Writing is Hard | WIP Update | September 2021 | What am I doing…..?

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Oh hey, so yeah…. it’s been a bit hasn’t it?

My last writing update feels like it was so long ago, and it was. June seems like a dream from where I am standing now in September. In July and August I took some time away from my WIP, The Lowell Saga, because I had just finished the first draft. A major accomplishment that I had never done before. Never have I ever finished a book and now I can say that I have. Is it perfect? LOL HELL NO. But it’s done and that makes all the difference. Since I have the bones now I have spent September working on building up the flesh of the beast that is my book in revisionsssssss. Yay.

High school was not fun for me, like it wasn’t for many MANY others. College was better, but still not the best of times. I struggled a lot with my mental health through school and especially post college after entering the workforce. But through my education I continued to read and write fan fiction because it kept me sane and was a great space for my imagination. Looking back on my past now, as a 26 year old sitting at the kitchen table at 6:43PM on a Tuesday night, has me wondering something… discomfiting.

Am I losing my imagination?

When I was younger I needed it to survive. Right now though I’m realizing that back then wasn’t surviving. Despite how much I loathed school, I had time to be myself even as I was figuring myself out. Now as adult, more attuned to who I am as a person and finding myself and all, I barely have time to breathe. Adult-ing is hard. Very hard. There is only so much time in a day and trying to squeeze in my passion is hard when there are other things pressing down. Bills, health insurance, direction, pandemic, stress, work, sugar, high cholesterol, so yeah you know…. life.

I almost wonder if I lost some of my imagination along the way. When I was younger it seemed so easy to think up stories and get lost in other worlds. Nowadays I am finding it harder and harder to focus. My full time job keeps me busy, and working late hours. I don’t have as much time to day dream as I used to.

I miss that. I miss day dreaming. That was where I got my best ideas for my stories. I know all you writers out there with day jobs can relate. With this writing update, I suppose I am more or less giving a pep talk to myself and any of you readers out there who need to hear this too.

Our imaginations aren’t going anywhere. They are within us, always. Sometimes they fall just a little bit farther down the rabbit hole. All that means is we have to dig a little deeper. I feel it as I am typing this line at 6:50 PM sitting at my kitchen table. I thought writing this update would be hard. And it started out that way but now I’m finding it hard to stop typing. It has been a long time since my thoughts just bled over the keys so easily. Wow.

Keep going all you writers out there. And I will too. Even when it’s tough , especially when it’s tough, because fighting that fight is the only way to get your passion back. Wow.

And after you write you’ll feel better. Writers always do.

I definitely do, and so does my imagination. Sorry if this was a weird post overall but …. just the act of writing again is making me feel so much better. I promise my next writing update will be more cohesive! I just needed to ramble a bit here to get my steam back. Life has been a bit rough lately, as we all know, given the state of the world. I lost my path a bit but I’m finding it again. All my garbage here was another step back on track. Okay, okay my musings are over for today 😛

Revising is new territory for me. I have never had a complete first draft to revise in the first place. But this was my plan of attack. First, I let my novel sit for a bit and focused on other things (that was why I was so MIA over the summer) and then late August I reread my whole first draft to get the story back in my mind. Now I am revising: changing scenes and character nuances and changing the vibe of some paragraphs. All of which is me saying I have no idea what I am doing.

Mostly, I am going off my intuition.