Writing resistance…

Just came across this post (thanks to Maggie Dawn) at Magpie Girl, where she perfectly describes the weird phenomenon that seems to accompany trying to actually write with a deadline.

Still, I have, in fact, had a little time to write….and I have, in fact, not done so.

Oh, to be sure, I’ve done writing-like things. I went to my writing group. I filled Tweet orders. I read up on all my favorite art/writing blogs. I even did lectio on a passage I’ve been asked to write on – this in preparation for writing said article. But I did not actually write.

Resistance. It is the enemy of all things artistic. Every morning the writer wakes up, eager to put pen to paper, and every morning resistance kicks in to keep the writer from actually doing the one and only thing she really wants to do. It is inevitable. It is part of the game and one cannot play in the writing world without this dark nemesis. What’s a girl to do?

Cram the bastard back down into the dung heap it came from, that’s what.

“Yes, “you cry, your voices in unison against our common foe, “Yes, but how?” Ah, there’s the rub. I think it goes something like this:

Show up at the page.
Put words on it.

What do you think?

What I think is that this is absolutely true. In order to write, you must show up and start writing words, even if it turns out that those words will later have to be edited or largely erased, at least you’ll have gotten over that fearful look of the blank screen and the knowledge of the deadline taunting you in the back of your mind.

The only other course is procrastinating, and convincing yourself that they only way to write is at the last possible minute, and turning in your work consistently the day after it’s due, much, I’m sure, to the puzzlement of the folks on the receiving end, who I’m sure must wonder if I can consistently turn it in the day after it’s due, why can’t whatever I’m doing 24 hours earlier at least?

And that whole approach sort of take the fun out of writing…