I have had a hard time sitting down to write for quite some time. I keep talking about it and thinking about; however, something always seems to get in the way.
- I can make the excuse that I don’t have time, but I do spend some time on the couch watching Netflix.
- I can make the excuse that I cannot miss those good TV shows (Haunting of Bly House and Utopia have been SOOO good), but it is Netflix and/or Prime so the shows aren’t going away anytime soon.
- I can make the excuse that my mom passed away Easter weekend and I just cannot have been able to find the motivation. That actually is the case; however, I know that writing is good therapy if you make yourself sit down and do it.
- I can make the excuse that teaching during the pandemic is overwhelming so I cannot focus in the evenings to write due to being drained. That is also true because I have been working long, crazy hours.
The point is that we can make excuses for anything and everything. Some are very real reasons; however, it is up to us to turn those reasons into a reason “why” not a “why not”. I recently decided that I can no longer keep working on school lesson plans, etc. during my evenings and weekends. It was draining me and I wasn’t finding any time for myself nor my family. I was a grump and a crying mess.
I had a student’s parent just last week get ANGRY because he emailed me one day after work hours and I hadn’t replied (because I wasn’t at work) so he emailed again the next morning demanding for a reply. I am not a Wal-Mart or a 7-11. I do not and should not be expected to be in teacher mode 24 hours a day. So this weekend, I decided to not even check my work emails and put up a vacation reply response that replies to any emails that I am out of the building until Monday. I am turning that excuse, that reason for not writing, into a reason to write. I am making time for myself right now. I, and my family, are more important.
Along with that goal to give myself some “me time”, I decided to sign up for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). I am not expecting myself to write 50,000 words like the site’s goal. I have never been able to meet that goal yet and am not going to put that pressure on myself because 2020 has been a hell year. This year, my goal with NaNoWriMo is to create and stick to a writing routine. I am not focusing on word count but just the goal of writing. Let’s turn 2020 from a hell year into a difficult, but good year. We can turn our excuses into motivations.
Good luck to everyone writing on NaNoWriMo and to everyone just trying to pull themselves together. We can do this.
Jessie Warren 