I thought proclaiming on a blog post that I was ready to get back to work would be enough motivation on its own. I was wrong. The thing is, I was healthy again a few weeks ago, but two things happened – 1) lots of rain and I never do well in gloomy weather, and 2) I wasn’t over finishing my TV Pilot.
Finishing any piece of writing is a great thing. There’s a sense of overwhelming relief and elation, even if it’s something as short as a pilot or a short story. Page length is not a factor in difficulty of getting word to paper. The next couple days are an emotional high of satisfaction.
Unfortunately, after that the panic starts to sink in. What’s the next project going to be? Is it going to be as good as the one just finished? What if I can’t even think of a new idea? That’s one part of it. The other part is that the writing process might be painful sometimes, but it’s always fulfilling. There’s an emptiness when a project is complete and it’s no longer with you every day. It’s a downer.
I thought maybe this time, I could overwhelm myself with other writing. Dive right in to a new project. I had plenty to choose from. But I hadn’t attached myself onto any of them yet. They were all cool, but I wasn’t excited about any of them. So I dabbled a little on all of them, not really getting anything done the last few weeks. I finally accepted the fact that I had to allow some in-between time and also settle on only one new project. Forcing the issue was only making things take longer.
Trying to convince myself that the period when I was sick a few weeks ago counted as my writing time off fooled nobody. I’ve settled on the next project (my Doctor Who spec) and finally moved past my period of mourning the ending of my pilot. It’s full speed ahead, for real this time.
On a side note, I didn’t understand why I felt so sluggish and tired the last two to three weeks even though I was fully healthy. It wasn’t until I mentioned to Violet that it had been a solid two weeks since I tried to cut back my coffee that I made the connection. No idea why I hadn’t considered it before. I’m down to one cup of coffee and maybe one tea a day, which is way down from the 3 plus cups of coffee I was at earlier. My body is suffering, but I haven’t cracked yet, and I think I’m finally starting to adjust. I’ll be off my caffeine addiction in no time.
