%%USERNAME%%    %%ACCWORDS%% %%ONOFF%% |
 Well, not so much fun and leisure as...get some damn writing done, you fool! |
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A while ago, I attended a writers' workshop and the lady who hosted it told us all to go away with this bit of advice - to write for just ten minutes a day. I was determined to go ahead with it and I did...for two days. So today I remembered that I'd resolved to do so and I whipped out my journal and wrote for fifteen minutes. I'm typing out pretty much the same thing that I wrote earlier, with some differences. I find I can go a lot more in-depth when I'm typing than when I'm writing by hand. Writing by hand is such a chore! I've struggled with loneliness a lot throughout my twenty-nine years. I struggled with it when I was the only one home with my mum when I was a teen and everybody else had other places to be. I struggled with it after marriage and when we moved into our own house for the first time. I struggled with it after my son was born and I felt torn between pursuing my writing and being a good mum, because my culture seems to indicate that a woman has absolutely no chance of living her own life - or at least, she has no chance of attaining any goals she hasn't already attained - once she has children. I feel it occasionally still, even though I get so little time to myself nowadays that any alone time is simply awesome. I've tried to come to terms with the idea that being alone isn't a bad thing - and a lot of the time, it isn't. My friends don't live nearby so I don't get to see them often, and even when I do, I feel like there isn't much depth to our conversations. I'm surrounded by people who do not think like me, who do not share any of my interests and hobbies. I feel like I've become desensitised to isolation. Loneliness is my preferred way to be. I walked into my college cafeteria at lunch today and it was the usual hubbub of activity. Youngsters walking around, chatting animatedly, shouting across the room, laughing, eating, socialising. I could recall how that clamour wouldn't have bothered me ten-twelve years ago, when I would have been one of the youngsters talking excitedly with her friends. But, as this moment, I just found an out-of-the-way little table and sat down. I watched the crowds for a while, wondering why it was only at moments like these that the sense of isolation became so strong. In the middle of a crowd, I feel most alone. |
| Second entry on the same day! I was going to do this in the previous one but my ten minutes had already been up and I felt I had written a sufficient amount so better to do this in another entry. In the counselling encounter group yesterday, I fell back and didn't say much. Plus, I was reeeaally tired and felt myself start to doze off. They're very calm, my class encounter groups - so far! - and we' scramble for something to say, which means there are many bouts of silence. People made comments about a number of things and when the discussion finally got going, I couldn't for the life of me keep my eyes open. I did say at the end that I started to drift off and the tutor was like "So what is it about this place that makes you want to sleep? Is it a safe place? What do you think? What's the reason?" And I was like O_O I'm just tired! I thought. But I guess there must be some underlying reason, otherwise I'd be falling asleep everywhere! So while we were checking out and finishing the session, I had a thought. I guess it is a kind of safe place - the people here are known to me. But more than that, the discussion had nothing to do with me - one of the ladies was talking about her experiences with one of her clients at her placement. When there is a discussion and I feel I'm not needed, I take a step back and let others do the work. I become an extra, someone who's not needed. It doesn't matter if I fade into the background. We were linking significant life events to counselling theories yesterday, so I got to thinking of my past quite a bit. I'm just wondering if this whole I'm-not-needed mentality comes from my childhood, when I was six years old and we moved to England. I didn't know anything about the place. I didn't even know the language! I feel I don't make friends very easily - possibly because of this move to surroundings that were entirely different? It happened twice - I'd become fairly settled in the new house and then we moved to the city we live in now, so...back to square one! Moving to another new place fairly soon after the last shift, I guess it might have reinforced the idea that it's better to just stay at the back and not draw attention to myself. Even now, I'm very hesitant about coming forward to offer my opinion if I think I might be wrong. I realise now that "moving" might have happened three times. I went to a girls' boarding school for about a year and a half or so when I was eleven. These are still developing years, right? The tutor said yesterday - I can't remember which theory we were talking about but she mentioned bereavement and how, if someone had lost a pet as a child but they were not allowed to grieve, then this might become the basis for the way they deal with grief, even when family members die, because they fallback on that experience to get through a similar situation in the future. So perhaps me staying at the back, not drawing attention to myself, is a fallback? Something familiar, something that's easily done. I don't like being the centre of attention for very long, what if I make a mistake? Better to not draw attention to myself. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| 07:02 Actually, forget the title. I don't think it is burnout. I think it's just transitioning from not writing the same novel to now...not writing, but reading and making corrections instead. Yesterday, I felt so useless because I didn't do my thousand (or, the way it had been for several days before I finished the mermaid story, a few thousand) words a day. I think what I normally do after finishing a story is I leave it, thinking I'll come back to it with a "fresh, outsider's perspective" after a while since I'll have forgotten some of the finer details, but I'm not so sure that's the healthy way to go about it. Distance breeds laziness...for me anyway. So this time, I've resolved to slog through what I've written while it's still fresh in my mind. The other idea was to work on something else while I do the reading, so I can get my word count in while I'm still in the habit of writing every day. But I know myself very well - I will become distracted by the new project sooner or later. I don't like proofreading. But it's about time I got down to it. Nobody's magically going to appear by my side once I've finished a story to tell me they're here to proofread for me. Besides, I'm going to put it up on Tapas. I'm a bit of a perfectionist so I don't think I could handle putting my story out there knowing it's got even one typo! Time to get to work! 07:12 ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
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