Right-brain fatigue

I'm back today from the writing retreat. Five full days to work on the novel. I completed 7 chapters in draft form with many remaining questions and issues. I like that part of the process. I'm on a One on the Enneagram personality chart and we love lists and organizing our thoughts.

Yesterday, I wrote three chapters and reworked one. It was the most productive day of the five. Perhaps because I could feel the time dwindling and the luxury of spending all day every day with my characters evaporating for the time being. And it may well be that I had so wonderfully primed the pump that I had much to say.

I wrote from 9-12, continued writing in my head over the silent lunch, wrote from 12:30 to 2, took a long walk on the beach, wrote again from 3-4:30. I could have gone all writing all night.

Not surprisingly, I woke up brain weary. I'd stayed so far to the right in my imagination all day yesterday that I couldn't do any more writing; I'd drained the well. I got up with leisure, wrote in my journal, packed for the trip home, and then spent about two hours asking myself questions (no answers yet) about the chapters to come but mostly staring out at the bay at high tide.

I didn't judge any of the ideas or organize them or decide whether they were feasible. I just wrote four pages of notes that may well serve me the next time I sit down to write.

Then I came home and did physical things like unpacking and grocery shopping and cat petting and bed changing and mail sorting and email answering. I feel more or less back in my life and tomorrow I hope to be back into both parts of my brain.

Day 2 Writing Retreat: Writer's block

When I arrived yesterday, it had been nearly 7 weeks since I'd worked on the current novel. That didn't mean I hadn't been writing. I write in my journal every morning. I'd written a couple of long papers for clients, and I'd been blogging every day on two blogs for a week. But the novel had sat neglected.

I'd like to be able to say that I've spent the last 7 weeks thinking about the plot and characters, writing in my head or solving problems or creating new angles, but that would be a lie. I haven't given it much thought. I get too busy when I first come back from a trip, then I get an odd kind of shyness about it. I make all sorts of excuses, the kinds of excuses and procrastinations that are as common among writers as air pollution in big cities. I can't work on it because I only have an hour; guess I'll check email instead. I can't work on it because I might get interrupted; guess I'll watch a documentary on Netflix. I can't work on it because I don't have a clear direction; guess I'll get something to eat. All kinds of other tasks take priority.

Well, I got here and there was plenty of time even on the first day. But did I get started? Of course not. I could have. We had a silent afternoon after lunch, but I read Kim Stafford's memoir of his dad and I took a long nap, and I played canasta, and I looked out the window, and I wrote my blogs. And, and, and.

As a long-time exerciser, I am well familiar with the opposing forces of momentum and inertia. I don't dare not exercise for more than 3 days at the most or inertia begins to wrap its wily arms around my limbs and I get leaden and just don't want to go the gym. By the fourth day, momentum has been replaced almost completely. It's as if the two exist on a spectrum and I've more than crossed the balance point and am on the slide to sloth.

The same thing happens in my writing life. I go away on retreat, start writing every day, make great progress. I get to spend most of the day every day for a week thinking the novel, planning the novel, writing in my head, living with the characters. A fine head of writing steam builds up and I am more than rolling, I am flying, it's going so well.

Then I head home, still full of the story and determined to live my creative life differently but no such luck. There's a full litter box and a big stack of mail and clients to see to and appointments to keep and friends to catch up with and marketing to do. And then 7 weeks have gone by and I feel shy again.

But after breakfast this morning, I opened the file, read the first 14 chapters I'd written, and made some tweaks. Sounds promising, right? Well, then I froze again. That's editing work. I can do that without a problem. But what about the new stuff that needed writing?

So I made myself plunge in. I decided to write a chapter that might not go in at all. That way there was no pressure. And in 4 hours, I'd written about 3 pages and I could see where I was going to go next. And maybe, just maybe I'll use some of that "extra" chapter.