Month: March 2016

Today’s intentions

Lynn

— To Remember —

* (Re)Committed to 1,180,000 12-month experiment
* Never try to catch up more than one day
* If I want days off, should finish week early
* Don’t need to track progress on goal (1)
* Just keep striving for my word counts daily

Today’s plan is to do eight 30 minute sessions of 405 words each.

Update: No writing on this day (yesterday now). Too much resistance. Every time I thought about getting started on that book, I had this uncontrollable urge to do something—anything—else. (Seems to be repeating itself this morning, but I’m going to have to find a way to resist the resistance.)

(1) Doing the best I can every day, only a few outcomes are likely from tracking: demotivating failure or temptation to ease up with success. Neither of those outcomes will make it more likely I’ll reach my goal.

Maybe I’ve been wrong about intentions

Lynn

Okay, I’m really just thinking out loud here, but I’m going to try an experiment.

I don’t know that limiting myself to talking only about results and not intentions is actually helping me. I don’t have to admit I screwed up by not following through, sure, but… where’s the motivation to get going? The accountability when I don’t? The excitement and joy when I do?

So—the experiment. I’m going to post my (writing) intentions each morning. Although I’d like to get on track to meet my 12-month 1,180,000 words challenge, the day to day work might change based on what I want to do on each particular day. I’ll keep the post short so I don’t use up a bunch of thought energy on it, and I’ll follow up with a results post later on that I can ramble in if I want.

I’ll start this tomorrow morning and see how it goes. :)

No more coffee—really!

Lynn

I’ve quit coffee again. I’m not having a hard time of it this time, no coffee cravings, I mean, and maybe that’s because I was off it for a while—and all these withdrawal symptoms have just made me stubborn.

I’m tired of coffee/caffeine having this power over me and making me feel this way just because I decide to skip it for a day or two. I’m done with it. I’m not going back. Not even for the occasional, recreational coffee when I’m out. I’m just done, done, done.

I had my last cup of coffee on Saturday and it’s Tuesday afternoon now. The headache didn’t get bad until yesterday. Now it’s just lingering, annoying me when I move my head. The worst symptom has been a surprise, because I don’t remember having it before, but for the last three days, I’ve felt like I’m starving. Absolute, stomach-growling starvation. I cannot get enough food. It’s crazy!

Luckily, I track my food intake because I’ve been working for a year to lose the weight I gained when I swapped the job for the writing, so I’m monitoring the problem. But as I said, it’s been a surprise withdrawal symptom this time, because I don’t remember having dealt with this one before. Usually it’s just the headache and neck ache, a feverish feeling, and maybe some irritability.

I had hoped to do a better job with the writing today, but it didn’t happen, so I can either be mad at myself about that—or be mad at the caffeine. I choose caffeine.

Caffeine is a drug and withdrawal sucks.

Now I’m going to cook up some dinner and think about how to get myself writing again before I have to give up entirely on my 12-month 1,180,000 words plan. >:(

 

Losing focus, not writing, and why not?

Lynn

My post titles are not the best. But this one says everything I want it to say. I got started this morning on today’s writing plan, and although I started late (no real reason, unfortunately), I did get in 25 minutes by 9 am. I wrote 183 words. That’s SO SLOW at 439 words an hour.

I took a break and should have gotten back to the computer at 9:15. I lingered, though, and ended up back here at 9:23.

I haven’t been writing. When I sat down at 9:23, I closed my eyes and tried to stave off the headache that had started twinging behind my right eye. Then, after I gave up on a quick nap, I took a look at a book on Amazon, thought about sending the sample to my Kindle but decided against it, and here I am, at 10:02.

The acetaminophen I took during the break has finally kicked in and the headache is very light at the moment. I want to get back to writing, but I’m not sure I will. I’m tired and I want to write about as bad as I want to move right now—not very damn much. ;)

Besides which, the book I’m working on is in a weird place and I don’t know what to do with it. Too much focus on people other than my main characters. This book has been like that from the beginning and I’m not sure why. All I’ll say is if it doesn’t recover, I might be done with this series. I just can’t keep up the interest, and I won’t make myself write (can’t really) if I’m not enjoying it. It was an experiment, so I’m not going to agonize too much over abandoning it if it’s not working for me.

