Are You Fueled by Positivity or Pushed by Negativity?
A rolling stone gathers no manuscript pages. In
fact, I’m pretty sure I’ve lost a few. By the time of this posting, I’ll have
moved over 2,000 miles, and missed several days of writing due to fatigue that
can only come from sitting on your ass for eight hours.
I’m not happy about it.
But it was as I traveled, slowly growing less
enamored with the scenery and ready to be ‘home’ that I realized my true
problem; I haven’t had an actual home since I graduated from high school in
2008.
Everything was always temporary. Sure, my
apartment in Los Angeles was with me for three years, but it was a dark and lonely
place where meth addicts kicked in your door. When I got my cat, things became
better, but by that point I knew I would be leaving soon and still didn’t form
any attachments to the walls' embrace.
When I lived with my parents during the lovely
recession, I kept thinking I would move “in three months” until two years had
passed. It wasn’t until I left with my then-boyfriend to Australia and we set
up a house together, got a dog, and starting planning for a future that I
realized what I had been missing at that time.
I think a great deal of my remorse at that
break-up had to do with just that sense of having a real home. I was finally
starting a family, having my space which I could do what I wanted with, and
then bam, just like that, it was all gone.
Starting over, in some ways, had its appeal. In
Australia, I lamented never moving to New York City like I had always planned,
and being with my ex would mean giving up a lot of what I needed in a partner.
It was freeing, in a way. And, after having a well-paying job for the course of
the summer, I was left with a much more flush bank account
than the one I had drained getting to Australia, so on the surface, things were
looking good.
As I write this, I am sitting in Chicago, two days
from my destination. I have little pricks of fear here and there, truly having
no idea what I will be doing outside of temporary plans, no idea what my life
will be like, or how I will take advantage of the opportunities I’m seeking
from New York, but overall, I feel a great deal better than I have in years. My
concentration is better, and my ability to enjoy the little things—or anything—has
improved.
And with that, so does my writing.
I’ve found that while my humor is often cynical
and rantish in nature, my best posts being negative venting, I’m far more funny
when I have high energy. The words come far more natural to me. It’s also a
thousand times easier to write when I’m happy, feeling good, and not worrying
about this or that.
I know authors who are the opposite. One story in
particular sticks in my mind about a romance writer who, an older married gal
in a deadbedroom, wrote fantastically while frustrated and pent up, but
couldn’t muster it when her husband regained his interest in her. Many authors
write their best while drunk, while in pain, while suicidal. Heartbreak is the
great optimizer of passion.
Others write best while in love, their muses a
beautiful woman. They write best in tandem with a cheerful cowriter building
them up. They have a happy home and family. They tell stories to their kids.
Their careers have taken off and just get better and better. They’re happy drunks.
If you’re dealing with writer’s block, it may be
that your inspiration is fueled by something lacking in your life. Sometimes,
sure, you have to push through the exhaustion or stress and get something done,
but in other cases, you might sit back and figure out if you can’t add
something to your life; it might greatly make things easier.
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