But I digress.
Over and over I’ve heard that, in order to write, you have to write every day. Because of several failed attempts at daily writing, I committed to writing most days. Some weeks that worked and then, “most days” became, well, four days is a majority, right? Then it was, well, this week was only three, but that’s all I could do. Really. Then that slipped into thinking “maybe next week I can write.”
Several years ago I went through The Artists’ Way with a small group of friends. I did manage to do my morning pages every day and it was helpful. Then one day slipped, then two days. And soon, with a change of careers which meant going back to school, that was dropped. I thanked the Morning Pages for helping me find the new career and told them, “Tata for now, I’ll see you when I come out on the other side of this river of courses and cultural adjustments and have built my new career.” Which I assumed meant two years of college and maybe one to two years of getting established in the new profession.
That was thirteen years ago.
Having a writing partner helps, as well. Two weeks ago I met with my writing buddy and he, fresh from a three week vacation in
Three days later I started this blog. I awoke that day knowing it was time to stop saying, “I will” and change it to “I do.” For whatever reason, I have a blog ethic: if a person is going to do one, you have to keep it up. And for writing – that means to write.
This blog – in addition to my desire to share my experiences and inspirations with the hope they are useful to someone else – is my commitment to myself to write every day. Not everything I write is posted here. My other writing includes revisions, pieces of poems, freewrites from a spark of inspiration – and I’ve been visiting WordLush to gather the list from the Daily Word Spittoon and writing something from that. I have been posting those creations at The Writing Vein Playground.
When I let go of having to sit in one place and write at the same time every day for a specified amount of time or number of pages, guess what happened? I’ve been writing every day! Sometimes it’s 15 minutes, sometimes it’s two hours. Sometimes I’m working a new story or revising an old one. And sometimes it’s this blog and the word spittoon game.
Look folks, I’m writing!
12" x 48" silk painting