Reflection and resolution

Hey friends! I just blogged for 31 days in a row! And holy crap is my brain a pile of mush.

Today is that last day of my mission to blog every day in the month of November. I'm half elated and have relived. I won't lie, it's been grueling from time to time, but also quite exhilarating!

It became abundantly clear that I have no shortage of ideas. I don't think I had a "winner" every day but I was shocked at how easy it was to find a new thing to focus on everyday. Of the five drafted posts I'd accumulated as a cushion before started this project I only had to use two. And that is even with getting pretty sick for a couple days.

Because I had a daily practice I felt more and more confident about telling people "I'm a writer". I loved having a concrete project to talk about.

I loved having the daily rigor of an hours-long writing obligation. But it did get in the way of making plans and all too often had the side effect of being a great excuse to not leave the house. Most significantly my plans to apply to grad school took a significant hit. I hope to get back to them this December. So I can be absolutely done, send them out, and then never think about them again.

Also I like the outdoors and miss it (see yesterday's post!).

So I'm gonna try an experiment wherein I continue doing some of the best parts of this challenge, but in a way that still leaves room for having a life and getting sick.

I've come to a soft resolution about my daily writing practice which will hopefully help me maintain some rigor but still give me a break now an then.

I newly resolve to write at least 1,500 words every weekday (2x my usual), 750 words (morning pages) on the Saturdays and Sundays, and I will blog at least three times during each 7 day period.

Hope this works!

Cold Hard

Today writing was hard. I really didn't want to show up for my writing today.
I just wanted curl in in bed for the entire afternoon. Even when I got down to writing it seemed it was mostly no good, and it was slow going, taking three hours to reach the minimum 1,667/day required by this NaBloWriMo challenge.

I've had a cold for the last few days. During breakfast while my partner and I were geeking out about tiny houses my cold came down hard with sinus pressure and a micro-migraines. A crown of pain and ringing developed and grew. The constant burble of cafe noise became tinny radio chatter turned about three ticks too loud. Even behind my sunglasses the california sunlight was piercing to the point of disorientation.

Even now, hours later, after he's taken the train back to the city, as I sat in this room with the lights switched off and the filtered lights coming in from the closed blinds and my computer's screen reduced to it's dimmest setting, I feel my heart warm to think of the house we drew together this morning. I am lucky to have him in my life. Despite the cold.

Even in this dark painful place I have enough to show up for writing today. I feel the resistance. It's hot and piercing like sunlight. But I can handle it I am here for the day. I even had a story idea strike me last night. A fortune as unexpected as daylight savings.

I think the organ in my body that produces new ideas somehow remembered that last night I would be allowed one more hour to sleep. And that meant one more hour of scheming creativity.

Committing to daily blogpost this month has required me to severely scale back my expectations. The part of me that is still afraid people will notice I am not really all that exceptional is screaming that this is a bad idea. But I disagree. I'm messy, complicated, and sometimes I break down. This is especially apparent if I don't give myself the time to clean/edit.

I am still reeling about the fact that I would've liked more time to hold onto and mull over the concepts I posted about yesterday. I'm working on being more okay with the mess of my work. And it's important work. I don't have to stop work on my ideas just because they've been published/become public.

So yes. Today was a hard one. But I believe in the power of showing up so I am here for my craft and for myself. If you are reading this thank you. I'm glad you showed up too.