News and another Overwhelm Post

So first off, NEWS! 

I have my first-ever solo Dungeons and Dragons adventure out for sale now! https://www.dmsguild.com/product/302673/Swordsbreak-Mine

An abandoned, hallucination-causing mine is creating chaos for a small town. When the village children begin to go missing, adventurers are called in to stop the beast lurking in the dark. Long forgotten in the mountains, Swordsbreak Mine hungers for a feast.

Swordsbreak Mine is a complete dungeon ready for use in any campaign or as a stand alone one-shot game for level 4-6 characters. This adventure was made to help fill in any campaign or side-quest needed during your own game. 

I also have a new post up on Speculative Chic all about building a backstory for your next character in your Dungeons and Dragons game. http://speculativechic.com/2020/02/12/5-tips-for-your-dungeons-dragons-characters-backstory/

Now on to the post! 

Overwhelm and the Nothing 

Flopped on the couch as I watch another episode of NailedIt on Netflix at 7am on Sunday, I glance at the 7-page to-do list I created just a few hours ago. I curl up tighter under my blanket and the cat sprawled out on top of me adjusts herself ever so slightly. I pull out my phone, order Door Dash and don’t move from my spot until my food arrives. 

Another weekend gone in the blink of a Netflix marathon. 

Despite all my talk of dealing with overwhelm and conquering that beast, this still happens to me. Not nearly as much as it used to but I still struggle with it. So I thought it would be helpful to share some of the tips and tricks that are helping me. 

1. Make an “Uncomfortable Chart”

I got this little bit of awesomeness from Yes and Yes but it’s really made tasks I dread into something a little less miserable. This chart is simply a place where you track tasks you don’t want to do, for whatever reason, and when you complete the task, you get a sticker! It’s amazing how much my brain loves that sticker reward and how many annoying phone calls I will make to get that little cat sticker into my chart. 

2. Batch similar tasks. 

If I have a bunch of tasks that require a similar skill or place and do them at the same time. If you’re at the grocery store and realize you need batteries too, grab them. If you’re stuck in traffic and have the capacity to make some phone calls, do them together (but don’t drive distracted!), if you need to respond to a ton of emails, go into at once. This helps me feel a bit more organized and less annoyed when I finish one task, like cleaning the bathtub and then groan as I realize I didn’t clean the bathroom sink. If I do it all at once it’s done and over with and out of my brain. 

3. Set a timer. 

There’s an app on my phone called Forest where you can plant a tree or flower and it will grow for a designated amount of time. If you navigate away from the app then the plant dies. It’s a great way to get me off my phone because of the guilt I feel about a digital plant’s death on my hands. When I am really having a hard time, I set a timer for 5 minutes and do one thing on my list for that long. A lot of times, once the timer goes off, I keep working. If I don’t then at least I’ve done something. This is especially helpful on really bad days when the list seems too insurmountable. 

4. One thing. 

Sometimes there is one task that is holding up everything else or taking up the most space in your brain. If you can take care of that one task, it’s like a domino and suddenly everything else opens back up. For me, this has been something as simple as taking my car in to go new tires which then makes me feel safe driving to the pet store to get the fancy cat food for my nearly-toothless old lady cat. Find the pin that will open up everything else.

5. Kindness. 

The absolutely hardest thing for me is to be nice to myself. I am not kind to myself at all. Especially when I am in the middle of an overwhelm attack. I beat myself up for everything and every possible issue. This is the toughest task for me but also the one that has helped the most. When I no longer berate myself, I feel more capable of getting tasks done. If I am not spending a lot of my energy yelling at myself, I have a whole lot more energy left to tackle those lists. 

It’s important to remember that no day will always be perfect. There will be times you get nothing done or when the world knocks you down. It’s okay to rest, recover and then get back on your feet.

