I Think I've Got it...

It happened. I think.

It happened. It's scary to think about, but there's no earth shattering apocalypse or orgasm or even boatload of money coated in coke and wrapped in bacon covered in cheese...

It just happened.

Yes, I'm talking about writing again, but writing is my life right now. It might feed my family one day (*tries not to laugh hysterically*) but writing means---well, it means a lot to me so:

I realized something and it's pretty amazing:

I've been trying too hard.

I was aided most by this article and then maybe some of this one too. It's been a slow burn over the past few days--pssh--past few years but by George I think I've got it.

Here's what I tell people about my writing life: I'm currently working on three novels. "Whoa," they say, eyes wide. "That's intense." Hell, yeah, it's intense and I'd probably be done with two and working on the last if I were Stephen King. I'm not Stephen King though, BTW. I'm a struggling undergrad in a writing program who isn't even really "working" on three novels. Not wholly.

I've been wrapped up in three concepts for three stories that I was head over hills with turning into three novels. One I call my "steampunk sorta-maybe disel-punk-esque" story is about a twelve year old boy named Cole determined to cross the country to track down his missing brother when his father dies.

The second is my "sci-fi" story that has a bunch of characters and absolutely no plot. A few situations, some endings, but no plot.

The third is my "fantasy epic in part 3" about a young woman who falls down a well all Alice in Wonderland like and lands into a world that smacks her right into a tense political conflict between warring countries.

I think these ideas are pretty awesome and I've been hanging onto at least two for the better part of six years. They are all the babies I care to have right now and my dream is to have them turned into full length novels that I will one day feel in my hands and marvel at their sheer reality.

That's not going to happen now. Not ever, but not now.

Charles Finch sums it up in his article under boldly named "Patience" and "Focus". Alien concepts to me only a week or so ago. A WEEK. But like I said, I think I've got it now.

See, I have neither. Patience. Focus. I'm fresh out, sorry.

And it's weird cause, like, I think back to a simpler time. Back when I would stay up all night clacking away on a dingy keyboard that was connected to an old computer that was a 1998 Dell or something. Anyway, then I was totally focused, or at least a lot more focused than I am now. I would sit and write and write happily 'cause I was just so excited to sink my teeth into my story and see where it took me. I never realized that momentum was motivated by a need to just get it all on a blank Word doc and keep going.

Somewhere I lost that. Every word had to count, every sentence had to be perfectly edited. I had to write that epic the FIRST time around 'cause Lordy knew there was to be no second go.

My point is, I've been trying too hard to be this writer that is thrown into our faces 24/7. The JK's, the GRRM's, the Kings, the Collins, the Roths. These supposed "overnight" sensations that found literary success in what seems like no time at all.

But that's not how it happens. We know that JK was rejected a lot before the lucky publisher picked her up. As GRRM worked on The Song of Ice and Fire trilogy he met the challenge of a 1,800 page book that I'm sure wasn't written in a month. Roth details her writing struggles in her blog.

So Rome wasn't built in a day and I was trying to build three Romes. It was more out of a sense that the ideal writer was to be bustling away at a dozen different projects and simultaneously churning out finished projects than arrogance, but maybe it was arrogance too. I thought it could be done. I thought I was doing my work justice.

Six years later all I've got is a smattering of written info for each and not one chapter in sight.

I'm humbled now if you couldn't tell. I'm not Batman, and aside from being pleasantly surprised at the fact, I realize I can relax and be a normal human who works on one thing. I can write those hot sexy new ideas in a notebook and know I'll come back later. I can attempt a disciplined writing schedule that won't be easy (the attempts will probably fail more often that not) but I can try. I can take some pressure off; I can breathe, I can relax. At least a little.

Most importantly...I can enjoy writing again.

Maybe.