Motivation

It’s hard to write about vampires while prepping for Christmas. I know, it’s only November, but some things need to be done before the twelfth month else I get so far behind I want to hang myself with the tree lights come the holidays. My creativity is far from suffering—the cards are almost done! Ter casually suggested this year’s theme (“socks”—you can free your elf but she’ll never get over it) and after a couple of days mulling over the potential, I was off to the races. It’s always fun once I get started, but having a theme this early is rare. The Ocean Room looks like … well, like the picture introducing this post: less a living room than an artist’s studio.

So, in the meantime, my vampires are in limbo. The Calista story is almost done; I think there’s one more scene before she’s told all she can tell. After that, back to Black, another one that’s almost done. I was over at terribleminds.com the other day and hit another brilliant post about how Chuck gets past the hiccups at one-third, halfway and two-thirds into a project. Those are the hotspots, what I’ve long called the “150 page speed bump” where I get hung up and question a) what I’m doing, b) why I’m doing it and c) if I should even be trying to do it. Creativity is a magical thing, but it’s also fraught with mental landmines designed to sabotage what I was so excited about when I started.

Naturally, now I can’t find his post to link it –but there was also a dandy about motivation that I found extremely helpful, and not only because I already know half of it. It’s a few suggestions to help a writer struggling with the strange paradox of wanting to write while not wanting to write.

Since I can write about doughnuts, you’d think motivation wouldn’t be an issue. So for now, I’m using Christmas as an excuse for avoiding my works in progress and I’m totally good with it.