Overwhelm

Staring at my to-do list and my head starts spinning. How am I going to get all of this done? Why have I let so many things go undone? The overwhelm swarms over me and instead of doing even one thing on that list, I drop onto the couch, order pizza for delivery and zone out into Nailed It while guilt slowly consumes me. 

Overwhelm is something I struggle with constantly. I love making lists, but a lot of times those same lists make me feel totally overwhelmed by the number of things there are to do. No matter how organized or together you feel like your life might be, there are times that things don’t get done. Everyone has dozens of what I call life admin tasks, things like: clean out the fridge, get the oil changed in the car, make that dentist appointment. These are tasks that don’t repeat all that often but they add up and are unstopping. 

Currently my to-do list has about 75 things on it. When I look at all of those things, I often feel it’s hopeless and start to berate myself for being so lazy and useless. That doesn’t help the situation and just leads to a depression spiral that eats me alive. 

So what do you do to handle that feeling? 

First thing is to stop beating yourself up. The most important person you talk to every single day is yourself. How are you treating yourself? If you’re anything like me, you’re not real nice with your mental chatter. 

Everyone has tasks they don’t get to. That to-do list is never going to be totally empty. It’s okay to have tasks on there. It’s alright if there are a lot of things to be done. Take a deep breath and forgive yourself. As much as you want to, you can’t change the past. You can’t go back and do things differently. What you can do is work on today. 

Next, I find setting a timer and trying to deal with one task. A lot of times, those tasks I’ve been putting off because they seem too big, take just a few minutes. Set a timer for 5-10 minutes and focus on a task. Good things for this are: responding to emails, calling to schedule an appointment of some sort, starting or folding laundry, cleaning a small area. 

Focus on that task until you reach the end of it. 

Now celebrate that little win. 

Your entire list is like this, and that list is never going to end. You will always have things to do and problems, struggles, new things popping up, things will surprise you, you will mess up. It’s alright. You’re human and that means imperfect. 

Now, how can you prioritize, figure out a system to help with managing these tasks and not forever wallowing in overwhelm? 

Well, I’m going to be sharing several posts about that because that is something I struggle with a lot. I think it’s especially difficult as a creative person trying to manage general life admin tasks, day job tasks, family, friends, fun, and my creative projects all at once. It can feel like an out of control disaster a lot of the time. 

I haven’t found a flawless solution. I still struggle with things (like making that damn dentist appointment) but I am slowly finding things that work, that help or that even remove some of these tasks, or at least automate them. 

The Realities Of Saying No

Last week I had to make a hard decision about my capacity and what I can and can’t keep doing while also taking care of myself.

I post about the importance of not letting the hustle run you ragged but I haven’t been practicing what I preach at all. I’ve taken on more and more projects without letting old projects go. What I’ve ended up with is a plate overflowing with to-dos and a brain overwhelmed with tasks.

Finding myself staying up late night after night to finish projects and stressing about where I was going to find the time to do things. I still loved everything I was doing but I was doing it all poorly. So I had to face the reality that something had to go.

It sucks. There’s no real way around that but looking towards 2019 and the goals I have, I knew that things had to change.

So as December kicks off and 2018 begins to wind down, I encourage you to look at all your projects and see how they match with your goals and, more importantly, how they match with taking care of yourself.

Make hard decisions and be honest with yourself.

The Final Countdown

We are in the home stretch of NaNoWriMo! The end is in sight and the words are building up by the day. I love that NaNoWriMo can show you what a daily writing habit can do (or a binge writing habit) and give you ways to track your words. I’m really fond of the graphs that you’re provided with on NaNoWriMo.

So let’s talk about the future. Come December 1, what’s the plan?

If you said send this to publishers and agents, please, please, please do not do that. Your NaNoWriMo novel needs time to become a polished gem. This is likely a very ugly first draft. There’s nothing wrong with that and it’s how a majority of writers create. The thing is to not let go and send this story into the world while it’s still a draft like this.

