Where Have I Been?

For the past few weeks I have not blogged about my novel. Why, you may ask, was I not blogging? The answer is simple: I wasn't writing. Can't blog about writing if I'm not writing. The obvious next question is, why was I not writing? The answer to that is a bit more complicated. Well nothing is really ever simple, is it?

The immediate answer is that I was busy distracting myself with other things, i.e.: facebooking, Myspacing, worrying about trivial matters (too many in number to list here). Why was I distracting myself with other things? Now that's the real question, leading to the real answer. Fear of success is probably the main reason; there are probably a whole slew of secondary reasons as well but I won't get into that here.

I've developed some pretty good avoidance strategies for not accomplishing the things I want. Keeping myself busy with minor things that I pretend are major is the main way I do it. I've done this so frequently in the past that  I should have seen it sooner. Now that I've realized I'm using this particular strategy again I can stop using it and get back to writing. I'll have to check myself much more frequently to ensure that I don't backslide; this is something like being a recovering alcoholic. I wonder if there's a twelve step program for underachiever's...Underchievers Anonymous? The writer as self-psychoanalyst.

What I'ld like to do, if you'll all allow me, is to ask for a reset of sorts. I want to start this blog over from today. In other words in 365 days from today I will have a finished novel. No avoidance, no stopping, no excuses. I realize this is a lot to ask. I started this blog several months ago with the same premise and the same promise...to have a completed novel in 365 days. I also realize that once you break a contract, a verbal committment or a promise people no longer trust you. This is with good reason; you've let them down. It's an issue of trust. I will probably lose readers. However if you stick with me I will have a finished novel a year from today...promise.

I will have some things to post within the next few days (my plan is to post every two to three days at the longest) about my restarted process.

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Bill Browning, writing from Starbucks/Ansley Mall, Wednesday, 16 June 2010...365 days and counting.