And here…we…go!

I’m tired today. Despite a cup of tea and a looped sound-track of rain and thunder, I’m feeling weighed down in my chair. It’s too cold in my office, I’d rather be outside, I’m squinting at my computer, and my back hurts. Probably from my recent efforts to combat bad posture by sitting on a big blue ball.

I’m not sure I like you, big blue ball.

So as a result, today’s post may be disjointed. It may be spontaneous. It may be downright weird. But if you’re going to get to know me as a writer in any kind of way, you’re going to have to learn sooner or later that quite often I am all of those things.

From week to week, usually there is at least one thing that catches my eye and serves as my topic to write on. This week, there are several, but I’m so brain befuddled that I can’t seem to stretch a properly long post out of any of them. As a result, I’ll be discussing them all, scratching out a few paragraphs for each one. Thankfully, they seem to have the overarching theme of perseverance. We may escape with a complete and connected piece after all. Bear with me to the punch-line.

I’ll start with an article from a blog that I’m starting to be quite fond of. Cal Newport spends his writing time exploring good techniques for “how people reach elite levels in knowledge work careers.” For us fellow writers, discovering good working habits is a distinct key to our success. And unfortunately, it requires a lot of thought and practice, because not everyone succeeds the same way.

We also have to be very aware of the ways we fail – not to beat ourselves up, but so that we can rise above our own bad habits. For me, the one thing in life that keeps me from writing most often is not, as one might expect, a lack of time. I am very busy, but there are hours in the day where I could be working on my novel. They are scattered, here and there, and while breaking up your project with interruptions isn’t the ideal working situation, if my goal was just to get the words on the page, I could find the space to do so.

So why don’t I?

More often than not it’s because I don’t feel “the spark” – that passion you get when you first come up with a brand new idea that fades over time. You can’t feel intimately connected with your story throughout the entire writing process. The passion comes and goes, and this seems to be a normal experience for writers. But it’s a terrible excuse to not keep chugging away. It breeds laziness and discouragement. Two of my worst enemies. I fend off these fiends more often than I would like to admit.

However, one good thing about putting a project aside for a moment is that even if you’re not actively working on it, some part of your brain is. The characters, setting, and plot continue to bubble at the edges of your periphery. The subconscious continues to chew on the idea and make connections even when you’re not thinking about it. This is called Unconscious Thought Theory, and you’ve probably noticed it happening at some point in your life. We can probably give unconscious thought the credit for all those brilliant story connections that we make by accident.

If you find yourself getting bogged down in the details of a story, you might try putting it down for a week or two and seeing what your brain cooks up while you’re on the lam. As Cal puts it, you may come up with some “surprising understanding.” Those plot blocks or vague characters you were struggling with before may suddenly seem a lot more sensible.

There’s a fine line between giving yourself the breathing room for deep creativity, and just being lazy. Which is where another very insightful article comes into play.

Today I read this interview with graphic designer, illustrator, and writer Cecilia Ruiz. Cecilia has, through a lot of hard work and perseverance, achieved what I have sometimes dreamed of: a lifestyle of freelance independence. Even just this week, I have been wondering what it might be like to one day work as a self-employed editor of fiction.

Downright terrifying, I’ll warrant.

But also probably immensely rewarding. The idea of waking up every day to edit stories and work with other authors fills me with a deep longing that proves I would enjoy it (understatement). There are so many opportunities that this type of work would open up for me. But one cannot look at self-employment with rose colored glasses; I know enough freelancers and self-made individuals to recognize the stress and sacrifice that comes with the freedom.

Nevertheless, there are plenty of people, including Cecilia, who did not set out with the goal of being self-employed. They worked at what they love until suddenly there was no room for anything else.

Really, is there any other way to reach your dream job? There are very few careers where you can draw an absolute, linear progression. Writing is certainly not one of them. More often than not, career plotting is abstract, messy, and sprinkled with not a little bit of right time, right place. Then you get to throw in the added confusion of networking and self-promotion!

And boy, doesn’t that sound like the very definition of writing.

All in all, no one can tell you exactly how to become the next bestselling author, or the next top-notch editor. What we can say is that it takes guts, creativity, and a proper understanding of who you are and how you work. It takes perseverance. Even in the face of the dark times, we can never stop working for what we want.

Bearing up under such intense pressures, it can be very comforting to remember the words of Ray Bradbury:

“It doesn’t have to be the greatest. It does have to be you.”