Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Do What You Don't Want To Do And Get What You Want To Get

This seems to be my mantra lately, but it's a good one. There's a lot of things I don't really want to do...but I want the end result. So *shrug* you do what you gotta do.

Diet? Not fun. AT ALL. But I've been doing it anyways and doing really well. Cleaning my house? Blech....but...it's really nice waking up in the morning to an empty sink and not tripping over piles o' crap on my way down the stairs. Doing what I don't want to do has been getting me what I want to get. A size down in my jeans and a clean (mostly) house.

So, I decided it was time to apply this to my writing.

I love writing, I really do. But sometimes, a lot of times, it just feels like work. It's daunting thinking of the days and weeks of pouring out words that need to be edited and rearranged and cut and rewritten and edited again and again...and again. :)

But the end result is so worth it. There is seriously no feeling in the world like looking at a clean, polished, finished manuscript - a story YOU wrote that you know is GOOD. It's just beyond awesome.

I want that. I want that finished manuscript. I want to sell it and see it published.

But to do that, I've got to put in the work. I need to do what I sometimes don't want to do if I want to get what I want to get.

So....I guess it's back to the grindstone :)

How are you guys doing on your projects? What do you do that you don't want to do in order to get what you want to get? (and how is that for a mouthful LOL)

11 comments:

Christine Fonseca said...

dude! I so get this post. and yep - I push through the hard, yuck, nonsense....and get to work!

Laura Pauling said...

I know that every day I need to go into the editing cave and really embrace the part of editing that I don't like - but love the finished product! Great post!

B.E. Sanderson said...

Exactly. I don't want to open rejection letters, which leads me to not wanting to query, but I want to snag an agent and get published. So, I've been sending out query letters and checking my email constantly. This hated process is something I need to do to get what I want, so I do it. =o)

Stephanie McGee said...

I don't always want to admit to myself that I'm not where I need to be skill-wise to get the story to be what it ought. And that gets intimidating. But I keep writing (and forcing myself to revise instead of jump to a new project) and it feeds me. Keeps me going.

Unknown said...

Wise words that I really needed to hear. I have at least four stories that need to be done and I just can't seem to make myself write them. I freeze when I call up the document and stare at it until I just close it out in frustration. I'm allowing myself to get bogged down in every day problems and work and using these as an excuse not to write. Thank you for this.

Katrina L. Lantz said...

Yes! This is why we force ourselves to exercise even when we feel tired. It's so worth it to be healthy, but it's hard sometimes.

I also force myself to read for pleasure. That might sound weird, but sometimes I feel like I'm wasting time I could be writing. I have to remind myself it's worth it to gain that subtle insight that comes from reading polished work.

Great article!!

Elana Johnson said...

This is so true. And I'm soooo jealous you've gone down a jeans size! I am a baby beluga. *sigh*

Misha Gerrick said...

At this time: Creating an Excel database of the hundreds of fruit farmers in Spain that went to the largest trade-fair in the world.

>_<

Mark said...

Well said;) The way I get writing/editing done is to compare it to my day job. After a stressful day at work, even the most grinding creative writing is pure pleasure by comparison!

Conda Douglas said...

Such an excellent point. Who is a pro? Someone who works at what they do.

Kate Danley said...

There is a "how to become a tidier person" website called FlyLady and one of big keys to success is setting a timer for fifteen minutes (the thinking being that just about all of us can do something for fifteen minutes). The upside is that I find once I get starting, the whole laws of "An object in motion tends to stay in motion" usually apply.