Finding time – Writing Nightmare #7

If you are a writer, you know that inspiration comes suddenly and without warning. You may be on the bus, at work, at Church. Inspiration doesn’t ask for permission, it pops up in your head and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

There are a lot of different things that can trigger that feeling of inspiration: a conversation overheard, a landscape, an object in a shop window, the face of a passer by… or nothing at all. And when this happens, your fingers start aching for a keyboard or a piece of paper and a pen.

You have to write! You have to jot down that incredible idea before it’s too late and the impression of the moment is gone. The need you are experiencing is almost a physical pain.

The nightmare is that you don’t always have the time or the opportunity to make capital of those moments. Why? Because usually life gets in the way.

Maybe you are driving your car and it’s not a good idea to leave the steering wheel to grab a notebook; maybe you are at work and your boss wouldn’t like the idea of a “creative break”; maybe you are talking to someone who would consider you rude if you run away in search of your laptop.

But this is not the worst possible situation, because you can write a few key words on a piece of paper or your mobile, something that will help you to recall the situation and the feeling, and write later.

The worst situation is when you don’t have time immediately and you know you won’t have time later, maybe for many days. That is when it’s more difficult to suppress the urge to write on the spot, no matter what.

This is happening to me quite often lately. A few weeks ago I started a temporary job (two months more or less) in the same company I worked for the past year. I am happy about it, because I was growing crazy by constantly being home doing nothing, but my new schedule leaves little time for writing. On the other hand, being in a new workplace, surrounded by new people is something that supply a writer’s mind with a lot of new material!

Moreover my free hours (as every one else’s) are full of other things, such as eating, sleeping, going to the laundry, looking after the renovation of our new apartment…

That’s why the longstanding question (is there something we can do to balance life and writing?) keep rolling in my head. Probably the answer is yes. There must be a way.

If I found out exactly what it is, I’ll tell you. So… stay tuned. In the meantime I’m going to keep writing a paragraph here and a few sentence there every time I have a few minutes.

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