Writing as a discipline

I haven’t been writing a whole lot the last couple of weeks. I temporarily lost my motivation, my reason to write. 

At first I felt immensely guilty. For not keeping up the discipline. For not keeping the words flowing, regardless of inspiration. That’s how I usually approach my writing. I can’t count the amount of times I’ve felt utterly inspirationless, but started writing anyway. More often than not, nothing interesting comes out of it. But sometimes, I surprise myself. And that’s why I keep up the discipline. Usually.

But for the past couple of weeks, I haven’t wanted to do the work. 

In an ideal world, I would take some time and do nothing but write. Hours at a time. Really approach it as a job. Something you schedule so that you have to pull through. But that takes a lot of mental focus. And more often than not, I take the easy way out. 

Which is to say that I fill my time with anything but writing. And then the day is over, and I'll admit defeat and say: “I’ll write tomorrow. I’ve done all this other stuff now, tomorrow I’ll have all the time in the world to write.”

I never do. 

But when I do sit down to write, like I’m doing now. I love it. I love making stuff. I love publishing it on my website or on Substack, even though no one ever reads it. I love finding nice pictures on my phone that fit the topics. I love creating. 

Even if I get a high out of creating something, I don’t do it consistently in any way. Making something from scratch is really hard. It’s not like my day job. Where I mainly do mundane tasks on the computer all day long. I really like it, but I don’t create anything. It’s projects, deadlines and communicating with people. You make a to-do list and you do the tasks. That’s it. 

There’s a clear objective to obtain and I’m on the clock. And so I do it. 

My writing doesn't pay me. If I was honest, of course, I’d like some extra pocket money from it. But it’s the creating part that does me in. The sheer possibility of it all. No outlines, no structure. Just me and a blank page. 

I think all artists struggle with the freedom of it. The desire to make something ‘good’ or ‘worthwile’, even though rationally, all artists know that bad art and no inspiration are part of the job. 

We either take ourselves too seriously or not serious enough. It’s a human condition, I guess.