May 18, 2022
Week 84
Emotional State: Letting it Flow
Books & Dead Fuses
I’ve finished the reader magnet, all 17,547 words of it. Yes, just like that. It feels good to say that. It’s as if I’m getting faster with my writing, which is awesome. I’ve put it away to fester while I work on other things, namely, the paranormal cozy mystery or cozy fantasy mystery, depending on who you talk to and what they call it. (Can we agree, publishing industry, on what something is called please?!)
Except I’m having problems with writing the cozy. I squeezed out an additional four chapters and things seemed to be okay, except that the tone was a little off since I just finished the darker books of the Space Between series, and I struggled to write in first person after having spend so much time in third.
And then yesterday hit. I woke up at 6 am, came downstairs, meditated, and sat at the keyboard to write the next chapter and… nothing. It didn’t feel like writer’s block in that I have an idea of what comes next, but I couldn’t get the words out. Or maybe that was writer’s block, but I’ve never felt that version of it.
At the time, it felt as if I was dead inside – not dark and depressing death, but just numb, empty, nothing happening and not a care in the world. I even felt uninspired when reviewing other writers’ work. It was as if the emotional fuse inside my body turned off, but the rest of the electrical board was still on and humming.
It was an odd feeling. Instead of fighting it, I watched a series on Youtube, Wonderfalls, which is like my urban fantasy series, but not, but closer than anything else I’ve seen and I cross-stitched.
It was glorious.
It didn’t get rid of the dead zone inside, but I enjoyed it all the same. Anyway, I woke up this morning with a significant cold. I think my broken fuse was my body needing a rest, which I mostly honored yesterday in my video watching, cross-stitching marathon of fabulousness. and this is what I learned.
When we push ourselves, when we resist what our body and brain wants to do, I don’t just think that we end up with subpar products and outcomes, but that we actually do damage to ourselves as well. Had I made myself write and do all the things on my to do list, I would’ve made myself sicker. I think.
As is the way with these types of thoughts, it also led to another – my writing process.
Organic Writing
Recently, I’ve been reevaluating the platforms I’m on, the writing I share, and also how I do my writing. I’ve decided to keep all writing tips on Medium, so you’ll see those posts being removed from here. My weekly journal, book news, and book reviews will remain on here. I’m focusing less on posting to Instagram besides the few I’ve set up and even less than that to LinkedIn and Facebook. I may abandon my Facebook Group altogether except for the big highlights.
I’ve also observed a few things about my writing process. I had set up this massive publishing schedule in September to give me goals, a timeline and something to work toward. I would not have published my first book without my feet to the fire and I feel the same way toward my next book and the books beyond that. When I set up that schedule, it was following the advice everyone had about writing in more than one genre – set up your brand first in one before you branch out in another.
It’s great advice. I get why they say what they say. But here’s the problem. I am an inspirational writer of sorts. I can sit down and write almost every day on whatever project is before me if I’m feeling it. This means pushing through the days where I’m feeling lazy. It means slogging through edit after edit and still enjoying the story. It got me through the first drafts of Book Two, Three, and the new reader magnet in a short amount of time, so it’s good for me and it works.
However, it also means that if I have an idea for a story or a blog post, I need to write it down in that moment, because otherwise it’s gone and I can’t recapture that feeling. With blog posts, it’s not that big of a deal, but with books, it totally is. I wanted to write the cozy mystery in November. I wanted it so bad, I ended up writing part of it in December even though December was supposed to be a month off. I don’t regret writing Book Three of my fantasy series during that time instead. It’s good – really good – and I’m glad I did, but I wish I would’ve written the cozy mystery first.
I am going to write the cozy series. I know that, but when I had the free time this month to sit down and work on it, the reader magnet story got in the way. Or rather, I wanted to write it more, so I took the time to write the 17k words for that. And then when I tried to get back to the cozy, I had to force it to happen. It didn’t magically fly off my fingers like it had when I sat down in December and finally let my imagination free to where it wanted to go.
It’s just like what happens with blog posts. If I don’t capture the story while it’s thrumming through me, I’ll lose some of its flavor. Oh, I can give it a shot and force it to happen, but it’s not nearly as good as when I sit down and flow with the story and the thought rather than against it. And here’s the thing I keep forgetting: I can write it down and then leave it. It doesn’t need to be published that day. I can come back another day to edit and polish it. And it’s the same thing with books.
Lesson learned: have a schedule, but keep it loose in case some random story takes over and needs an outlet. This does not mean that I’ll have three or four unfinished manuscripts. I will still finish what I start, but I will finish it as I’m in it, rather than sticking to an editing schedule I created and stopping the work on a project I had the mojo for, which is what happened in January. I stopped writing the cozy and started editing Book Two because that’s what my schedule said I had to do.
I need to be more organic. I need to listen to my body and my brain when it tells me what it wants to do, not just in writing but in life as well. I also need to forgive myself for not listening. I’m undoing decades of habits and routines. It’s alright to get it wrong so long as I listen and improve. I’m also writing books for the first time and figuring out my process is part of that experience.
Everyone has great advice that works for them. I need to find what works best for me and live my truth. It is the way.
The only way… until I find something else that works better.