Like pulling taffy from my brain...

One of my tweeps caught me at just the right time with a 500-word challenge, so here we go.

I've been trying to figure out why I haven't blogged for a month and a half. I was doing so well for so long! It felt great to write with something resembling self-discipline and make my craft a part of my daily life. And yet, suddenly, I just dropped it.

Ultimately, it's my own damn fault. I made the mistake of telling my dad and stepmom that I was writing every day and posting much of my work on my blog. For whatever reason - entirely not their fault, for they are as supportive as one could ever hope - whenever I tell my parents about my writing endeavors, I completely lose all motivation to complete said endeavors. Weird, huh? It's one of those things I've always thought might be worth a good hypnosis session to root out, if I ever had the money to blow on a hypnosis session. (Not at the top of my priority list.)

Anyway, I should probably learn either to stop telling them about my writing projects, or to get over this weird self-defeating behavior, sans hypnosis.

Really, there's so much to write. I've got this novel that's still a work-in-progress, I've got poems rattling around my subconscious, I've got random topics to rant and rave about.

I did start going to an improv writing group recently, which pretty much kicks ass. It was fun to flex my creative muscles again. The exercises we did in that group, and my willing response to my friend's word challenge just now, make me realize that I need to rely more on formal exercises during these periods of dormancy. Maybe instead of the more intimidating and nebulous 'work on novel revisions every day', I need to set myself less ambitious goals, like 'write 500 words every day'. Now there's a novel concept (pun only slightly intended).

Because, really, I always go through these dormant periods. I don't stress about them too much, since I always come out the other side and write regularly again, but I'm starting to get to the point in my life where I feel like I need to pursue writing seriously if I want to take myself seriously as a writer. And I definitely believe in myself as a writer. But instead of treating it like a hobby, if I ever want it to be my full-time career, I should probably start adopting a more professional approach. ...Not to suck all the fun and passion out of it. But there comes a point when 'letting it flow naturally' turns into 'letting oneself be lazy'.

Maybe I'm finally starting to learn how to make passion and self-discipline co-exist. Stranger things have happened. Hell, I even finished a novel during NaNoWriMo last year, in what seems a lot like the merging of passion and self-discipline, in retrospect. Granted, there was a lot more passion than self-discipline involved, but there's no reason I can't make it work with the proportions reversed.

It's times like this that I just need to make my good old instinctive Irish stubborness work for me. Reverse psychology can be such a pain in the ass sometimes, I swear - if someone would try to argue me out of writing, I'll bet you dollars to donuts I'd have another novel written in another month. O foolish mind!

Whew! Made it. That was tough, but I definitely needed it.