Writers and Procrastination

We humans have perfected the art of procrastination. Writers practice it on a regular basis. 

We get a flash of an idea for a new book or essay or a children's story. That's right, it flashes in our mind. We can see it so clearly. We know we should start writing immediately but there are other things to be done. Time goes on. Idea fades until it finally gives up and expires. 

We have Chapter 1 finished and the outline completed for the rest of the book but we don't work on Chapter 2. We move on to something else. Maybe we come back, maybe we don't and Chapter 1 gives up and passes on.

We want to write a memoir about a personal situation. The desire to tell the story is strong but the ability to begin is so weak that the story never becomes reality. 

We're going to make a Family Stories book and give one to every family member we know. We'll write all those great stories our family tells around the holiday dinner table when so many gather. We think about writing those tales at every family get-together but we go home and decide to do it later. You know what happens to 'later.'  

We have good intentions and the writers in the examples above did, too. Instead of tackling the project right away, we put it off. Once you start putting it off, it rolls on like a snowball downhill. 

Why do we procrastinate? Fear of failure is one reason. Lack of confidence is another. Laziness. Yep, sorry to have to spell it out but it's true. Some writers decide the idea they had is just too much work to bother about. Habit. That's a bit scary because once you start procrastinating, it's all too easy to keep right on behaving that way. 

Look again at the list of reasons we procrastinate:

• Fear of failure
• 'Lack of confidence
• Laziness
• Habit

What's the cure? Do some thinking about the project you wanted to do but put off and put off. See if you can figure out why you never got going on something you truly wanted to do. Then take a big dose of writing! 

I like today's poster because it is so simple but says so much. It might be a good one to print and post near your computer as a reminder. If not now, when? If not you, who else is going to write the story?