Shit shit shit shit shit!
My streak is broken!
I've been using the website 750words.com to jump start my writing. It's based on the book "The Artist's Way." I've written earlier, and earlier and a few times earlier about using the site.
I've been on a writing streak for about a hundred forty days. Every day 750 words. Whatever comes into my head. No editing. Well, sometimes, some.
Writing on the site is based on faith in the method. If I write every day, get the cobwebs out, or whatever, then the good kind of writing that I want, the writing that the artist within me wants to do will come. If I write it, it will come.
Mostly what comes out is crap, charitably, crap. And that's OK. That's kind of what's supposed to happen. And sometimes what comes out is a good first draft for a post. So, success. But it's inconsistent. I'm producing something, and that's good. But I'm not producing what I want to produce, and that's not so good.
But faith! Do my words every day. Keep the streak going. Keep working. If I build it, the artist within me will come.
And yesterday it happened. I started the day working on a post that had originally been a shitty first draft in my 750 words writing space, and the stars aligned. Not completely by themselves. I had to help them a little, but they did line up. I wrote that post and another and another and suddenly I was flying. All the backed-up creativity released and my inner editor gave up, and the words came out and I posted another thing and another and another. Seven in total.
Yes, it wasn't just my daily practice that did it. I'd uncovered some "bugs" in the way that I was thinking about the kind of writing that I wanted to do, and that made a difference. That was one of my posts. But the daily discipline helped. I am sure of it.
I went to bed last night, satisfied and happy, with the idea for the next day's first post already in my mind.
And I woke up this morning, happy, looking forward to writing it.
And then, I realized that with all my productivity the prior day, I hadn't written my 750 words! I sometimes do that. I'd like my habit to be: do that first thing in the morning, but I'm sloppy in that, as I am in many things, and did not. I had the page open. I looked at it a few times, but I was having such a good time FINALLY getting things out. And then it slipped from my consciousness. Faded. It was gone.
Lying in bed at 5:45 I wondered whether to get up and start writing or snooze a bit more. I realized that I had not finished my words, but no worries. I could time travel.
Time traveling is when I change my setting so that instead of my time zone being Eastern, I set it to Central, or even Pacific, to get a few more hours in the day. In rare cases, I've had to time travel to Alaska, or even the International Date Line.
So I got up, peed, gathered my stuff, turned on my computer, and prepared to do my writing. No worries. I'd been to the International Date Line before, early in the morning. No rush.
I saw a couple of Hangouts messages including one with a short video of Siena and Daniel "talking."
I switched my time zones and prepared to write. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the time at the date line. 11:58.
Shit.
Shit shit shit shit shit!
I'd wanted to do 750 words of original writing, but now there wasn't time. But I'd written a lot, and I wouldn't be entirely cheating if I grabbed some of those words, put them on the site and saved them. Part of my brain was thinking that I could still do it. Part was thinking shit shit shit shit shit.
I fumbled my way to my blogging site, grabbed a nice long post, copied it. Took it back to 750 words and pasted it. And...too late...
It was a new day in American Samoa and the Date Line. That little excursion watching Siena had been enough to keep me from keeping my streak going--even by somewhat suspicious means.
So here I am, doing what I maybe ought to have done yesterday. Get up early. Do your words. Get the day started out right. Drink water. Meditate. Maybe exercise. And THEN do the rest of your day.
And here I am, having written today's first post, the story of how I broke my streak.
There's another way that I might be redeemed, though. I can write , who runs the site and ask her to restore my streak. I've done it before, and she's been kind enough to do it. So this post, which I drafted this AM in 750words is my long-winded explanation.
The way you see it is the way that I wrote it (except for adding the links later and fixing a few typos). It's not a bad first draft, and that's the way it's going to get posted.
Then I'll write Kellianne a note, reference this post and hope she restores my streak.
If (when) she does, I'll post an update.
No comments:
Post a Comment