I’ve been gone from my blog for a couple of weeks. I’ve thought about it every day, but I usually save my weekends for posting. In fact, my writing goals for some time have been this:  Every Friday, post a poem to Medium (I post to the Poets Unlimited publication, see Links of stuff I like). Every Sunday, post to my blog. I also decided to try Story a Day in May. I wrote a short story every day for a week, then I hit a wall where I couldn’t write for three days.

When my goal was only to post a poem to Medium every Friday, I managed it consistently. In fact, I had to start keeping a chart for myself of which poems I had published there because I was losing track. Then,  I can’t remember what happ
ened, but something got in the way and I skipped a week. At another point I skipped two. Right now it’s been over a month.

I was out of town the past two weekends. I told myself I wasn’t going to use it as an excuse. I would get my blog posts out, no matter what. I did actually write something last week, in honor of Mother’s Day, but it needed a lot of revision, and I couldn’t get to it in a timely fashion, so I decided not to bother.

The prompts for Story a Day became too difficult. I was giving myself a half hour to write a story, and suddenly it needed more time, time which I simply couldn’t squeeze out of the rest of my day. I also forgot the main goal:  quantity not quality. My perfectionism snuck in to undermine me and since I couldn’t do it “right” I didn’t do it at all.

Now, I’m not trying to make excuses. What I am trying to say, is this is where I usually give up. I say to myself, see – you can’t do it. You let other things get in the way. Other people out there manage to be regular with these things (every Friday I get Austin Kleon’s newsletter in my inbox, every day I get something from Jonas Ellison, frequently I read on Medium about somebody who posts 100 poems in 100 days, or 100 short stories in 100 days, you get the drift). So I kick myself, I start to feel depressed, and then I give up.

But I’m not giving up. I’m picking myself up, dusting myself off, and trying again.

I know I’m going to be out of town next week. I’m aiming for getting ahead of the game this time instead of thinking I might squeeze in a little time on Friday before I leave, and maybe I can whip something up on Sunday when I get home (when I’m dead tired from meetings and driving). I’m going to do what I can to make it easier on myself. Keep it short and sweet. Not aim for perfection. Learn by doing. Learn by failing, too. But most importantly, not give up.