Right Now

We all have a ‘right now’.  There are people on cloud nine; they’re happy, at peace, they have good days.  And there are others who are cursing up at that cloud from rock bottom.  But most of us are somewhere in between.  And the cloud in question represents different things to different people.  For me, that cloud is success at any creative endeavor.  This may or may not be healthy.  I’m not at all sure.  But my ‘right now’ is being a fairly talented person who is incapable of finishing anything.  It’s too big, and too scary.  Finishing a project has been such a long time coming that I would now have to redefine myself to clinch a victory.

“Be miserable.  Or motivate yourself.  Whatever has to be done, it’s your choice.” –Wayne Dyer

I’m really tired of this.  So here I am in my ‘right now’- a creative pessimistic procrastinator.  I’m full of doubts and plagued by guilt monkeys.  I've spent far too long declaring what I’m going to do and then letting my fears get the better of me.  I've started so many brilliant projects.  I've finished precious few.  There are half-completed paintings, barely-started poems, a notebook full of dress designs, even a sketch for a board game that is a zombie invasion of a Walmart supercenter.  But the towering glory of this pile of projects is my novel.  Half done.  HALF DONE.  A novel.  How can a person have such a clear vision for a work and have put in countless hours plotting and stewing and countless more writing only to stall half way through?  I've committed a year to this thing.  I am at a crossroads.  Continue or abandon?  Learn to finish or settle for my status quo? 

Meh.

That’s how motivated I feel right now.  Meh.  So in lieu of stating what I intend to do, which seems to be part of my own system of procrastination, I’m just going to admit right now: I have no freaking clue whether or not I’ll be able to finish this book.  Even though I have a plot mapped out to the smallest detail, and even though I have blocks of time scheduled for working on it.  No idea.  It’s a toss up. 

“A ship in a harbor is safe, but that’s not what ships are built for.” –No one is sure who said it first

The one thing I will declare is that I am, at least, a ship.  Not a dinghy or a life raft.  A blasted ship.  I have too many ideas and promising starts to be anything but.  If I could just act like a ship- a real one- that has everything it needs to traverse oceans of uncertainty and storms of self-loathing.  I've told myself I’m a lifeboat for far too long (not even a lifeboat- more like a canoe with only one paddle that's shot full of holes).  It’s gotten me nowhere.  I think I'm ready to aim for a different 'right now'.  

Like this ship.  This ship means business.

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.' We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone and as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” –Marianne Williamson

So there it is.  No clue what’s going to happen.  Admitting to my own potential.  If there is any chance you have a similar position in relation to that darn cloud, read along.  Fail or succeed, something will be learned.  

Roll for initiative,
J. Wahl

p.s.

Dear trolls:

This is a stream of consciousness blog.  I do not have time to finish my book and agonize over every line of these posts.  I have two kids and I'm pregnant.  I just don't have time to stress over grammar and sentence structure.  Just want to get that out there so that when I inevitably make a mistake or glaringly obvious typo we can all shake off the irony of a writer without any apparent skill at grammar.  Kthnxbai.