The writing process is very individual but here’s what I do when I finish NaNoWriMo:

1.     I set it aside.

I usually don’t look at it for the month of December. I let it sit on my harddrive and ignore it.

2.     I read over it.

I download my novel as a pdf and read it on my ipad where I can’t take notes or adjust the words. It forces me to actually read from beginning to end.

3.     I make notes of things to change.

Most of the time I have big changes to make with these stories. I mean, giant plot changes for the major points of the story.

4.     I start big and work smaller.

Starting with the biggest changes makes it easier to get through the work. There’s no reason to worry over commas when I am going to rewrite a third of the book. Dealing with the big picture problems gives me a pretty draft to come back to.

5.     Get feedback.

I send the cleaned up version out to beta readers or friends and get opinions. It’s helpful to have people outside of the process give their opinons.

Those are some simple tips for handling after NaNoWriMo. Just really do not send your NaNoWriMo draft out to publishers or agents on December 1. Please.

NaNoWriMo Halfway Point

We’ve now hit the halfway point in NaNoWriMo, yay! That means you’re either still riding high and feeling great about that word count, or feeling a bit dejected and behind. So let’s talk about that a little.

It’s really easy during NaNoWriMo to get so overwhelmed and feel so behind that you give up entirely. I’m not going to hit 50,000 words so what does it matter? Is the exact thought that runs through my head about this time of November.

But here’s the thing, even if you don’t hit 50,000 words, you’ve still got the chance to do something amazing: write. No matter how many or how few words you actually put onto page during November, you’ll have more words than when you started. (Assuming you wrote even a single word, which I’m sure you did!)

Maybe it’s not 50,000 words. Maybe it’s only 2500 words and you feel horrible for ‘failing’ and ‘not winning’ the race to 50k. But you’ve already won by writing in the first place. Writing isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon and not hitting 50k doesn’t mean you’re not a writer, it just means you didn’t hit 50,000 words.

Don’t let the idea of failing, the thoughts swirling around your head, destroy your writing. You are a writer, so keep going.

Nanowrimo Tips

This Thursday we jump into the start of November and the thrill of Nanowrimo. For those who aren’t familiar with it, NaNoWriMo is the annual National Novel Writing Month that takes place every November. The goal is simple: write 50,000 words during the month of November. 

Every year, tons of people jump into the challenge. It’s a great way to find a supportive community of writers and learn more about your writing process. However, writing 50,000 words in a month can be a huge challenge, so here are some tips to help set you up for success. 

1.    Let the people around you know. 

Let your friends, family, partners, etc. know that you’re going into this challenge. Ask them to maybe help out with dishes or house-cleaning duties for the month. Volunteer to then take your share in December. 

2.    Prep food. 

One of the things I always struggle with the most during Nanowrimo is meal planning. I want to just write so I end up ordering out a lot and that gets expensive and unhealthy. So what I’ve started doing is freezing meals and finding simple recipes that I know are basic, fast and filling. It saves me money and keeps my brain better fed. 

3.    Schedule time. 

Don’t just expect time to fall into your lap come November. Have a game plan on what time of day you’re going to write. Is it better for you to write in the morning before work or after work? Maybe you can write during lunch? What about stopping at a coffee shop or library on the way home? Find that time, mark it on your calendar and keep at it. 

4.    Write extra when you can. 

Some days you’re probably not going to hit your writing goal. Plan for that and on days when you have extra time or inspiration, write extra. I always try to write extra in the first part of the month when my energy is the highest so I have a buffer for the slow days. 

5.    Reach out to the community. 

Nanowrimo has an incredibly active community on their website, on twitter, tumblr, facebook and pretty much any social media site. Don’t be afraid to reach out to others. Relationships with other writers is great and will help you outside of Nanowrimo too. 

