Writers Life | Just Keep Writing

Just keep swimming. 

Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming.

What do we do? We swim, swim. 

Dory, from Finding Nemo

Lately, I’ve found it hard to write. I think about the novels I have in progress and struggle to actually get to my desk and work on them. There’s been a lot going on in our family–a new puppy, a grandchild to be born very soon, study that involves overseas travel, some health issues, and a lot of questioning about what the next stage of life will look like. That’s life and we writers have to write around whatever is going on, but sometimes I dream about living alone in a cabin in the woods and just writing all the time. My family would not appreciate that, so I just have to work around them.

When I feel like this, I ask myself:
Why am I doing this?
Do I feel called to create?
Is it worth the sacrifice?

Writing can be a selfish practice–in fact, it’s probably necessary to be selfish with time to write, otherwise it doesn’t happen. Perhaps selfish isn’t the right word. Perhaps it’s just anti-social? At the end of all my questioning, the answer I get is to just keep writing.

When I first got the call to write, it felt like a compulsion. It felt like freedom. It felt natural. It seemed God had given me stories to write and the ideas flowed and grew and bore fruit. According to 1 Timothy 4:14-16, the exercising of the gifts of God in our life brings benefit to all to those who hear us, and to us as well. Writing is a discipline as is physical exercise for the body. If we have been given a gift, there is an exhortation to use it.

After many years of writing, I feel as if I have to finish what I started. It’s a call that just won’t let go. I have three novels to complete (after I finish a 10 000 word thesis.) One is a manuscript I’ve reworked and reworked. The other two are very, very rough drafts. I still believe in these stories and feel they are to be written for a reason. So, how can I get push through and get past this feeling that writing is hard?

Julia Cameron encourages the use of morning pages. The practice of free writing every day builds a habit and can free the mind to create. She believes that if you’re feeling a little discouraged or blocked, just keep writing.

I’m currently reading Still Writing by Dani Shapiro and she tells the story of a friend who kept telling herself that she was ‘going to write a short, bad book’. That book became a best-seller. The fear or intimidation of wanting to write a good or great book, and not being able to achieve it, is in part relieved if we just write. If we begin to ‘write a short, bad book’.

The practice of writing every day and looking at my works in progress as ‘short, bad books’ has helped me to regain my creative flow. The flow may be like a dripping tap, rather than a Niagara Falls torrent, but it’s better than it’s been for a long time.

How is your writing going? Are you in a period of great productivity or are you struggling to write?