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I wish I knew who said that because it is true as fuck. I know VERY few writers who enjoy the process. Instead what you may find is many of us putting it off until the absolute last minute. There are cabinets to organize and gifts to buy for events months out. There is grout to clean and thank you notes to write. And the files, my God, the files. There is filing to do.

 

Just getting my ass in a chair to START writing is like wrangling cats. And once I write, I have to get up after every few sentences, walk around and hope I find something urgent that needs doing. And as I write this, I have a 1400-word article due for the largest fitness journal in the country. It’s on branding, which I can easily write about. And I’ve written several articles on marketing and PR for them in the past. But my procrastination is so bad that I’m actually choosing to write a blog than write the article. That’s one for the books.

 

I know how crazy this all sounds, but for those of you who think us writers have words flow from us like a fondue fountain, you need to check yourself before you wreck yourself. It’s an ugly process, because when we FINALLY get the work done, we haven’t showered, changed out of our pajamas, eaten real food, or spoken to other humans unless it was required in order to obtain our not real food that we shoved down our tear-stained face.

 

And when the piece is written, the elation you feel is indescribable. And then you chastise yourself for making it harder than it was and promise to never put your psyche—and your bowels—through that again. And when other’s work comes to your inbox on a regular basis full of typos, you gasp and can’t believe they let that shit into the e-verse before triple checking it. The nerve that they pretend to be a “writer” so easily when your armpit hair is an inch long and you’ve called your therapist for an emergency session.

 

And it’s during times like this you think, “How the fuck am I going to write that novel I’ve always wanted to write?” Or, “How the fuck am I going to continue to put out awesome-ass content that entertains?” Because there’s way more bad prose out there than good, and I know I have the goods. If only you were all in my head so I didn’t have to sit down and do the work.