WHY ARE WE SURFING THE WEB WHEN WE WANT TO BE WRITING OUR NOVEL?

I subscribed to the monthly newsletter at Reinassance Souls.com.

Um, I think we ALL might have been here. So I share. I would like to add *napping* to the title.

Play Time? Down Time? Work Time? Creativity Time? WHY ARE WE SURFING THE WEB WHEN WE WANT TO BE WRITING OUR NOVEL?

I find it intriguing that most of us don’t spend as much time writing/painting/practicing an instrument during our free time as we thought we would when we were younger. Over and over I hear clients say, “I used to think of myself as a writer, but I guess I’m not after all. If I were, I’d spend more time writing, wouldn’t I? After all, there are the evenings after work plus the weekends.” Similarly, I see Renaissance Souls getting very down on themselves when they block out their Focal Point Times, and genuinely want to spend that time painting or practicing, but end up turning on the TV or surfing the internet instead...

One solution to these confusions is to think of different kinds of time. If we’ve been at work all day, having to be “on” just about from the minute we begin until the minute we stop, it’s not surprising that we’re tired. Regardless of how much we enjoy what we’re doing, being “on” is tiring period. And when we’re tired, we need down time.

Creativity takes energy! Perhaps when we take out that oil painting set or digital camera for the first time and head for the hills to see what we can see, it feels like play time. It feels easy, fun, something that doesn’t require much energy at all. But if painting or photography are our Focal Points, we will soon pass that initial “This is the zoom lens, this is for wide angle shots” phase. Then we are into the development of whatever skills we need for the creativity we are trying to express. Practicing trills or high dives takes energy as we concentrate on improving with each practice, just as writing a play is not a down time activity, no matter how much we get absorbed doing it once we get going.

So if we happen to have challenging jobs, be they in the corporate world, the service world, the world of entrepreneurship and self-employment, or the world of providing a creative and healthy home environment for our family, we may well not be able to “devote all our evening and weekends” to pursuing our passions. The operative word here is all. Taking down time is no reflection on our seriousness about writing or our commitment to our Focal Points. In fact, it’s just the opposite: by understanding the role of down time and play time we are honoring the energy our passions need from us and being sure we have that energy when we’re ready to dive in.