I’m in the doldrums. That space where, as a writer, I stall for a bit before the wind picks up and I’m sailing fast again.

Last week, I finished a story. One I had to push hard to reach The End. Adrenaline helped, because I was staring at an immoveable deadline. As soon as I wrapped up production and uploaded the sucker, I revised my plan and my bullet journal, and aimed at the next couple of hard deadlines, but then the wind died down. Ugh.

Lots of things are percolating, bubbling up like a fictional witch’s green, smelly goop. Stories I want to write, stories I have to edit. I took a bit of “me” time to hang with my daughter, which included a couple of days of shopping and junking. I played at cleaning up my workspace. Now, I have to get serious. Make myself afraid I’ll miss my dates. That’s the only way to motivate myself. I am an adrenaline junkie, and I’ve convinced myself over the years that I’m most creative when I’m riding that high. Huh. I need to change that internal narrative, because someday, I do want to be that plodding, methodical writer, who has “balance” in her life—not that I’ve ever met her.

Now, so many days have passed since I revamped my plan, that I have to revamp again, increasing my daily writing and editing page counts, in order to meet those hard dates. Here goes again…

Offer your thoughts for how I can goad myself into pushing through this slump to get back on track, and I’ll offer two stories, to two winners, readers’ choices!