And there she goes again...

Hello my dearies!

Welcome (back) to my Blurb. I hope you've all been well in the past few months of my sporadic blogging. I'm sorry I haven't been around much! I was busy, but that's not really an excuse.

But I'm SO GOOD with excuses! To myself, mostly. That's also known as

P-R-O-C-R-A-S-T-I-N-A-T-I-O-N

as a writer, you may have come across that word before. Maybe you've experienced it personally, physically, made its acquaintance, argued about which side of the bed you want it to sleep on. 

On that note, I tidied my desk today - dusted everything, even the pens (...I know...), then I sorted through the stacks of paper holding up the air above the desk, put them into boxes or the bin, depending, and then...then I went for a run...then I tried to decide what I'm going to wear to this wedding I'm going to this weekend...oh, and I had to do some work, too. 

Yep, Procrastination, thy name is Tessa. Or the other way round, as the case may be. 

BUT

but

I've already told you about the Writing Diary thingy I started. I'm determined to make good use of it!!! My goal for tomorrow: make an actual schedule for writing that involves some measure of written word per day. What I really need to do, you see, is get into the habit...because I'm scarily far away from that right now. 

I promise I'll let you know tomorrow how I'm doing with the goal-setting.....

The Blank Page Phenomenon

*shudder* 

Oh no! Writers, beware, it's a BLANK PAGE!!! 

*runs away screaming like Kevin Home Alone*

*sigh* 

OK calm again. 

I'm one of those people who have a seriously schizophrenic love-hate relationship with blank pages (or new notebooks, or pages/word files). There's nothing quite like that smooth crispness of the new, virgin field to sow your inky seeds upon, to spread and populate and live lives of their own. 

And yet.... only too easy for those little bits of ink to get away from you. Blots appear, words get smeared and then - OMFG - the ink runs out. Everything goes blank. 

Where's that Muse when you need him? 

Oh, that's right. He's on holiday. 

So I'm here stuck with a blank page, a head full of ideas and a mish-mash of characters screaming at me or just sulking in the corners of my mind, with no clue where to start.  Sometimes I wish I could paint, or even draw a reasonably life-like stick figure, so I could get on paper exactly what my ideas look like. My father can do that. My sister, too. (paint, that is, not draw life-like stick figures though I'm sure they can do that, too)

Instead, I get to paint with words. 

Only sometimes the paint dries out, or the paper isn't quite what I'm looking for that day. Maybe I'd do better with yellow paper, or white, or lined, squared, plain, whatever colour/texture/type I happen to NOT have at hand. 

You know what that's called? Let me spell it for you. 

P-R-O-C-R-A-S-T-I-N-A-T-I-O-N

otherwise known as

WASTING TIME in EPIC PROPORTIONS.

I'm really good at that.

If I were a psychologist, I'd probably tell myself I have a deeply rooted fear of failure. So in order not to fail at something (or rather not do as well as I'd like), I don't do it. I sabotage myself by giving in to the BPP (Blank Page Phenomenon, do keep up).

NO MORE! 

This year, my resolution is to STOP WASTING TIME and FINISH WHAT I START. 

There, I've said it. You're all my witnesses. 

What about you? Do you suffer from BPP? What stops you from being the writer you know you are? Any coping mechanisms you've developed? 

Go on, do share! 

Progressive writing and other genius ideas from yours, truly

So, I don't know if you've ever surfed around my old posts, but a while ago I submitted myself to what I call my 'progressive writing scheme'. Aim of the game: at least one sentence a day, every day. Then, when you've written (or rather I have written) one sentence, I write two the next day, three the day after, and so on and so forth. Originally I meant to double the previous day's offerings, but that was an illusionary aim, I'm sorry to say. This way is better.

Then, when I have no time for the right amount of sentences, I start over again.

And guess what: IT WORKED!

I have not made it past 20 sentences in proper order, but it has worked, and this has really given me a boost. I tend to over-plan my time, you see - aiming for things that I cannot possibly achieve. Well.

No more. Now I have my scheme. One sentence a day, that I can do, no matter what, no matter where, no matter when.

Hehe.

A new week...

It's Monday again.

Now, I've never been much of a Monday-fan - perhaps conditioned to dislike it from bygone days of having to go to school? - but Mondays do have some positive connotations, too (believe it or not).

They are the start of something new, a beginning, almost like a new chance.

In my case, a new chance to get sorted. Weekends have this weird effect on me. I'm not the most organised person to begin with, but on weekends, things go haywire. Daily routine is abandoned, to-do lists are ignored, chores put off till later (or Monday, as it were). Particularly if the weather's nice outside.

Now, you might shake your head and give me a disappointed sigh on that, but there it is. Weekends are a toxic wonderful mixture of too much time and too little planning.

I love it, I really do. Social life happens, the weather's great for sports, nobody from the office calls with new problems/tasks/catastrophes, I get to sleep in (and as anyone who knows me can tell you, I am so not a morning person)....