Writing with a day job

Most of the writers I know manage some kind of a day job for at least 40 hours a week, but sometimes a lot more than that, as well as all of their writing projects. It can be really hard to figure out ways to manage that and in my case, I don't even have a spouse or kids to complicate my schedule further. What I want to share today are some tips and tricks I’ve found to help manage my energy while spending my day working.

1.     Taking a serious look at what my schedule actually looks like.

 I know that it may sound a little silly but actually conceptualizing the times that you are committed to anything related to your day job is vital. If your commute is an hour in the morning then you probably can't try and squeeze in an extra 45 minutes of writing without sacrificing some major sleep. If your job allows for remote working then maybe you can easily fit that in first thing in the morning.

Know the reality of your job: do you actually get to take a lunch break where you could write? It's a really vital part of figuring out what times are even available for you to write. Know when the busy seasons are for your day job. If you work in financials than the end of fiscal year is probably going to be a really stressful time for you. By knowing that, you can try to mitigate the number of projects or external creative due dates you have during that time. Be aware of the most stressful times in your job if it follows a pattern like that and try to work around them.

2.     What are your priorities?

Figuring out what projects are the most important to you can really help make sure that when you do you have time to work on your creative endeavors you actually know what to work on. For a long time I spent a lot of energy spinning my wheels trying to figure out what project I was even supposed to be working on or wanted to work on next. I lost a lot of time by not having my priority set. Now I know what projects I have coming up and what projects I really want to accomplish. It really helps make sure that the limited time I do have is used well.

3.     Figure out what your energy levels are through the day.

Some people get out of bed and can immediately write. Some people can stay up all night writing. Some people hit their peak energy in the afternoons. Figuring out how your energy cycle works give me a huge help. It also can potentially point out some problems in what you're eating or your activity. I noticed that I tended to get really sleepy in the afternoons which lead to me realizing that I probably shouldn't be having giant pots of pasta for lunch every day. It made me sleepy. Now I'm perkier in the afternoons and I've also found that I can get a lot of writing done during my lunch break at work.

While I still occasionally work in the mornings, I found that I am a lot more likely to use the mornings to read and ease into my day. Figure out what works for you rather than trying to work against your body’s natural rhythms.

4.     Take care of your body.

This one always makes me roll my eyes a little bit but it is really important to remember to take care of your body. Now I am by no means saying that you need to be a gym rat or anything like that. I know that for me if I'm not eating at least some fruits and vegetables and getting a little bit of exercise I am a lot less productive and creative. If I'm really struggling, I try to get out and take a quick 10-minute walk around the parking lot. This also means that I try to pay more attention to how I'm sitting and the ergonomics of my desk. It’s not a sexy or exciting tip but this really make a huge difference.

5.     Know what you're giving up.

Part of embracing creative endeavors outside of your day job mean sacrificing things. For me, it mostly means sacrificing video games and TV shows. I am woefully behind on every pop-culture series and I haven't played a game through to completion in years. I've given those things up for the most part because I know that my energy is better spent trying to accomplish my goals. I had to realize what sacrifices needed to be made in order to continue writing in a way that could potentially build a career. It sucks and a lot of the time I still fail and get sucked into playing the Sims. But remembering what I'm working towards and what that requires helps me get back on track a lot easier than it would other hand.

Most writers are managing some kind of a day job and everybody’s schedule and requirements will make that look very different. I'm incredibly privileged to have a remarkable amount of free time available to me because of where I am in life. What works for me may or may now work for you but I really think that stepping back and being thoughtful and deliberate about the choices you're making with your time and energy make a world of difference.

The Power of Routines

One of the things that I think is so easy to forget about any kind of habit or hobby is the importance of building a routine. Routines are the backbone of any habit. They make or break getting things and when they fall apart, well... it's easy to fall off track. Simply, a routine is a series of steps or actions followed regularly.

I speak from experience because when I started a new day job at the start of the summer all of my routines fell apart and I've been trying to piece them together again. First I denied that my routines would need to change and then reality set in hard. So I've been trying to rebuild these routines and create a pattern to my life. So here's some of the things that have been helping me rebuild the scaffolding around my life and my creativity.

