I have often heard people say that a writer should be writing. They are referring to the discipline required to complete a project. This is great, especially if you’re working on a novel or your job actually involves writing. What if you’re only writing small pieces for a blog and/or possible magazine submission? I admit that like anything else, if you want the success, you have to put the work in. The problem is my motivation, or lack of it. I am really struggling to find something to write about.
Too much has been going wrong at home these days. When you enjoy writing humor and not a damn thing is funny, what do you do? I’ve been looking at my screen going, “I got nothing.” This is the reason for the lack of posts from yours truly. I live with two walking wealths of material so you’d think this wouldn’t be a problem but for some reason I seem to be stuck.
I also run into a minor problem of finding little gold nuggets but forgetting to write them down. Slowly, I am getting better at that by using a memo feature on my phone. When I can I try to put ideas for posts there, too.
I’ve also been looking at other people’s posts. I admit I am jealous of how prolific they are.
Most of these folks aren’t writing in my genre but I wouldn’t think that would matter, a block is a block, after all. It’s a good idea to forgive myself for this, too. I’d rather not put out anything than just a placeholder. I could just do a political rant. I have been trying to stay neutral and not put my opinions out there on that score. I’ve seen good friends fight too much over politics. I run the risk of ending up even more depressed with all the venom out there.
Looking around at my fellow humans should help. After all, if I spoke half of the things I thought about what I’ve observed people do I would probably have been jailed by now. It’s probably the reason people describe my husband as “patient” and “takes abuse well”. He’s always saying that ‘Barb’ is an apt nickname for me.
If the problem is stress, maybe I can work on some short term solutions to help since a vacation doesn’t look doable in the near future. Alcohol has too many calories and picking up my daughter hung over doesn’t play well with the elementary school crowd. I’m getting my fair share of exercise so recently I’ve decided to try the opposite, meditation. Funny how it actually takes work to relax. It’s an actual effort to find five quiet minutes to do this.
I did read a post from someone recently that was a bit of a disjointed mish mosh. I’m thinking this was a great idea. This person had several good snippets laying around that were too short to be good posts on their own and so she put them together. So far, I’m low on snippets but it can take the proverbial heat off by feeling like I have to produce a whole cogent piece right now.
I’m thinking this is a great idea and who knows, maybe it’ll be just the cattle prod I need to get out of this rut. I know I can’t “force inspiration”, but a little nudge would be nice. In the meantime, I will keep trying.
No comments:
Post a Comment