Avoidance

I have been so unmotivated to write lately. Life really has been crazy. I’ve been fostering 5 kittens, interviewing for jobs, housesitting, babysitting, and making a birthday dinner for gramma! There have been a lot of distractions that have taken away from my time and mental readiness to write.

Today, however, I had nothing on my schedule.

It is a day off. I feel exhausted today so I decided to take a personal day at home and see where the mood took me. I watched some TV and got bored, so I cleaned the hamster cage. Still bored, so I cleaned the fish tank. I vacuumed, washed dishes, I shopped online for cat supplies, and made basil fried rice for dinner. It was a beautifully productive day, yet although I had the energy and motivation to do so many things today, I could not bring myself to write. It has been a frustrating and depressing lack of motivation. Apparently I will do anything around the house to avoid writing.

I took some time to ponder this today and I think it boils down to not wanting any more rejection. So far, every agent I have queried has said no or has not responded–and we all know no response means “no thanks” in many agencies. 32 people have rejected my book, and that along with the rest of the stress in my life I think has gotten to me. I consider myself a positive person, but everyone has a breaking point. I think that’s another reason why I do not want to write a synopsis. The goblin in the back of my head is saying “what’s the point” when in reality the synopsis might be my saving grace. Who knows. The publishing world is so subjective it drives me crazy!

I need to find motivation again. I’m hoping once I land a job, get an apartment, and figure out a routine everything will fall into place. Right now anything sounds more appealing than writing and that’s not a healthy place to me. I love to create. I know I love to create, yet I’ve fallen into a void of avoidance that is difficult to escape.

Maybe I need to read more. Anyone have suggestions? Any great books that inspire you to create in any form?

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One Step Further

Yesterday I received an email from an agent asking for the first 5 pages of my manuscript! While it is not much, the fact that she wanted to read more than my query was encouraging. I have not heard from her yet, but I’m looking forward to her response. She might say no, but that’s ok. Someone wanted more and that makes me happy and geared up to keep querying.

The next step (that I keep putting off) is writing the 2 page synopsis of the book. Some agents want to read a synopsis upfront while others will ask for it later. I keep putting this off since it is so much work to write a succinct summary of the whole book. Like the query I have a small amount of space to make a big impression. I recently finished the query and that took a lot of time and patience and energy to get it to be the way I wanted. The synopsis gives me more space, but it covers more ground. I’m tired. I know I need to do it and that it will not be as bad as I’m anticipating. I am currently fostering 5 kittens and looking for a full time job while doing this, so that might be another reason while I’m putting it off. Maybe this weekend I’ll suck it up and get writing!