A Lack of Focus

"Distracted from distraction by distraction
Filled with fancies and empty of meaning
Tumid apathy with no concentration"
--"Four Quartets" by T.S. Elliot

I'm starting to think that I have allowed myself too easy access to distractions. Email, chat, Facebook, blogs, and YouTube, all contribute to mental over stimulation and lack of focus. If my muse rebels against working on a particular page on my manuscript, then it is so very easy to jump over to check gchat and see who is talking to me or to facebook to see who has posted a pithy status message. I waste not only time, but mental energy bouncing around the Internet.

So, I'm now trying my hand at rationing my media usage and giving my mind long swaths of computer-free time to remember how to focus again. I have my AlphaSmart word processor which is great for Internet-less writing, and I might even drag out a good old fashioned pen and paper. I've also purchased a bunch of books that I want to read.

How do you avoid getting distracted?

A New Procrastinateling

A few months ago, I blogged on the procrastinatelings that inhibit our ability to write or work on novels. One in particular, blogging, has not plagued me this summer. In fact, I have been so remiss in my blogging that I wonder the TriMu keeps my ugly mug up on the sidebar.

Although I have not been hounded by the blogging procrastinateling, I have met with a new one, so powerful, it ripped me away from my assigned blog days. The dread procrastinateling has a foreign and exotic sounding name--noveling.

Yes, friends, my novel (and those of other members of this group, but I'll let someone else blog about that) has invaded my brain to the point that the first thing I think about when I wake in the morning is that I actually want to open up Chapter 7 and rip into yet another scene revision. The last thing I want to do when I sit down to my computer is blog.

So, this is all you get for now--a brief recognition that, yes, I am still alive. And now it's time to feed my happy new procrastinateling while he is with me. If the past is any indication, he won't be here long.

Attack of the Procrastinatelings

Writers are the best procrastinators on the planet. We are creative people, so we can come up with some great excuses for it, but it usually comes down to fear and laziness. We fear failure, (what if I'm really just a hack?) and we fear success (what if I never have another good idea again?). Add to the fear a general state of malaise and you get a sweet breeding ground to grow procrastinatelings--all those fun, creative excuses we use to avoid writing.

Procrastinatelings come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors. They even talk. There are the procrastinateling peoples--friends, family, knitting clubs, critique groups, etc. Then there are the necessities--sleep is the biggest drain, cleaning house always seems so important when you sit down to write, and eating comes in a close third in this category. Moneys are procrastinatelings that always seem to disappear right when you need them so you have to go out of your fictional worlds and get a job to breed more. My favorite procrastinatelings are the entertainments, including, but not limited too, gchat, facebook, movies, television, walks in the park, reading books, knitting and, of course, blogging. The most painful, but also most effective, procrastinatelings are the obligations--usually caused by peoples or moneys, they demand your time and they want it all right now. Actually, all procrastinatelings eat time. It's their favorite food.

There are many procrastinatelingocides in the world (duct tape is a key tool in some of them), but I procrastinated too long to mention any in this blog post. I'm tired (necessities), Mom wants to chat (peoples), I need to look for another job (moneys), I am at the climax of a book I'm reading and I really want to get back to it (entertainments), and I should be writing my short story instead of blogging (obligations)*.

What procrastinatelings are eating your writing time these days? Have you developed an immunity to any of them? If so, please share your recipe.

*Note: Two procrastinatelings can act against each other. Usually this has the effect of canceling each other out and nothing get's accomplished.

My One Real Skill….Procrastination

I love to write.

I do.

Really, I do, but sometimes, the words just aren't there.

Here are some things that I do when the words aren't coming all that freely.

Blogging. To the untrained ear, this actually sounds like writing. I mean blog is a shortened form of web log. Sort of an electronic equivalent of a sailor's log book. A place to record (i.e. write) the day's occurrences. Ummm….Not the way I do it. See when I blog, I like to play around with the design of my template or someone else's template. Unless, you consider writing code, writing, this is an excellent tool for avoidance.

Knitting. Knitting is the newest way for me to avoid writing. Yarn is becoming an addiction. I'm now a regular attendee of a "Sit and Knit" at the local yarn store. I'm now making knitting friends so I can have more people to help me avoid writing.

Reading. I would venture to say that most writers love to read. I've decided to call my reading, research. Do you think that will work?

Making a Living. Unfortunately, this is the main culprit behind my recent lack of productivity on the "novella." My work has fallen on me and I'm trying to dig my way out. That being said. I like my job best when I have a lot to do so my hope is that in a couple of weeks, I will figure out how to balance the need to pay my bills and the desire to write competent fiction.

What do you do to procrastinate?