"I don't seem to have felt at all how for a long time."

[truepenny]

So, one of the pieces of writing advice I tend to endorse is the idea that you need to write every day, or as close to it as you can manage. And I still think it's true, or at least helpful, to think of writing as something you have to practice frequently and regularly, like music or baseball or dressage.

But I swear to god I had no idea how hard it is.

I knew about how hard it could be to find the time, especially if you have the pieces of a real life to try to assemble around it. And I knew how hard it could be when you felt like there were no words in your head, even when you had time to write them down.

I stopped blogging last year because of tendinitis in my right thumb (and, yes, that word really is spelled correctly, wrong though it looks) and carpal tunnel issues and the fact that my day job was all data entry. Thumb and wrists have improved, especially if I am NOT STUPID; temporary day job, being temporary, ended in November, and I am still waiting for another assignment; it seems like this would be the perfect time to write things: An Apprentice to Elves, for example, or Thirdhop Scarp, or any of a score of other projects.

But then there's the Restless Leg Syndrome, which revved up about the time my day job ended and has been relentless ever since. I learned in 2010 that creativity and RLS exist in inverse proportion to each other; in 2012 I learned that not only does RLS scour the creativity out of my head, but on the occasions when I do manage to write something, or to think seriously about writing something, it also deploys the worst of all the inner voices any writer (or artist or musician or anyone who loves what they do) can be afflicted with, the one that says, That's stupid. No one wants to read that. God, that's just puerile. This isn't working. The more words you put into it, the worse it's getting. Stop before you destroy whatever good you'd managed at all.

I know that voice is a liar. But I'm also tired and stressed and unhappy (see above re: neither job nor writing), and you know, that write every day advice seems smug and self-satisfied, and dear god don't you think I would if I could?

My RLS specialist and I are working on adjusting my medications. I am trying to get the things done that I can and not to beat myself up about the fact that right now there are things that I can't.

But it may be a while before I'm blogging regularly again. Thank you for your patience.

Comments

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I actually find writing every day to be actively bad for me and for the amount of writing I get done. Frequently, yes. Six days a week when possible, yes. But not seven. I have heard a friend talking about how she would feel so guilty if she didn't write on the day of her mother's funeral.

I really do want you to be able to get writing done, and I am in total sympathy with frustration over the days when something external is making it hard. I just find the "every day" advice to be one of the more toxic pieces of "one size fits all," and I hope you can get to a size that better fits you and still results in stuff getting done as you want it to.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

It's not the not writing every day that bugs me, it's the not writing any day.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was trying to get at that with the second paragraph. Sorry. Sigh.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

'Sokay. Communicating in words is stupidly hard.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Yeah, That's some frustrating shit.

I'm getting better about taking days off.

[alecaustin.livejournal.com]

Very much with Mris on this one. Writing every day is one of those guidelines built on the fact that you have to keep on writing if you want to finish anything ever, but gets interpreted literally to a distressing degree.

I fervently hope that you can find a way to balance your writing with the travails of RLS and meds, both for your sake and because I would very much like to keep reading your work.

[marycatelli]

Some of us do have to write every day because it's like falling off the water wagon -- distressingly hard to get back on. Not, however, everyone.

[alecaustin.livejournal.com]

Right, well, the guideline I try to pass on is figuring out what you need to do in order to finish things and/or keep writing. If that's writing every day, fine. If not, also fine.

[mariadkins.livejournal.com]

mari concurs.