Writing is the Drug

"I felt like one of those people who put plates on sticks and spin them, running up and down the row of plates, spinning, spinning, spinning and dreading the inevitable crash." Devon Monk

I used the same imagery to describe a friend's daily situation just yesterday. Bizarre. I hadn't heard or read anyone using it in years and there it it, right after I'd used it myself. It's weird when that happens.

Anyway. She also says in her post, "I see other writers zoom past me on fleet feet while I turtle on with no finish line in sight. Plod. Plod. Plod. Turtle. Turtle. Turtle." Boy, can I relate to this. I'm feeling a little tired lately, and the urge to couch it instead of work on the book is sooooooo overwhelming. But I need to work so that I don't admonish myself, which is far more draining for me than working on the book.

I was visiting Lilith a little while ago and was delighted to read her post today, which so describes what different parts of the writing process are like physically for a writer, as well as mentally. I've always felt silly telling someone that a particularly good writing day was physically exhausting. They look at you like you're nuts because you are sitting, typing away, and it doesn't look all that exhausting. But it soooo is.

And different parts of the process, using different areas of the brain, so affect us differently. Can I use the word "different" one more time, maybe? Anyway, editing is easier for me than creation. Though creation is like a high I get into the zone, like with any high, it's draining when I come back down. You can fly but be prepared for the invevitable crash.

What helps with the crash? More of the drug, of course. So I keep coming back to the writing again and again. I do get withdrawal symptoms just as any drug addict does when they are away from their drug for too long. Nightmares, feeling shaky, feeling restless, feeling irritable, nervousness, on and on.

Which brings me to her link to this post. Her description here:

"I sometimes think that state–the focused wonder–is the drug that keeps me coming back to writing. Because it feels so goddamn good. Sometimes, the fierce relaxation of being really in the groove and going along, each sentence unreeling to thread me through the labyrinth, takes on that aspect of working wonder and it’s those times, my friends, where I feel like I’m flying over the page."

That feeling is what I'm talking about. It's so hard to describe, and the psychological aspect of it is what brings on the physical part, because I'm certain that as writers our brains fill with all those feel good drugs, all that dopamine, when the synapses are really firing along.

Anyway, back to it for me. I need to finish this book, and thank goodness, because I need my fix ;)