The Productive Procrastinator
It’s me, hi, I’m the problem, it’s me
I keep putting it off.
Consciously, unconsciously, maybe it’s a bit of both.
I keep putting it off and I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s the usual fear of not being good enough, or maybe it’s the thought that I might be and that it might not be enough. Either way, I haven’t been sitting down to write. Or rather I am writing, but I’m not writing that.
I am and have been for a while, a pretty productive procrastinator. I don’t procrastinate with TV, TikTok, sleeping in, or online shopping for items I don’t need and probably won’t buy. When I’m really running away, I work overtime on the day job, check off chores, create illustrations for the Instagram account and commissions, tackle the TBR pile — highlighting sentences and passing them as inspiration — and I write. I write random bits and pieces, short stories, poems, lists, and questions. I write everything but the novels I’m trying to write.
So when another day goes by, and the word count is the same as yesterday and last week, and last month, I have all these other creations with which my mind rationalizes why.
The part of me that yells JUST SIT DOWN TO WRITE, as loud as a shipwrecked soul screaming into the night, is met by an ocean of other creations and nonsensical justifications. There’s a part of my brain that is going to sleep hoarse, and there’s another working overtime rocking the boat with waves of indecision, excuses, and wishful whens. When you regularize your part-time work situation… when you fix up the apartment… when you reschedule that doctor’s appointment you missed… when you finish the illustration for the contest, when you submit your story to the new publication, or when you finish meal prep for the week… if… when… then…
Some backstory
I’ve been writing novels for years, but most people in my life had no idea. Then, sometime during the pandemic, I managed to cross the 50,000-word mark on one of my stories. It felt big and real, and I dared to tell a couple of people about it: both the story and the fact that I was writing it. There were months when the novel made progress and then months when it didn’t but, all in all, it moved forward. Then 2021 was a year that didn’t feel like a year, and 2022 was a year that felt like three, and in its ups and downs, a new novel was born along with new bravery to tell more people this is what I want to do, that this is what I’m doing.
Some people were skeptical, but most were supportive. Now, every time they see me, they ask, how is it going? And to them, I can say: “It’s going. It’s a process.” I pick excuses from the waves and share them like a child offering up the seashells she’s found. The same seashells I show myself, except I know better. Except, I have the screaming voice in my head that’s yelling “JUST SIT DOWN TO WRITE” a lot louder than I can say, ooh that’s nice.
Where we’re now
I could be writing. Right now, I could be opening the other document, and instead, here I am. Hi. The productive procrastinator strikes again. But before you tell me off, I haven’t written about this yet, and writing usually helps. Maybe I’m hoping that by spelling it out to myself, the excuses will dissolve like foam on the sand. Perhaps then, I can see what’s underneath, or better still, perhaps I can finally SIT DOWN TO WRITE.
