For the past couple of days, I’ve been a grumpy sourpuss – which is probably relatively entertaining to the outsider looking in because I usually run on full-steam THIS IS THE BEST DAY EVER. Grumpy looks a lot more like a scowling, nothing will ever be fun again with a serious up tick in the frequency of my more sailor-like speech patterns.
I find during my bad moods that I want absolutely nothing to do with whatever my brain tells me that I should write. That blog post I had planned for today for my new weekly series, “Unsolicited Advice Fridays”…nope. A chapter or even a measly paragraph for my book…definitely not.
I struggle to eek out a couple hundred words. My inner writer is like a teenager crossing their arms and giving that masterfully condescending stare down of you can’t tell me how to live my life.
And I have absolutely no idea how to deal with my angsty, obstinate teenage writer self.
I beat myself up for not having material lined up to hit publish on. For procrastinating. For having too many social events on my calendar instead of more writing dates with myself.
Have you ever tried to tell a teenager how they did it all wrong in the first place? I’m betting that tactic didn’t you and your cause very far.
Turns out teenagers – metaphorical and otherwise- don’t respond well to being told “here’s how you could have made better choices two days ago to make your situation less shitty right now.” An empathetic this sucks and you’re going to figure out how to fix it seems to go a lot further.
I know that I have to have compassion for myself when I’m in a rough mood, but it’s hard. For now, jotting down a few words, hitting publish, and going to bed is about the best I can do.
Don’t worry, Unsolicited Advice Fridays will kick off next Friday, and with any luck I’ll toss in some of my grouchy sailor sass to spice things up a bit.
For tonight, I’m taking flossing and removing eye makeup as a win for the day.
It’s the small things.