.png)
I had every intention of following up Writing Truth #2 with Writing Truth #3, Find Your Tribe, a week after #2 published. Well its been several weeks and guess what - that didn't happen. I could say "I've been busy," (its true), I could say, "I wasn't sure how to tackle the topic," (not really true), or I could say, "Life got really overwhelming," (when isn't it).
The truth is procrastination won. For several days I promised myself that tomorrow it would get done. These are not long posts - they don't take hours to write. Yet quickly those days turned to weeks! I still plan to write lesson #4 about Finding Your Tribe (and I will highlight my amazing writing group), but given my recent failure to meet my own internal deadline, I thought I would tackle procrastination.
Like many people, I am prone to procrastination. I have early memories of being told not to put off that essay until the last minute, followed by memories of young me promising myself it would never happen again, as I frantically typed into the wee hours of the morning. One thing I am GREAT at is making excuses. I've come up with some real humdingers!
It can be easy to let my guilt about not starting, help me continue down the procrastination path. There are a ton of books and blog posts about Winning Your Inner Battle with Procrastination. This is not one of those posts. Rather, I feel that its better to acknowledge that procrastination happens and then let any guilt you feel go.
Creative people sometimes need breaks, heck, all people sometimes need breaks. Procrastination can be your brain's way of saying,"take a breather, let the stress go - here's a wonderful video of a dog licking a cat - you need this." So if you find yourself diving into the depths of YouTube, or down the rabbit hole of Twitter, its okay. It doesn't mean you aren't cut out for the creative work you've chosen or that a missed internal deadline means you are destined to pull a George R. R. Martin, and repeatedly miss your publishers deadlines. (Yes, I am bitter, and no, I will not stop until Winds of Winter is published!)
So pick up your pen and let the procrastination guilt go. Or if you are not ready, here's a link to a Great Dane being tapped on the nose by a kitten - Enjoy!