Writing is Hard...But It's the Best
Getting my autistic brain to just sit down and write already.
It seems like most writing competitions have their submission deadlines in January.
Last week, I competed in the first round of the NYCMidnight Short Story Competition, which separates writers into groups and sends an email with a genre, subject, and character assignment. We had eight days to write a 2,500-word short story. If I’m in the top five of my group, I’ll move on to the second round.
Earlier this month, I submitted a 10,000-word chapbook to a competition through an academic press that, if I win, could end up getting published and printed.
I also pulled together a 14-page treatment document for an experimental narrative podcast series and have been pitching that to production studios to get it off the ground.
And I’m in the process now of writing a 6,000-word short story to submit by the end of the month for a competition that, if I win, would have an honorarium, would lead to my story being published, and would allow me to get in front of literary agents to potentially lead to future representation and opportunities.
All of these are exciting and tremendous opportunities for my literary career, ones that are too good to pass up. They just all happen to be in January, when I have paid client work I need to complete and weekly deadlines for this newsletter and a life to live and mental health to manage.
What I’ve learned from this perfect storm of juggling multiple writing projects and deadlines is that you can’t treat them like other things on your to-do list, like responding to emails or running errands or preparing your taxes.
Writing time is sacred and requires a specific and delicate balance of factors in order to be productive. There’s a routine, a warmup process like an athlete about to go play, an intentional clearing of the mind and build-up of focus.
It takes time just to work through the mental barriers that hold me back from sitting down and writing—which feels like most of the battle, just getting myself to sit down and write.
And sometimes I’ll go through everything, the entire process, just like every time before it, and I just can’t write, can’t focus, can’t work, no matter how much effort I put into it. Nothing comes out.
So much work and pain goes into that lead-up process, because it’s not natural to muster that much creative energy and attention just at the snap of a finger. Frankly, it sucks. You fight so much resistance and distraction, and sometimes it wins.
That’s been a tough and stressful realization in this moment where it feels like I need to expertly manage my time and energy to get everything wrapped up and as good as it can be and submitted before crossing the finish line at the end of the month.
There are many ways that my autistic brain is an asset for my writing. I see the world differently because of my autism, and I’m amazed at how creative I can be when I really let my autistic brain run unencumbered. My hyper-fixation and attention-to-detail are invaluable when I’m sketching out new stories or researching new ideas or editing a piece.
But sometimes it doesn’t want to cooperate.
I’ve grown to learn its mannerisms and quirks—like chewing two sticks of gum and throwing a racquetball against the wall will get it to re-center—and to ride the waves as they come.
An example: recently, for whatever reason, I’ve been getting bursts of energy and focus around 10:30pm every night. After I take Bailey out one last time and get him situated in bed, I’ll sit down at my writing desk and get to work on the project that I might have tried to work on earlier in the day during “normal work hours.” The words seem to just flow easier.
Rather than trying to fight it, like I used to, and be strict about when I should be writing and working and when I should be resting, I’ve learned to take a break in the afternoon and not feel guilty about it because I trust that that 10:30pm surge will come and I’ll be able to make the progress I need to on these multiple projects and tight deadlines.
That’s a huge shift for me. But it’s been paying off. I’ve been able to manage everything and get it done when I need to. And checking off those projects from my to-do list, and proving to myself that I can work under this kind of pressure and still produce something that I’m proud of—that I’m excited about. Especially after recently making the pivot to prioritizing my writing more in my career, that’s been so validating and invigorating.
I can do this. I can be a writer. Look at all I’ve been able to get done in just the last month.
None of this would have been possible, though, had I not done all of the work in the past two years in my personal growth journey, of breaking down the barriers in my head that held back my full power and unlocking the full creative potential I’ve always felt within me.
Because so much of writing is getting your head in the right place to just sit down and write.
All of that stuff that I worked through held me back from just sitting down and getting to work. Learning how to work with my autistic brain and not against it has made all the difference, and it’s allowed me to challenge myself, to put myself out there, to build the career that I want and fulfill all that potential.
“Like a magnetized needle floating on a surface of oil, Resistance will unfailingly point to true North—meaning that calling or action it most wants to stop us from doing.” - Steven Pressfield, The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles