Back in the Dark Ages, when
I was in Junior School, they would occasionally wheel out a large television
and we’d watch part of a series that was considered both entertaining and
educational. From what I recall, we never got to see a whole series – perhaps
two or three episodes at most (out of six, I think).
One series involved an
alien child – you knew he was an alien because his face and clothes were silver
– befriended by an Earthling child and trying to escape the clutches of someone in
authority. Yes, it does sound a little like ET.
I have very little
recollection of the other series, apart from the ending! A group of children
have followed clues to a small box hidden in a garden, possibly in a rockery,
and inside the box there’s a note that reads: Time does not stand still. As a
child this was not the kind of treasure I wanted to find.
However, as well as
not remaining static time can bestow perspective. History, I once scribbled
into a notebook, is just a series of stories we tell ourselves over and over
again. Ask someone else and the history changes. Time changes history not only
because there may be more facts and less propaganda as the years roll on, but
also as a consequence of the context changing.
What’s this got to do with
writing? Quite a lot and not much,
depending upon your perspective.
I had a bout of flu
recently, which is still taking its toll (rambling alert), but I can now see some improvement
every day. I spent the first day of proper sickness in bed – I haven’t done
that since I was a child. When it comes to flu, you know the drill – shivers,
sweats, headaches, pains in the teeth, the jaw, behind the eyes (I also had them for a
day or three before), sneezing, coughing, nausea, no sense of taste and a total
loss of appetite. I also had tinnitus, which included repetitive noises –
sometimes like music or machinery – and repetitive thoughts.
Sleeping for maybe
an hour at a time, sometimes far less, your perception of time itself changes.
Even my dreams were on a loop. I approached the same wall at least half a
dozen times and I can’t get past it. (Yes, I am a fan of John Wyndham’s novel,
The Midwich Cuckoos, as well as the 1960 film, Village of the Damned – I like
your thinking!)
Not really eating and not
really sleeping, apart from feeling very debilitating, can act like a detox because your mind begins to empty. Precepts and concepts that seem inviolable peel back with ease like a banana.
I’m not going to lie to you – as soon as I became cogent, or something very
like it, I checked my emails. Much of it, while not
exactly spam, was not really relevant. The bulk of that was elective, perhaps
when I was interested in specific information about ebook marketing, business
models, entrepreneurship, marketing, governmental policy, civil liberties,
cyber-security and all the other good stuff I read about for business and
pleasure.
But…when you only have five
minutes of focused attention it tends to concentrate the mind wonderfully.
What I did with my five minutes was this:
1.
I updated a
freelance profile to show I was ill with flu and therefore all work was
suspended.
2.
I changed my
preferences and eradicated around 50% of all not really relevant emails. I’ll take a view on the other stuff
when I want to take a closer look at it.
In my next five minutes of
clear thinking, which doesn’t include the time slot where I just felt sorry for
myself and was only slightly amused by Anne coughing like a distressed sea lion
(of course, she had the flu first…), I did some actual thinking.
Writing requires
introspection, and lots of it, not only so that you can trace the muse through
the wondrous forest of your own imagination (where both fiction and non-fiction
are born), but also so that you can get your head around the other stuff that fits around your
writing and connects you to the world – preferably the parts that wants to buy
your work.
Illness, however, doesn’t
believe in media campaigns and schedules. It has ‘missing out syndrome’ pegged:
you can’t miss out if you’re not really interested.
The world, of course, goes
on without you and you might lose a little business. Then again, that can happen any day of
the week. I think I might have lost a job not so long ago over less than a
penny a word, although that might have been the flu addling my pitching
technique.
Where was I? Yes, don’t wait until you’re
unwell to stand back and take stock. Make time to regularly ask yourself the difficult questions:
1.
What sort of
writer have I become?
2.
What sort of
writer do I want to be?
3.
How am I
measuring my success?
That last point is all-important.
In business we’re told that the bottom line is profit and loss. Well, yes, as a
business; but not as a human being. If you’re so focused on leverage and margins and all the other stuff that can
make being in business so interesting that you don’t see the bigger picture,
you’re really missing out on something vital.
Writing makes writers what
they are, but it doesn’t make them who they are.
Put your pen down; turn off
your tablet, desktop, laptop, or smart phone. Live. Before you do, here’s
something to ponder:
There will never be another
day exactly like today, so what will you do to distinguish it from all the
others?
Look alive, people – spring
is coming. It’s time for some changes, and some more vitamin C.
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