Brave

I've only realised in the last couple of days how timely this theme is for me. My post from a few weeks ago is really telling me that I need to be brave and do something that might be considered reckless. I have some ideas. I'll let you know how I go!

For now though, here's my submission for this month.

Frustration

Sigh. I'm frustrated. I don't seem to be able to get over it either. I try to be positive, I really do, but at the moment I feel like I'm wasting time. I'm working, I'm even writing, but I don't feel like I'm achieving anything.

This all began to become obvious about three weeks ago. My Mum came to visit for the weekend and we went to see Ruben Guthrie, a play by Australian playwright and actor Brendan Cowell. I loved it. But I began to wonder why I wasn't writing plays myself. Or anything, really. I mean, I am writing, but nothing feels finished and I still have to go to my day job. I feel somehow trapped. Somewhere.

I wish writing was my day job but I have no idea how to get from here to there. And that, more than the fact that I'm not there yet, is what I'm frustrated about. I'm a proactive person. I like to have plans and implement them. I like to make decisions and act on them (for instance, when I moved away from Melbourne the time between me deciding to do so, and actually getting on a plane was about eight days, and it was only that long because I had to give notice at work). I've made some decisions about things I want to do in the near future, but I can't act on them yet. Patience is certainly not my strong point.

All that said, I do have some things to be positive about at the moment. I have received some wonderfully positive feedback from my teachers about a screenplay and a short story I have written; and a non-fiction piece I wrote last year is about to be published in Voiceworks.

So why am I complaining, I think. Well, I'm just impatient I guess.

Patience and Pebbles

I've felt frustrated this week. On Tuesday or Wednesday I went to get in the shower in the morning after writing for forty minutes or so; it was raining outside and I thought about how lovely it would be to stay at home, inside, writing all day. But, like every other week day, I had to go to work. I felt sad about it for most of the day. It was probably quite an immature response: to mope and pout all day.

I emailed a good friend of mine to have a whinge, and she offered the following advice, passed on from her mother: "People who move mountains start by moving very small stones".

And so I am going to practice patience and start with the pebbles.

The monthly project is due tomorrow.

Image by cocoi_m.