I’ve been writing since I was 8, but am as of yet unpublished. I’ve
been working on my novel, Uneven Lines, for nearly four years (yikes!), and
hopefully someday you’ll get to read it. Sometimes I write poetry. I’m
27 and live in a studio apartment with my stand-up comedian fiancé and my cat
Gizmo. I have no idea when I’m getting married, but I’m totally fine with that.
If you browse through my blog, you’ll definitely come across Jordan—he’s the
15-year-old narrator of my novel and my muse/the annoying voice in my head/the
third love of my life.
Boom! 100 words exactly. By the way, Jordan's monthly post was this Monday, and he still wants your questions!
So what am I insecure about this month? Oh, the usual. I still haven't even looked at my novel since September. I know exactly what my issues are but I just can't seem to work past them and get back to editing. I want to actually find an excerpt to use for a blog post on Friday, so maybe just reading it will get me back into the swing of things.
One of the big problems I have is that I dream big. Everybody dreams about getting a publishing deal and all of the things that will happen afterwards, right? Well, I think I overdo it. I won't get into the crazy details, but it is something I think about on a daily basis. It would be great if it was motivating me to work, but it's not.
It sort of reminds me of when I drink alcohol--I'm always very aware of how intoxicated I get. With the whole dreaming big scenario, I'm extremely delusional, but I'm also aware of how delusional I am. I tell myself things could not possibly happen in the exact way I imagine them, but I keep imagining.
Here's the thing--I fully believe that everything happens for a reason and that the universe will on occasion send signs. I also believe that I actually got a sign that these dreams will on some level come true. It freaked me out when it happened, but now I'm wondering if it was a sign--or was it just a bunch of coincidences at once? I can't really know until it actually comes true, but that could take a long time. So I worry that I'm putting too much faith in it and not enough in myself.
I worry that dreaming too big is holding me back. That I'm too afraid of it not coming true, or even of it actually happening, because that would be scary. Great, but scary. I don't want to give up on the book, of course, because I've put way too much work into it, but I'm wondering if I should give up on the dream. Maybe it would be better to just let it die and not think about it, and put all of my focus on the book itself without even thinking about getting it published until it's done.
What I'd like to do is to not let the dream die, exactly, but set it aside. Stop worrying about the future and focus on the present. I'm not going to get anywhere if I don't finish the book first. The universe can't help me with that. It's all up to me.