When You Miss Your Writing Time

For the last month and a half, I've written fresh material every day.  It feels good doing that and knowing that I'm making a little progress at a time.  It feels good when I'm looking up at my calendar above my desk and have a visual reminder too.  I estimate I've got at least 200 pages that weren't around last December.

Until the dreaded 18th came along.  I was so busy with my day job that the only thing I was looking forward to was Skyping with an old college friend.  It had been a while since we talked.  Her family was going through a rough ordeal, and I wanted to see how she was doing.  By the end of the call, it was about 11 PM and I was ready to wind down for the night.  I thought if I got out at least a page, I'd be okay.  That's happened before where even a hundred words is all I can muster in a day.

I stared at my laptop screen for half an hour.  Nothing came to mind, of if it did, I was too beat to recognize it.  In the end, I threw in the towel and went to sleep.

I woke up the next day feeling a little frustrated with myself.  I felt like the day before was a complete waste.  Then I decided to adjust my whole perspective on it.

You know those signs reading X number of days without an accident?  You don't need to beat yourself for missing one day of writing when you've worked nonstop for the last 48.  Think of it as setting new records for yourself.  48 straight days is a personal best for me.  Now I'm going to see if I can make it to 49, to 70, to 100.  Yeah, it kind of sucks that you missed that one day.  But then you might as well beat yourself for getting sick and missing a day of flipping burgers.

If you can make up for those missed writing sessions and keep those breaks as few as possible, you should be okay.