The official blog of Michelle Tuckett, word ninja.

Day Twenty-Six: Aprox. 20,000 of 50,000 words

Last Sunday’s inspiration post mentioned something called FILDI, which means “Fuck it, let’s do it!” It is that beautiful moment when we suddenly remember that everything is temporary anyway, and if we don’t get it done, it never will have a chance to suck and to just do it for the sake of doing.

Which all amounts to saying “Fuck it. Let’s do it.” I am about to say it. I’m about to do it.

I have only 20,000 words written. I need another 30,000. It is the twenty-sixth.

Failure. Is. Not. An. Option.

Fuck it. Let’s do it.

This month has been less enthusiasing than expected. I thought that blogging my novel would be an extra push of difficulty and fun, and in many ways it has been. It has also re-aquatinted me with a dear old nemesis. The delete key.

Little vixen. So tempting, especially when I know what I am writing will be read. Gulp. The tool of the perfectionism gremlin, sitting in the corner of my keyboard with it’s harmless looking arrow with a little x in it, promising redemption if only I get rid of the crap I just wrote and try again.

Because this time, it is for real and available to be read.

I write, then I realize I really ought to make more sense than usual, and there needs to be a plot told in order, and maybe I should make sure the spellings and such are all are corrected and there aren’t any major errors. This all takes time. Lots more time and energy than just banging things out fast and furious and unhindered by fear of judgement like I have become accustomed to.

I expected this issue. I did. I knew that the pressure of posting fiction online would push me to new ideas and maybe greater insights. The vision I had was that I would turn out posts on a regular basis throughout the month, and then have maybe another month of just automatically posting the rest of what I had written if anything had not made it. I imagined things streamlined and fairly carefree overall.

What I got instead was the sudden and overwhelming need to do other things, from the other novel insisting in being written instead to doing a cleaning overhaul of a good deal of my house. I am so very reluctant.

I fully intend on extending the posting of the articles I am writing and keeping them going until the story finishes up. I fully intend on finishing this month even though I would just about do anything else, including continuing to clean my house, maybe take up a hobby of sticking nails through my cheeks and making funny faces.

I want to leave this project and just skip it, write the story I’m already working on or move on to the next one or even give up on writing and run off to train exotic animals for movies. I want to quit so badly. I am sick of the story and the research and I am sick of myself being sick of it and avoiding it. I want this month to just be done already.

But this is that moment. The moment that separates the writers who get things done from the ones who remain unfulfilled and not writing.

This is what we do the practice for, the daily or weekly or monthly goals. This is why we work at making relatively well formed sentences and paragraphs. It isn’t for the good times. It’s for the times we hate and wish we could be anywhere doing anything else.

We work hard and get good at doing it so we can keep going when we would rather do anything else.

If I keep going, I will be uncomfortable and maybe amused and maybe brilliant and maybe miserable for the next five days and 30,000 words.

It will probably suck.

For five days. Maximum.

But if I quit now? I will feel the sting for years. Maybe a lifetime.

Because these are the times that show us who we are capable of being.

So here we go.

Fuck it.

Let’s do it.

Never miss the opportunity to be greater than you are.