The past few days I’ve been feeling like I have a giant hangover. My brain feels the way I do after I try to exercise after a few months of inactivity. You know, when you end up tasting your lung?
I started writing again. I started on a short story. One of my goals is to indie publish at least five short stories this year. As you will recall, I intend for this year to be the year of productivity. And I meant it.
In 2015 I would’ve told you I could easily write over 100 000 words a year, if not more. I was by no means fast, but I had those days where I would hit large word counts. So, being as cocky as I could be, I took my laptop and thought, “I can knock out a short story in one day.” How did it go? Well, it took me 2 hours to write 700 words, and I felt exhausted. I went to sleep that night, and I probably had 12 hours of sleep. No kidding.
Seriously people. I haven’t written anything new since mid 2016, I think. Of course I don’t count emails and blog posts. It was excruciating building up to those 700 words. Of course I deleted a lot of sentences as I wrote, because they just made no sense, literally. My words were written out of order. And no, I wasn’t drunk. It was just a mess. My mind was a mess. I just couldn’t think properly.
I respect the hell out of all of you who keep writing even if you don’t publish. All of you that write no matter what happens in your lives. All of you that show up to finish that book, or short story, or those awesome flash fiction pieces that take so much thought, and genius to plan and write. You guys are truly hardcore, and I hope to be like you when I grow up.
I wrote a bit last night, while we had a power outage. I wrote about 2000 words in two and a half hours. I really pushed myself. Because I know I should be able to write at least 5000 words in one week. I Used to be able to. I mean, if I really really push myself. Today I feel like I had attended a rock concert, while downing half a bottle of brandy. My head is not my friend. My body is lethargic. Don’t get me wrong, I love rock and metal. Just not when my head feels like someone is playing a drum solo inside my skull.
So believe it or not, one can make your brain lazy. I know I sure did. My brain’s feeling like someone that has never used it in their life.
I’m planning to write a bit everyday. Even if it’s just an email. I have to get my brain fit. I had no idea how bad I had allowed things to get. But no matter, I am soldiering on.
Have you ever felt like your brain is lazy and slow? Even a bit jumbled?
P.S. I downloaded one of those word games on my phone. They give you letters and you have to figure out what they spell, and even build new words from the given letters? I got caught out the other day, because I couldn’t figure out the last outstanding word spelled NET.
I know, I know. Pathetic.
Since I haven't written much in the past couple years, yes - I know that muddled feeling.
ReplyDeleteGlad I'm not alone 😉
DeleteHang in there, Murees!
ReplyDeleteKeep in mind that we can't really control if our work, our stories, get published. We can control the writing of them and the submitting of them, but after that it's out of our hands.
Thank you, Madeline. I plan to indie publish the short stories too.
DeleteThanks Mac 😉
ReplyDeleteHi Murees - good luck, keep wanting to write ... and just write what you want to ... perhaps sort of diary/journal entries on life as a whole - nothing serious ... but just writing. All the best -cheers Hilary
ReplyDeleteThanks, Hilary. That is good advice.
DeleteYou were right when you likened it to exercise. When you do it daily, you get better at it. I used to think that a writer needed to be blessed by a muse and only write good stuff to be a "real" writer. But I learned that it's okay to write crap. It's the fertilizer. I wrote about three chapters this summer that were nothing but crap and got deleted. But those crappy chapters got me thinking about the story and where it really needed to be.
ReplyDeleteKeep at it! 700 words in two hours is actually pretty decent, as far as I'm concerned.