Anyway, hour #3 of morning writing is supposed to start around 10:30, so I think I’ll try a 10 minute session, take a short break until 10:30 and then get that last hour in. Even if I just tinker with the text, that’s going to be better than sitting here doing nothing but longing for a distraction.

I’m trying to exercise my willpower today and avoid most of the normal distractions: certain forums and blogs where I can read comments all day and still not run out of new comments to read. Deciding to visit those places can definitely trigger an addictive cycle of F.O.M.O. (fear of missing out), and make me want to click refresh all day. So, avoid avoid avoid. That’s the plan.

If I’m feeling desperate for a distraction, I’m going to try to turn to reading some fiction instead.

I picked out a disaster book about a modern plague yesterday since nothing else has been appealing lately and surprise, surprise, I’m actually really interested in getting to sit down with this one and do some reading. I’m sure it helped that the opening started right off with someone feeling sick, which is great!, because one thing I hate is a plague story that makes me wait more than a page for someone to get ill. ;)

Anyway, time is flying and I’m now without enough time to write before 10:30 (it’s 10:27), so I’ll just do that break and then do an hour of writing before I go ahead and stop for lunch. I’m already hungry. :o

It was stupid of me to ever start that caffeine habit back up. Let’s hope the lesson sticks this time.

Goal for the next hour: Prove the caffeine wasn’t the only reason I was writing fast last week.

Update: I didn’t prove what I wanted to prove. I wrote 414 words in two separate sessions that totaled 55 minutes. That means I was writing at 452 wph, which isn’t even my average pace. Ugh. The story is bogged down again, and I just want to give up on it. I can’t do that!

Fake tea works for me

Lynn

I decided to try a fake-out this morning, and I’m surprised but it actually seems to be working. I boiled up some water in my teapot as usual (I love my little blue teapot!) and poured it into a tea cup on top of 1/2 tsp of lemon juice and 1 drop of lemon essential oil. It feels like I’m drinking herbal tea. I’m not, but it has definitely worked to fake out my need for something hot by my side as I work.

I wasn’t sure it would work, but there you have it: fake tea has done the trick.

I think I’ll buy a fresh lemon and try a slice of it in my water instead of the juice and essential oil. Maybe a slice of orange would trick me into thinking I’d had my orange jasmine green tea? I think I’ll try it next! :)

There is no magic pill

Lynn

I’ve spent the whole day planning.

I’ve planned my calorie intake (11850 per week if that’s of interest to you).

I’ve planned my menu (just eat as much of the same thing every day this week as possible to save time).

I’ve planned to quit drinking coffee again and do it with as little agony as possible, because caffeine withdrawal SUCKS and since I had 4 or 5 cups of coffee today (can’t remember exactly) plus three cups of green tea and I’ve been having that much every day for over a week now, I know I’m going to suffer tomorrow no matter how much green tea I drink trying to offset the problem.*

I’ve planned how to catch up on my writing goal of 1,180,000 words in 12 months.

I’m tired of planning, but the truth is, I don’t feel well enough to do much more than plan. Mentally, my thoughts are a jumbled mess. Physically, I have a bellyache and a headache. I blame the coffee.

*Why? Why, oh, why am I stuck on this coffee question again? I had a moment today where I realized I just don’t feel well. I’ve had a lot of headaches this week, many more than is usual for me, and my stomach has stayed upset. All the energy I had when I first started drinking coffee again is already gone. I did great with my focus and concentration for a bit less than a week and now it’s just gone. I feel terrible physically. Worse than I did, for sure. I’m also right back where I started when it comes to my writing. And if I’m not going to get the benefits, why the hell am I drinking the stuff? As desperately as I want to find one, there is no magic pill.

Thinking out loud helps me think better

Lynn

I started wondering at the purpose of this blog again this morning, just as I was about to write another “I’m not meeting my goals at the moment, but I’m going to do better” post and discovered it would be post number 721, and I actually came up with a couple of interesting (to me) answers today.

It comes down to this: I think better when I’m talking or writing. Or I shouldn’t say “think” better, more like, I think in a more organized way—writing things down, or talking them out, is a way for me to unravel the thoughts that knot up in my head. Because that happens a lot. I can get caught up in circular thinking and I lose track of what I’m thinking about even. Since I don’t always have people around to talk to—or I just don’t want to bother those people—I choose to write the thoughts down instead.

