Being Your Own Worst Enemy

[alanajoli]

I was having a conversation with my chiropractor yesterday and talking about my writing. In response to my saying something about how I was delaying on a project, she made the comment, "Well, don't be your own worst enemy."

This struck me as pretty sage advice. There are a lot of moments when I'm the only person standing in my way--and yet, I still stand there, just hanging out on the path to success and not going anywhere. (Or, at least, the path to accomplishing something with my day. Success is subjective, after all.) I've been trying really hard to follow amieroserotruck's excellent example, which I blogged about last week, in writing at least one sentence a day. To be honest, it's not a fun way to write. But rather than sit down and write more than a sentence or two, I read books I've been meaning to read, work on other projects, and generally do other things that get in the way of my progress. It's not that any of these are bad decisions--and everyone deserves a little time off now and again--but they are decisions that keep me in the struggling stage with the new WIP.

At any rate, today I'm going to start trying to stop being my own worst enemy, starting with getting on top of that project I talked to my chiropractor about. And who knows? Maybe tomorrow I'll write a whole page. ;)

Comments

[jeff-duntemann.livejournal.com]

According to my father, success is defined as being at no one's mercy but your own. So success may not be quite enough, heh.

The problem with writing every day (even as little as a single sentence) is that writing a single sentence may not be useful. Generally, writing requires a dedicated time block to generate useful output, and it may not be possible to carve out such a block every single day. Being a writer requires the rest of life to enrich the material we generate, and that includes reading books, seeing new things, working with our hands (that's a big one for me) and connecting with spouse and the greater human community.

So don't be too hard on yourself. Quality matters more than quantity. The discernment required is to tell the difference between one's obligations to other matters and excuses invented to keep from having to write. And that may be the toughest part of all.

[alanajoli.livejournal.com]

I like that definition of success. I'm certainly not there yet!

I'm not yet sure whether this new strategy has been useful, but as Shawn mentions a couple comments down, I tend to sit down to write a sentence and then write five or six. There's part of me that's really glad that I'm doing this, because if I weren't, I'd be "waiting" for a block of time between projects to show up--and I suspect I'd never get started. What I'm hoping is that this pattern turns into a drive to work on the project, so that instead of "waiting" for time, I start making it. Because that's really the only way it's likely to happen.

There are far too few occurences for me when I *have* to write something down. The last time that happened was the beginning of a short story I have yet to finished; before that, it was for "Nomi's Wish," which I wrote the first, 5,000 word draft of in a single evening. (It has expanded quite a bit since then, but the initial story changed very little.) When I don't have that compulsion, there are a lot of things I can do instead of writing--like working on projects with deadlines, or, to be fair, playing video games. And, because I'm at that struggling stage with obligations vs. excuses, I often choose to do the Other thing, whatever it is.

At any rate, it's an experiment, and I like the sense of progress (even at a slow pace) better than having nothing. I just don't like it as well as those days when I *have* to write, because I can do nothing else.

[orryn-emrys.livejournal.com]

*frowns* Am I my own worst enemy...?

It seems that the blog entry I just posted rather supports the idea, but in a somewhat less tangible fashion. I do have distractions, but they don't seem so all-encompassing... unless I count the prep I'm doing for my next D&D campaign, which I work on every day. Still...

... I must ponder...

[amieroserotruck.livejournal.com]

Well, amieroserotruck doesn't always follow her own excellent advice, so don't beat yourself up! I also have one writing teacher who firmly believes in giving yourself downtime, that your brain works on solving problems when you're not actively working on them. I too am my own worst enemy, and the enemy now has more ammo that the library is done and ready to be stuffed with books!

[alanajoli.livejournal.com]

*Laugh* I'm not beating myself up too much. I'm really just pondering. (I had a conversation with a therapist recently where she told me that beating yourself up over something almost never helps you change a behavior--and can actually prevent you from making those changes you desire! I'm trying to follow that advice in general in my life--because I do have that tendency to come down on myself.)

I think downtime is important, too, but balancing that with actually accomplishing something is important. ;)

[tezmilleroz.livejournal.com]

Aw, what a pretty new userpic :-)

Have a lovely day! :-)

[alanajoli.livejournal.com]

Thanks! It's my author photo that I had done for the novels. ;)

[smerwin29.livejournal.com]

The good part about writing at least one sentence a day is, for many people, that once they write that first sentence, they keep writing--thus turning one sentence a day into 100 sentences a day. And downtime is oh so important too!

Also, think of it this way. If you are your own worst enemy, it means there isn't someone else out there plotting your doom! :-D

[alanajoli.livejournal.com]

Wow, so that really is paranoia after all? They're *not* out to get me? :)

I've found that the one sentence turning into several is pretty typical for me, though I'm nowhere near hitting the 100 mark. This is new territory for me in more ways than one, so it's fun exploring and figuring out whether some techniques will actually work for me. But like I said to Jeff above, if I weren't committed to doing *something,* I'd likely still have nothing written down.