What’s Wrong With Me?
As I write this, I am temporarily blind in my left eye from a migraine headache.
Naturally, I’m wondering why I didn’t simply shoot a quick email to let everyone know I wouldn’t be able to blog today. But that seemed like the wimp’s way out. I mean, I’ve been getting migraine headaches since I was a teenager, so if I’d cancelled every little thing over a stupid headache, I would’ve missed out on a lot of my life. So I pop a migraine pill and keep going.
But right now the pain is forcing me to take a good, long look at myself—which I really hate to do most of the time, but this weakened state forces me to endure that tiny part of myself that occasionally insists on self-reflection. So I go ahead and ask myself, am I so tied to my image of being a writer that I can’t pass up one opportunity to blog (i.e., blather about ME) in favor of taking better care of myself?
The short answer is clearly NO.
My need to show up for the Blog probably stems from that same part in me that is willing to persist in a business that does its best to reject me at every turn. It’s the same part that keeps me going year after year, the part that shrugs off the “R’ word, the part that gets excited about a new idea, a new contest, a new literary agency, a new trend. It’s the part that studies Publishers Marketplace every day to see what’s hot, what’s new, who’s sold, and it’s the part that keeps me sending my work out and keeps me at my desk, writing and re-writing and brainstorming and yes, blogging.
And I’m not the only one.
So why do we do it? Persistence? Patience? Insanity? All of the above?
It hurts to think about it too deeply right now, but whatever you call it, it’s that thing that keeps us going, keeps us writing, submitting and yes, blogging. Through headaches and rejections, we just keep going…and going…and going…
Hey, my headache’s gone!
Kate Carlisle is a Golden Heart Winner and American Title finalist who writes Romance, Mystery, and Young Adult fiction.
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I am glad you showed up. Even with your migraine, you wrote something I sure connected with.
I *so* hear you.
And I believe in you too. 🙂
🙂 d
LOL Maureen, I feel like we should be wearing a helmet and shoulder pads. But we’ll just keep going, no matter what!
Hi Chris – thanks sooo much! From your lips, dahling…
And that’s why you show up for the blog. So there.
Kate, well. You know. It might just be that…you’re really, really good and you know that it takes talent, persistence and luck. You so have talent. So what it will take for you is to be there when you luck comes knockin’. And you will. I know it.
It’s the Energizer Bunny syndrome, Kate! WE keep on moving forward even while SOME try to shove us back!!