My biggest problem when it comes to writing is a lack of patience. It's not surprising, considering my favourite "whine" is "What's taking you so long?"
I think this is why my discipline of a page a day worked so well.
In my next book I chose to put in no such rules or regulations - but with the vague intention of writing at least five days a week.
Fail!
I have written nothing in what started off as a perfectly good manuscript in weeks.
This also explains my many, many "begun but never finished" novels starting at age 11 or 12. I am a very good starter. But after about two pages (sometimes as many as 20) my enthusiasm flags.
Right now I don't really care. I have enough writing projects (paid projects) to fill my time adequately. I refuse to worry about it. However, I notice that I am still doing what I have done all my life. While I walk I begin to tell stories in my head. They are so real in every detail that I am reluctant to stop them. And often I suddenly find myself at my destination without any idea how I got there. I love my stories. I can smell the flowers that populate the sides of dusty sun baked roads. I can hear the mountain twang of the hermit I am talking too. I can feel the texture of the the rickety wooden gate I am leaning on.
I derive enormous pleasure from telling myself stories - whose plots usually involve a great deal of heroism on my part, by the way. So maybe it's just as well that they stay in my head and never see the light of day.
I'm reminded of the answer given by Alex Haley, author of "Roots", when ask if he would have done anything differently had he known the incredible fame his novel would bring him. "Yes," he said. "I would have typed faster."
ReplyDeleteWe can never predict what a creative work will bring into our lives. One thing for sure, it won't bring in anything if it isn't finished. You go girl.