Just babbling in deep depression on a Sunday morning.
With one of the books I contributed to ghost-write cited in the encyclopedias.
With tons of narrative written from my early youth up to some years ago.
With so many feature films written and discussed with producers.
With tons of magazine reviews written in more than 10 years.
With a couple of my friends at the high school now working as full-time fiction writers.
Why I’m here writing stoopid technical manuals and industrial films?
Why I’m only devoting a few hours a week to write drafts of books that I will never write?
Why I’m not deciding to change my life and devote myself to narrative?
(Hmmmm… might that 15-years loan be only a childish justification?)
(Ops, sorry, wrong forum. I was thinking this was the Psychology Help for Ever Complaining Artists forum…)
Well, Ptram, this is what Robert Browning wrote in ‘Andrea del Sarto’:
‘Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,
Or what’s a heaven for?’
An irritating thought, so you could try reading Steven Pressfield’s ‘The War of Art’ instead, which is all about overcoming Resistance, is only about 165 pages short, and was recommended somewhere on this very forum.
Things could be a lot worse and then again, probably a lot better.
if you Google: Steven Pressfield - Official Website youll find a link to full interview with SP at AudioMotivation.com see if this helps lift the gloom.
Cheer up and enjoy the rest of the day, both of you
CW and Vic, thank you for your suggestions. I’ve just ordered Steven Pressfield’s book and two others from Amazon UK. They will reach the other titles on the same subject, in the “Procrastinatory Reading” shelf…
A very interesting reading indeed. There is a real force, in those pages, that really helped me to see myself in perspective. At first I was a bit disconcerted by the war metaphor, but I could get it, once having transposed it to the mythical domain.
On another thread, Antony is trying to show how to mix a freelancer’s busy life, with the need of conquering a time for writing (or having any other kind of creative life). literatureandlatte.com/forum … 7395#17395
Who knows. Maybe this time I’ll get those novel finished…
I have been meaning to thank you for the recommendation for ‘The Art of War’, CW. I had a look at Pressfield’s website and read the ‘What I do’ section and there and then decided it was about time I had fixed working hours myself. So I turned professional on Sunday 5th August, and, each day since then I have sat down at my desk by around 11am and put in a solid four hours plus.
The results are as he says in the book: inspiration comes if you turn up. So I’ve made progress. About time too. My thesis is due by the end of next month.
If this sounds like a self-introduction at Procrastinator’s Anonymous, that’s because it is. In the approved style: I have been clean for two weeks and three days, which is about a week and a half longer than I have managed before.
If you find yourself blue and bored ytou are not maximizing your free time.
If you are not maximizing your free time you are not giving validation for Work time.
This continues the brutal cycle of depression and can lead to extreme pleasure seeking.
I would suggest writing something during your free time for the pure pleasure of writing it. Not thinking about selling it. not thinking about presentation or anything else. Just writing for the pure pleasure.
This will validate your work time by maximizing your free time.
That or dive into the Beer and cheese puffs and see if you can develop a character that only speaks in drunkenese.
Nudging back towards topic, what am I currently writing? Well, nothing. I can’t read, nor can I write. Motivation, enthusiasm and concentration are playing hide-and-seek with my mood and are all now well ahead on points. Shrivelled and arid, I feel like I’m plummeting headlong into my dotage. What a wondrous welcome to 2008.
I know what it is! youve given up the Holy Distillation. Get back on it, dont punish yourself.
If its not that, then youll have to throw a few tangibles into the forum`s arena, so that anyone with the remedy for your literary malaise, on the tip of their tongue, can help
In this thread one obvious question will be, "Have you tried Steven Pressfields [i]The Art of War`?[/i]
dotage! at your age! yer only 45 arn