I stayed up until 1:30 a.m. Friday night/Saturday morning binge-watching episodes 5-8 of the new Prime Video series Cross, based on James Patterson’s Alex Cross detective novels. It’s quite a ride.
The “real” Saturday morning arrived (a little late) and I estimated I had about three hours of newspaper work left to do on this week’s edition, and even though the rest of Saturday beckoned after that, I took my time getting to it.
I could feel the free time waiting on the other side, but I just wanted to skip the work and relax. I thought about how much better I’d feel when the work was done, but instead I spent some time acting as if the free time was already here, effectively reducing the amount of open time that would be waiting on the other side.
As is my wont, my mind wandered to my unfinished books, imagining how happy/relieved I will be to write “The End,” and I realized that imaginary feeling is enough to satisfy me even though the actual feeling of writing “The End” is that much sweeter. I know, because I just started and finished a book in the month of October and I held the finished book in my hands this week.
I could write 10 books a year if I maintained the pace that resulted in Dejah & Summer in the Time of Magic. Meanwhile, by blogging every day I have produced about (let’s look it up) 125,000 words so far in 2024, the equivalent of two, three, six books or more depending on how you measure.
When I looked up my word count for the year, I took a quick sweep through my early January work and found a clip from a Mark Manson email I meant to write about but still haven’t. A reader named Teresa had said that her goal for 2024 is “to create more art than I consume.”
I wonder how she’s doing with that, but isn’t that a great goal in any case? How often have I stayed up until 1:30 a.m. binge-writing my next book? And why not? It’s fun to create art. Sure, it’s fun to consume it, but holy cow, that feeling when you’ve created something to be proud of.
Should I create a little sign that says, “GOAL: CREATE MORE ART THAN YOU CONSUME,” or should I just get busy?
