Almost bursting

This post has been a little while in coming. When I first wrote it, the starting sentence was “It’s been a little while since since I've written anything on here.” That’s how long it’s been, way back in the tail end of December.

I generally hate looking back. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of personal or ‘professional’ progression in 6 months, a year, two years. However - and this is a biggie for me - I want to look back in six months time and see that I've finished a second book, and I want to count the number of short stories and know that there was real movement from point A to point here-I-am.

*opens the curtain*

It’s been a little while since since I've written anything on here.

There have been some good reasons for not having done so, but none of them are the main reason… one acceptable reason is that I spent so long in editing mode, and then in ‘putter along’ mode that it feels like a bit of a revival to get back into actual writing mode. This is the part where the fingers hit the keyboard, and something gets put down. It may not be the best (it really isn’t right now), but it’s something. I need something. I need to have the passage of these days count for something when I look back and only see the failures. It may not be a supreme amount of words (it isn’t that either), but I did some words yesterday, and I’m in the middle of doing some today, and I’m going to do some tomorrow. I can’t go further than that because consistency is still a problem. What I’ve decided is that yesterday and today is not a pattern. Tomorrow is an acceptable thing that I can commit to, and after that, we shall see. I know pretty much kinda what I’m going to write, even if it isn’t bursting into my brain like a full-blown thing.

That’s cool though, it’s enough for me to get to another stage, which is the first tiny beginnings of a habit. Three days does not make a writing chain. Three days makes a barely-statistical bump in the Quest For A Good Habit. But it’s a start. Sometimes that’s exactly what it’s all about. Starting something and working on it. Sometimes it’s keeping going and doing your best, because when all’s said and done, that’s all you can do. There’ll be hard days and bad days, weird days and frustrating days, and days where you seriously wonder why you’re doing this writing stuff in the first place. It’s days like that when you just have to remember that at one time, this was fun. The part you’re on, or the thing you’re working on may not be fun at the moment. So what? The fun will come back. You will at some point finish and put it away, or polish it and review and work on it, and something will happen. You’ll find you like what you have. The more you work on creating your habit, the more you do this writing regularly thing, the better you’ll get at it. Like anything else.

And like most things, if you keep working on it, you will get better. Fraction by impossibly small fraction, you will get better. I don’t just say it, I believe it. I have to. Otherwise, why else would I want to keep doing this all the time, and for all the time I have?

Go write some stuff. It’s fun. Then do it again. And again.

First times

I wrote this a while ago, I think back in last April. I never realised that this had never been posted. So I thought - why not? This was both an odd and a familiar feeling when I started to read, and hopefully it will be good for me to look back when I finish up. Have I gotten any better at doing this whole regular writing thing in a year? Maybe. I'll read this again and decide later.

In case you were wondering, my money is on that I have possibly wasted a lot of time that I could have been a little more productive. As I said, I'll read and have a think on it. We shall see.