Getting some Traction

So, it's taken me more than a week to come back. In fact, looking at the notes I left myself, it's been quite a while. At the time I was reading a book about organization that talked about getting your most awful-but-important task done first-- right at the beginning of the day. The book used a Mark Twain quote about eating a frog first thing in the morning, that way you know that nothing worse can happen that day. It was some really great stuff and I was planning to really dive in here, but then my daytime job hit full swing with a new position and it's taking a lot more of my time and energy than I anticipated. It'd be nice if I could say I got a substantial raise with all the extra responsibility, but such is not the case. The extra $100 or so a month is nice, but nothing when compared with the sheer weight of my new position.

But this post is about getting some traction with my writing. My wheels have been spinning a long time now, and so I've fallen back into what got me going the last time around. I've sent some pitches around for some freelance writing work for websites and magazines. One's pretty promising, if a bit slow in the processing. It's not my novel, sadly, but it's writing. And it was this kind of writing that made me fall in love with words again and brought me back to the blank page. It was this kind of writing that propelled me 20k words into my novel before my inner editor and the overly complicated logistics of an online writing group drained my reservoir. I loved that group; my writing just wasn't ready for it. That, and we never really got to know each other on a personal level, and that made critiquing and receiving critiques more difficult-- I never quite knew the tone of the person behind the feedback. Plus, our group kept growing randomly and when we hit eight or nine, I think most of us basically gave up. Four or five is the perfect size, I think. But if any of them read this, I did learn a ton and I am grateful for what the group did. And I wish each of you well with your books. I'd love to see us all on the shelf one day. And if not, keep writing.

I wish I could say my traction is firm and I'm making headway. I'm not there yet, but I think about my writing everyday. And I long to get back to it in full force again. I hope to soon. I really do. What about you? How do you keep your traction going?