This week I found myself feeling very impatient and hurrying my writing. Needless to say I am not doing my best and most creative work. It’s almost as if writing has become some action item to complete by a certain date, without regard to the quality of the story. Such is the dilemma of the overworked writer.
I have too much on my plate right now and when that happens, I become impatient. I write too quickly; I’m not in my creative mind. So I have a decision to make. Put the writing on hold while I develop my web business, or try to parallel process the two tasks. Putting my writing on hold would free up a lot of time and allow me to do a better (and faster) job launching the web business, but I just can’t seem to let go. I fear that if I put my writing on hold, it will be difficult to start up again. But more than that, I feel that I will lose my creative momentum. On top of that, I do feel as though I owe it to all the people who already took time out of their lives to contribute to the book. I made a promise I would try and finish this year. What to do?
How do you slow down your writing when you are in a hurry? Is it even possible to do? I am reminded of a saying that I first heard Alex Mandossian say: Ordinary things done on a consistent basis produce extraordinary results. What does that mean for me right now? I need to stop focusing on the extraordinary results I desire and just focus on consistently doing the ordinary things. Like writing a single (good) paragraph.
I guess you figured out by now I will be parallel processing—it’s all I know. But I will try and slow down by staying focused on the road right in front of me and not too far out in the distance, where the road to the extraordinary is paved with consistently ordinary asphalt.
