Having a lot to say and being paralyzed by the accompanying mental chaos is almost worse than having nothing to say. I’m sitting here at my laptop not wanting in the worst way to waste your time, but figuring I’d better say something or you’ll forget I even exist (if you haven’t already).
I have three, four, or five areas of writing I’m currently supposed to be working in, depending on how I categorize them. If I break them out for you, it looks like this:
If I look at things from the standpoint of there being three areas of writing to focus on, they are two ghostwriting content sites, which call for non-fiction blog posts, and my own stuff, which is mostly two fiction and one non-fiction works-in-progress (WIP).
If I break things up into four areas, changing up the way I organize my projects, this is what I get: two fiction WIPs — one novel set in the tenth century and one novel set in the twenty-first century, and two non-fiction projects — short pieces I ghostwrite for others and a parenting ebook under my own name.
Separating my writing into five areas organizes my writing by individual project — one tenth-century novel, one twenty-first-century novel, one parenting ebook, one ghostwriting site that presents all different kinds of jobs, and one ghostwriting site that wants only blog posts.
The simple act of looking at what I just wrote makes my brain want to explode. I can’t help wondering, did Stephen King or J.K. Rowling (two authors for whom I have immense respect) ever deal with this sort of dilemma?
So, I drink coffee and dither and start to truly understand the phrase, “paralysis by analysis.” Do I work on one project at a time, full-time, to the exclusion of all else until I finish it, or divide my writing time among all the projects?
Decisions, decisions. I need to decide on my next step. I’ll let you know how that goes.
Rosanne Licata 