Nov 11, 2014 10:37
I swear, if I had someone following me around telling me I had to be done (with whatever) in five minutes, I'd be the most productive person on the planet. I am GREAT under pressure. I do all of my best work under the wire, always have. There's the time junior year that I forgot I had a three-page paper on Jane Eyre due in my first class. I wrote it all in my head in the shower, banged it out on the computer in fifteen minutes when I got out and got a B+. I remember bursting out laughing in class when I got that paper back. There's the time I wrote about 70% (no exaggeration) of a 90-page screenplay (the final project of my Screenwriting class senior year) the night before it was due, typing those final words at 3AM. I got a 97% and just enough praise from my professor to keep that screenplay on the WIP shelf of my desk immediately to my right, in line to be tweaked and eventually placed in a portfolio.
So, I'm going to give myself a deadline, and hit 10k words by lunchtime. I'm at 8502 for the month, which is pathetic. I've had three really good days and seven horrible, lazy, procrastinating days. But I have all day off work today and I'm going to make up for it, and see if I can't work this other thing into something postable by midnight. It's something really different for me.
But first, I want to share some of the motivation I keep taped up to my desk behind my computer:
"I didn't want to start writing something of my own because to do that I'd have to start writing something. I love writing but I hate starting. The page is awfully white and it says, "You may have fooled some of the people some of the time but those days are over, giftless. I'm not your agent and I'm not your mommy, I'm a white piece of paper, you wanna dance with me?" and I really, really don't. I don't want any trouble. I'll go peaceable-like." - Aaron Sorkin
"A writer writes - even though many of them hate it - and I've always believed that the only way to improve as a writer is, well, to write. And this blog has given me the opportunity to do just that. Sure, there've been times when I haven't felt like posting, days when I've wanted to give it up, and yet I've soldiered on because this little online forum has ultimately proven itself very fulfilling. Frustrating, annoying, maddening, lonely, heart-breaking, and frightening. But, ultimately, incredibly satisfying." - Joseph Mallozzi
"How do we move forward when we are tired and afraid? What do we do when the voice in our head is yelling that WE ARE NEVER GONNA MAKE IT? How do we drag ourselves through the muck when our brain is telling us youaredumbandyouwillneverfinishandnoonecaresanditistimeyoustop?
Well, the first thing we do is take our brain out and put it in a drawer. Stick it somewhere and let it tantrum until it wears itself out. You may still hear the brain and all the shitty things it is saying to you, but it will be muffled and just the fact that it is not in your head anymore will make things seem clearer. And then you just do it. You jut dig in and write. You use your body. You lean over the computer and stretch and pace. You write and then cook something and write some more. You put your hand on your heart and feel it beating and decide of what you write feels true. You do it because the doing of it is the thing. The doing is the thing. The talking and worrying and thinking is not the thing." - Amy Poehler
So, I'm gonna go do the thing now.
writing