, and I’ve been treading water, barely scraping by, particularly with these free posts. Yes, I have plenty of ideas, but weekly free posts, even as short as these are, is a drain that… should be one. This should be easy, especially since I try to keep them fairly short.
I’m not venting all this to engender pity, or to make it an excuse to cut back on frequency. I really don’t want to do that. But the fact of the matter is that even with my paid content, the vast majority is older material. Even the sequel to Criminal From Birth is material I wrote years ago finally getting attention. Yes, it’s been an editing project, but I’m not putting new words down as much as I’d like, and I am trying to put this out there as a way to make myself accountable. To brainstorm with myself on how I can get that desired productivity back.
Because when I do manage to sit and write words, I feel like I’m writing better than ever. I just… don’t have the metaphorical vice on me making it the primary option of passing time.
So I just really need to convince myself somehow that writing is the best way to use so much of the time I have available.
To be fair, it does fight with chainmail and string art crafting. I’ve already acknowledged to myself that distractions are an issue, but… I know I can fight those. I’ve been lazy on that front, and I’m putting a lot of effort into pulling away from those bad habits.
This is really only a matter of needing to put more effort into sitting down and making the words. Not when it’s convenient, because there are a lot of convenient time. Just… when I choose to do something time-wasty, I need to reinvestigate my own motives and choices and priorities.
I have so many stories to tell. I need to stop giving myself the bare minimum. I can do better.
For you, my dear readers, and for myself.
Your patience and understanding, your love, mean so much. I appreciate you more than you know. Shooting for success. Not perfection.
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