I always figured that if the world was ending, you could find me playing Candy Crush.
In my life, when I encounter strife, stress, sadness, or any combination of the three, I tend to take the quickest path to brain atrophy possible. TV or news won’t work, because there’s a chance of me hearing something that will resonate with my struggle. Forget about music. Same with reading. The answer is Candy Crush. Something colorful and distracting with just enough motivation to keep me playing it but without any emotional involvement.
I tried exercise for awhile… all I can say is “HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA!”
Anyway I always hoped I would be one of those people who finds their solace at the keyboard or notebook. I just tried in earnest to find a quote about writers finding their solace in writing and couldn’t really find anything great on it. That’s because writing is brain-intensive, soul-bearing, painful work.
Sure, there are great writing days where you sit down and words flow forth and you think about how your novel will be a gift to the world. Most days are probably in the middle: a sense of accomplishment of what you wrote and the fact that you have actually found the time to write, and some trepidation about the quality of your ideas. Then there are those days where you lose two hours to hot garbage, and when you read back nothing makes sense and you’re unfamiliar with just about everything that your hands had been doing for the last couple hours.
The past few days have been chaotic for me. Not the worst I’ve ever seen, but definitely busy. I’ve had to stick very hard to my block-timing journal, and most of the time that gets tossed out the window.
It’s really frustrating to block off time for writing and get nothing done due to other distractions. And then, after a challenging day, not feeling like writing will be a solace to you but just another thing to do.
I’m zapped. It’s been a long one. So today I am going to go home and write and hope that it helps. After a few rounds of Candy Crush, of course.
#CandyCrushistheEnemyofWriting
The Merry Manuscript 