Getting Back to Writing
Feb. 10th, 2019 01:44![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
autisticblueteamThe last fic I wrote (and published), prior to this month, was posted in late July. 7 months ago, there abouts. That’s the longest haitus I’ve taken from writing since I started up again when I joined the Red vs Blue fandom, back when I was pumping out a frankly ridiculous amount of writing on a regular basis. I honestly don’t know what’s contributed to this haitus the most, though I can pin it on a few things. I had other projects to work on that took up time, I’ve had to deal with some health issues, my anxiety about writing... the state of fandom itself.
But I’m back to writing and I’m hoping the break will have done me some good, long-term.
It hasn’t been that I haven’t had ideas—I’ve had a few, not to mention some old ideas I’d love to get back to. But fandom has been shifting for a while; it’s been different since 14 aired but since 16 and the tumblr mess, it’s not gotten any more familiar. It happens, it’s how things go, but change is messy for me so it’s taken me a while to adjust I suppose. So here I am: trying to adjust, and trying to start tackling some ingrained issues I’ve had for a while.
Anxiety about my writing is nothing new, but I’ve been leaving it relatively unchallenged for a long time. Readership, comments, notes, so on and on, the numbers game. Since transitioning to writing 70%+ femslash it’s become more noticeable than ever and it probably had something to do with my haitus. I get worried about the numbers, so I get anxious about posting. I end up in this weird limbo of wanting to be noticed, but being terrified of being noticed—its what contributes to my anxiety around commenting and interacting with people just as much as it does the same for my writing. And so I don’t post, or I don’t write, or I feel bad if I do and the cycle continues around and around...
Yeah, I need to start challenging that.
I love writing. It’s my thing. And I love sharing it. I can’t say the numbers won’t ever bother me at all but I need to work past it because I still want to share it. I still have ideas! I still want to write them and explore them and share them with however many others. And at the moment, I think that it’s been stopping me doing that as easily as I’d like.
So I guess that’s the mission/resolution for this year: challenge my relationship with the numbers, write what I like and in turn, try to get more comfortable with fandom interaction again in the new forms it’s taking. I’ve curated my dashboard a bit better, I’m trying to kick the writing gears back into action with F/F and I’m hoping to interact a bit more on a few levels. But one step at a time.
I’ve let the anxiety dig in and now I’ve got to work to dig it back out.
But I’m back to writing and I’m hoping the break will have done me some good, long-term.
It hasn’t been that I haven’t had ideas—I’ve had a few, not to mention some old ideas I’d love to get back to. But fandom has been shifting for a while; it’s been different since 14 aired but since 16 and the tumblr mess, it’s not gotten any more familiar. It happens, it’s how things go, but change is messy for me so it’s taken me a while to adjust I suppose. So here I am: trying to adjust, and trying to start tackling some ingrained issues I’ve had for a while.
Anxiety about my writing is nothing new, but I’ve been leaving it relatively unchallenged for a long time. Readership, comments, notes, so on and on, the numbers game. Since transitioning to writing 70%+ femslash it’s become more noticeable than ever and it probably had something to do with my haitus. I get worried about the numbers, so I get anxious about posting. I end up in this weird limbo of wanting to be noticed, but being terrified of being noticed—its what contributes to my anxiety around commenting and interacting with people just as much as it does the same for my writing. And so I don’t post, or I don’t write, or I feel bad if I do and the cycle continues around and around...
Yeah, I need to start challenging that.
I love writing. It’s my thing. And I love sharing it. I can’t say the numbers won’t ever bother me at all but I need to work past it because I still want to share it. I still have ideas! I still want to write them and explore them and share them with however many others. And at the moment, I think that it’s been stopping me doing that as easily as I’d like.
So I guess that’s the mission/resolution for this year: challenge my relationship with the numbers, write what I like and in turn, try to get more comfortable with fandom interaction again in the new forms it’s taking. I’ve curated my dashboard a bit better, I’m trying to kick the writing gears back into action with F/F and I’m hoping to interact a bit more on a few levels. But one step at a time.
I’ve let the anxiety dig in and now I’ve got to work to dig it back out.
