Okay,
so here’s the issue I’m currently having. I don’t want to write. Which is
absurd, because I love writing, and it’s always been a thing I’ve done to have
fun and escape. I’m good at it (normally) so I don’t understand what the
problem is. I’ve had many stories in my head for a long time now, with unique
characters who I’ve been very curious to develop, and I’ve always been excited
for NaNoWriMo (even the camping ones).
But right now I’m stuck. Horribly stuck.
Not even just with this document I’m currently on. I can’t make myself write. I
can’t make myself think about stories of my own. I was having an amazing day today,
where I chose positivity. I was cheerful going into work, I was thinking about the
future, I was fantasizing about my life (which I haven’t done in forever), and
I told myself how good today would be. A new hair and nails place opened up next
to my work, so I went in for a trim, came home, finished a good book, and am
currently participating in a group Virtual Write In with my close friends on
Facebook.
And my chest feels tight. Not like
someone’s sitting on it, but like there’s a blob of something thick, something
solid that got stuck near my heart. It doesn’t move. I can still breathe around
it, and that’s a plus, but I can’t break it up. The more I try to think about
what I want to write, the more I try to come up with thoughts that aren’t my
own but a character’s thoughts but are actually technically my own since the
character is fictional and can’t have their own thoughts without me pretending
to be them and coming up with the thoughts for them—deep inhale. The more I try to do that which I’ve always done and
loved and been good at, the bigger that thing grows, and suddenly I’m starting
to convince myself that I’m not a writer at all. I’m a phony. Real writers don’t
go through this, right? They plunge ahead, eagerly anticipating their next
chapter, and if writer’s block hits them, they go for a run or drink something
hot, maybe do a few writing warm ups and prompts, and then they find the
courage to go on. (I’m sure they wished it was that easy.)
I want to write. I do! I’ve always
wanted to write.
So why am I struggling? Why do all
my ideas feel shallow, dumb, impossible? Why am I bored with my characters before
I even start to work with them?
Why do I want to log off the
computer and just find a book that’s already been written to read so I don’t
have to think about my dreams dying from an illness I haven’t diagnosed? I call
it an illness because sometimes I really do feel sick.
There has got to be something wrong
with me. I want to write. I just don’t want to write.
That doesn’t make sense!
I’ve tried to approach the subject
with my friends, and they give me good advice. Truly, they do, but it doesn’t
work like that. When something in my mind has already decided I’m going to
fail, telling it that it’s lying doesn’t shut it up. So my body responds by
crashing.
Come on, girl! You got this! You’re
a writer. You’ve self-published a novel that, while not read by a lot of
people, was still well-received by the ones who did read it! You’ve got worlds
living in you, lives that will never actually be alive until you put them on paper!
There had to have been a time I’ve
felt this horrible with writing. I hope there has been, because if so, I’ve
obviously worked through it before. I’ve gotten better before.
This just feels different. I’m
scared.
One good sign is I’m still writing,
just not novels. Look at this bad boy I’ve managed to conjure up! The words are
there. I can type up a blog post, or mini scenes of fanfic with a friend, but
when it comes to sitting down before the blank document that is meant to be my
novel (or in the case of the document I’m currently typing in, it’s 15 pages worth
of a story that might not see the light of day for a long time), I freeze. My
mind goes blank. Here comes the static.
Oh, if only there was static. Static’s
too loud. It would give me something to think about other than the chasm that
rips open in my brain when I’m about to be a novelist.
See, I smile inside when I say to
myself, “You’re a novelist.” That sounds fancy. Important. And I want that
title. I want someone to say, “What do you do for a living?” and I answer, “Oh,
I’m a novelist. I have this many novels.”
Realistically, I’ll probably have a
day job, too. Writers don’t always make enough to support themselves on their
craft alone, and I doubt many self-published ones do.
Then I realize I shouldn’t have
self-published because it’s too stressful, and how are you supposed to get
people to read your novel when they cringe at the words “self-published”
because surely that means your work
wasn’t good enough for an actual publisher to look at! (That’s not true, FYI. I’m
sure there are many brilliant books that were self-published. Wouldn’t dare to
call mine brilliant, but I didn’t even bother trying to find an editor. Maybe I
got caught up in the excitement of having a book out so quickly.)
After that, I chastise myself. Why
regret my decision? Take pride in it! You worked your butt off to get that book
completed. You painted your own cover! The people who have read it did so
because you told them about it yourself. You put yourself out there!
I try to be encouraging. And I’ll feel
a little better about my decision, and I’ll decide that I’m glad I self-published
so I could truly own my book.
Which is likely, if I keep this garbage
up, to be the only book I ever publish.
Cue the cycle to start over.
No one reads the book I have out.
Why did I self-publish again?
Because I suck at writing.
Yes I do.
Whew, I exhaust myself. I worry that
I bother my friends, typing out the same woes over and over, and they’re good
about talking to me, but in the end they have nothing to fix my problem. The
solution lies within myself and my determination.
Determined
isn’t exactly a word I’d use to describe myself. Negative. That would be more like it. Likes things easy. It’s hard to fail at something that’s easy.
A coward.
Ah, so we’ve found an underlying
problem, the one that probably causes most my issues, from anxiety and
depression to my inability to take charge of my life to my writing failures. I’m
afraid.
I’m always afraid. I’m afraid I can’t.
I tell myself that over and over again. I can’t. I can’t. I can’t. And my body
believes me. My soul believes me.
I can’t write. I can’t dream. I can’t
go back to school. I can’t find a job I’d actually like going to. I can’t fall
in love. I can’t drive outside my rectangle (I hate driving, it gives me
anxiety). I can’t schedule my own doctor’s appointment to finally ask about
whether or not I’d be benefited from medication for mental illness. I can’t be
positive. I can’t be happy. I can’t.
When did this change? I’ve been
mentally ill for at least eight years, some bouts serious and others just as
subtle as a bug bite I’m trying to ignore (don’t touch it; it will only itch
worse). But when did it start affecting my life this much?
I can’t want things. I don’t want
things.
Since when? Who doesn’t want
anything?
I want to be happy. I want to be
positive. I want to be able to do things like schedule doctor’s appointments
and going on dates and meeting people and driving around wherever I want to go.
I want to find a career I’d be happy with, and to have an education. I want to
fall in love and share my life with someone. I want to want. In the end, that
is the thing I want most. I want to want, to feel that desire that is so strong
I can say, “Screw you, fear! You don’t control me.”
But it does control me. It controls
me with the word “can’t.”
So I say I can’t write, and it’s
probably a fear of something. I can’t tell if I’m afraid to suck at writing, or
if I’m afraid of something else in life and it’s sending me into a depressive
state, making it hard to write and find pleasure in the things that have made
me happy.
Everything in my life is connected. One
thing affects the other. It makes it hard to pinpoint individual problems.
Who knew I’d start talking about
severe writer’s block and end up pouring all these words out on my mental
state? I didn’t.
But hey, it helped me win a word war
(friends and I wrote for fifteen minutes quickly, trying to get as many words
as possible). And the blob in my chest isn’t there anymore.
