Not Procrastination

December 6, 2021

 

Do you ever feel like you need to study all the materials available on something and only then sit down and do it? Like at times, I’d love a manual on life to read, and then after I finish it I could live my life. 

No, that’s silly. Any manual on life would be so complex with ifs, and buts, and ands, that it would take all the moments from birth to death to read it, leaving no time at all to live it. But sometimes I have felt, and have heard other writers ask, do you ever feel like you need to read all the craft books on writing for a while, and only then start the writing? I guess we ask this because it is often hard to make that mind transition from reading about new skills to writing new raw material. And writers have to create their own raw material, their zero-eth draft. Perhaps not all writers feel it, but some of us do.

 

I haven’t begun reading my draft yet. I felt frustrated all weekend because I was blocked about reading it. This morning I remembered something I had written a few months ago when I was stuck while trying to start my re-write. I had said that maybe I can’t do it because there are things I need to learn yet. 

 

That was an Archimedes in the bathtub moment for me. I had the glimmering of  this on Saturday morning post karate. Often, I take a bus to the library after training. I return books, browse through the stacks, and sit at the back and read poetry or bits of memoir. On Saturday I pulled two craft books, that someone had recommended, off the shelves and sunk into one of the soft black armchairs. I looked at the sections on revision. They both had tips which felt useful so, despite already having an overwhelm of books to read, I borrowed them.

 

One I placed on my bedside table and this morning I opened it to the chapter on revision. Of course, like all revision advise this one too talked about character. This one too had the familiar questions—

What does this character want and to what lengths will she go to get it?
What obstacles stand in the way and what is at stake if the protagonist fails?

How will the protagonist change in the pursuit of this desire?

 

And no matter how many times I revisit these questions for my three MC’s, I discover new things about them. Today I decided to ask myself these questions.

 

There are many things I want but if this was a novel and not life, I would only focus on one or two of them while developing the plot. Getting my book ready to send out to agents and supporting my karate students for their dan gradings, are the top two things I want. Interesting things emerged when I answered the second part of the question—what lengths would I go? I recognized that both require such differing inner energies that I might not be able to pursue both and complete them in the time I want. And though what I most badly want is the first, I would slow down on it to finish the second. 

 

I found that the main obstacle was wanting both equally and juggling constantly to fit them both in. In the process I dropped too many other things and was constantly anxious and unhappy. What is at stake is the sense of self-doubt, identity, and so many other questions about life path that are bound to emerge if I failed the tasks. In a novel I might experience several mini failures but would most likely accomplish the final task(s), but in real life that is uncertain. Yet fail or not I have to go on. And failing in the second is not an option.

 

The change that will happen in the pursuit of these is something I don’t want to think about. I would if I was writing about my characters, but when it is me, my life, I can only stay open to what changes come and try to flow with them rather than imagine them in advance. 

 

Knowing this helps. I have a plan, sort of, with priority one and priority two now. And reading those chapters on revision is not procrastination but having something to focus on while reading my manuscript. And writing this blog is not procrastination either but a step towards sorting the clutter. 

But an extra day every week or two, to sleep and to finish the tasks that never get ticked off my lists would be great right now.