I like writing things down. I have lots of journals and notepads and Evernote, and when I get antsy, I start writing it out. I write down so much stuff that I often look back at it and wonder what’s the point, but I do it anyway, again and again. I cannot resist the urge to write stuff down. I don’t really want to resist that urge, tbh.

That still leaves unanswered the question of why I choose to blog those thoughts instead of just leave them in Evernote or in a tablet somewhere (where, tbh, tons and tons of those thoughts still end up despite me having the blog!). I don’t actually know the answer to that. I’ve tried to figure it out a dozen times or twenty, but I never seem to come up with an answer that satisfies me. I’ve tried several times to just limit myself to writing about my writing in Evernote or a journal, and yet, I always end up back here, ready to make all this stuff public.

Maybe it’s a form of accountability that I can’t get anywhere else and I just don’t know where to draw the line about what I share and what I don’t share in the effort to be accountable.

Could be. Could also be—simply—that I like imagining someone reading this stuff and commiserating with me and being hopeful that I’ll eventually reach one of my crazy-big goals. :D

Can’t do that with a private blog in Evernote. No one but me will ever read those things and I’m not enough of a narcissist to think they will. After I die, my journals and computers and files all will end up in the trash or a box in someone’s attic to molder and fade and become obsolete and unusable.

TBH, I don’t mind that. People get on with their lives even after someone dear to them dies and that’s just natural. But while I’m here, I’d prefer to write here, on the blog, and hope that maybe someone will get something—even just a moment’s entertainment—out of my words.

That feels real to me and I think I finally understand why I can’t just keep this all to myself in Evernote.

Sorry, but post number 722 is coming soon. :D

A few fallow days but not done for

Lynn

Here’s a bit of an accountability check-in: I’m falling behind on my 1,180,000 in 12 months goal. I didn’t do well with the writing on Tuesday, then Wednesday and Thursday I did no writing at all.

The school had some admin days and the kids had a four-day weekend. They returned to school Wednesday. I did okay, although not great, the first day, Saturday. I was still hanging on on Sunday. Monday I was finding it really hard to concentrate when I sat at the computer but I got lucky and got some words done really early that day, but the rest of Monday I gave up on and just worked on my tax return instead. By Tuesday I was completely off my routine—and getting back to it is the big challenge now.

Even the smallest of bumps in the road tend to throw me into a ditch. I’m attempting to climb out now, by writing this post and reminding myself that the embankment isn’t as high as it looks. It’s an illusion.

I’m now 19,402 words behind on my goal. The daily word count needed to catch up is still very close to my current goal: 3,233/3,286. It’s still a reasonable number! If I can reach 3,233 each day, I can reach 3,286—so I’m not giving up and I’m not going to reset my start date.

I’ll just keep trying to write four hours each and every day and plan for success.

Also, I’m going to work on limiting myself to reporting results instead of intentions.

Does that mean I shouldn’t post this? :o

Probably. Ah well. It’s already written so I’m posting anyway. :D

Too little writing but still better than average

Lynn

Yesterday I found myself, again, with fewer hours of writing than I had planned or hoped for. I wrote for 2 hours and spent most of the rest of the day working on getting ready to do my taxes. :D

Yes, I had quite a bit of clean up of my accounting to take care of so I could reconcile my accounts and compare my numbers to the 1099s I received. As far as all of that goes, I tend to put it off until I have about 3 months to catch up and then I catch it all up at once. I don’t want this to be my method, but it’s definitely turned out that way. I took the time to schedule time into my calendar for this every month, so we’ll see how that goes in the next few months. :D Maybe well—I can certainly hope!

Today, I still need to reconcile the bank statements for those last few months of the year and then I can move on to actually starting the tax return. Yay. (That’s sarcasm, just so you know.) :D

As far as yesterday’s writing goes, here are the session logs I recorded.

Minutes Words Session WPH
44 540 540 736
65 1,602 1,062 980
11 1,885 283 1,544
120 Total minutes
1,885 Total words
943 Total WPH

I can blame some of this slow down on the fact that my kids have been home for a long weekend. They’re still here today, but I’m hoping to overcome that and get my 4 hours in anyway. :)

Well, it’s 8:08 and I don’t want to start any later than it already is, so I’ll be back later!*

*I’ve noticed on short days I tend to keep hoping I’ll make up the time and hit my goal and update then, but on days I finish, I update right away. That’s what I’m going for today. :)