Insecure Writer’s Support Group (Apr)

The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. On this day we post about our thoughts, our doubts, and the fears we have conquered. We discuss our struggles and triumphs, and offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling.

Every post opens with a question (a blogging prompt, if you will), and this month's is:

When your writing life is a bit cloudy or filled with rain, what do you do to dig down and keep on writing?

That is a tough question, especially since I am such a procrastinator in the first place. When I get down, or just hit the wall in terms of stress, I come up with an endless list of excuses as to why it is okay not to write. I spend way too much time justifying my time away from the keyboard, and that just makes me feel worse.

One way to kick myself in the ass and climb out of it is to brainstorm something new. I will dig out my well-worn leather-bound journal, my pretty purple pen, and just start writing down ideas. Most of them are nonsense, and few of them ever become a story, but the exercise distracts me from my troubles, and pen-and-paper seems to free me from the expectations and pressures I associate with the keyboard.

The other way is to go looking for submission calls. Yes, sometimes that idle browsing is just another avenue for procrastination, but it can also expose me to a new idea or concept that gets me excited about writing again. As an added bonus, those submission calls usually have a deadline attached, which is a much-needed natural counter for my own lack of self-discipline.

Last month was one of those cases where that idle browsing was exactly what I needed. There were two anthologies that caught my eye, and I already have my submission written, edited, beta-read, and polished for the first (a fun tentacle story starring my Futanari Moans heroine), and I literally just wrapped up first draft for the second (a BDSM-themed take on asexuality), so I will be looking for beta readers soon.

What about you? How do you escape that pit of literary despair?