1. Re-Establish Themed Days

I work on a lot of different projects. I run a podcast, Ink and Brain Monsters; I help run a Dungeons and Dragons Twitch channel, Roll for Trouble, and I write. Not to mention the daily life habits that creep in and take up a surprising amount of time every day. It's hard to managed all of it and not let a ball drop somewhere along the way. What's helped me is coming up with specific days to focus on a project. I work on my podcast every Tuesday. That could mean I record an episode, edit an episode or write up a script but that's what I try to do every Tuesday. By trying to give certain days themes it helps with the overwhelm because I know I have the routine of themed days to get work done.

2. Track My Time

I'm trying to pay attention to how I'm actually spending my time. What I've found is that if I don't go out and do something in the day then by 2:00 I am asleep on my feet. Learning that pattern has helped me realize the best time for me to work out or go on a walk is lunch time. I'm trying to build routines around my body's natural patterns and not against them.

3. Start Small

One of the best things I have done is started small. I give myself 10-20 minutes per task and that has started building these routines into place again. It's strange feeling like I'm starting over and it's easy to get discouraged and overwhelmed, but by starting with manageable chunks of time I feel like I am getting a handle on them.

Those are the three main things I'm doing right now to try to rebuild my routines. It's all in small steps and something that I am still struggling with, but I think it's important and I'm going to keep at it!

The Importance of Rest

The Importance of Rest

The idea of all-nighters lingers for a lot of creative people who work a day job. Your passion project is fit into the hours you can carve out and a lot of that time happens at night or early in the morning. When you’re passionate about your work and driven to reach your goals, it’s easy to forgo sleep in the pursuit of writing.

For a while I definitely did this. I would stay up until 11 or 12 working on projects then get up at 4 or 5 to write before I went to my day job. Because I have a hard time sleeping anyways, I was getting maybe 2-3 hours of sleep a night for years.

Eventually it all caught up to me and I really think that lack of sleep was part of my big breakdown a few years ago. That moment of losing my ability to even think really made me step back and rest. I couldn’t think of ideas to write so I went to bed early. I slept so much that year.

Now that I am back upright and building my path as a creative once again, I’m presented again with the question of how important is sleep versus working on my novels?

For me, sleep has become priority number 1. I try to go to bed and get up at the same times roughly every day. I take naps when I am struggling to keep my eyes open. I take care of my physical needs when I am exhausted.

But something that is easy to forget is that even if you are going to bed at reasonable times and sleeping, are you actually resting? What I mean is do you take a break from working? Do you go out and have fun with friends? Watch a TV show you like, read a book just for fun? Are you allowing your brain breaks besides just when your eyes are closed?

It’s so easy to get sucked into the hustle all the time, no breaks, mentality but it’s important to understand that your brain deserves breaks too. If you work all the time you are wearing your ability to think down. You are emptying out that creative well without giving it a chance to refill.

So this week, try to give yourself even just 30 minutes of doing nothing or doing something just for fun. Give yourself a chance to rest.

The imposter in the mirror

Imposter syndrome is something that I feel like I've always had a little bit of. I didn't really know what it was called until the last five years or so. I frequently have felt like I don't belong or deserve the success that I've had. I downplay my accomplishments and struggle to take a compliment. When I'm in a room with my amazing, talented friends who have written dozens of books I feel like I don't belong there. I tell myself I am a complete fraud who has no business being in that room.

That feeling makes me turn inwards, fall quiet, and try to disappear into the background. I stop trying to join in on conversations and instead I sit in silence and wait to be invited to participate. When that does happen, I answer briefly then fall silent again. Hearing my own words, I take that as confirmation that I am a loser that no one no one likes and no one even wants here.

I don't write this as a pity party or as a way to for compliments, which I really do have a very hard time taking, instead I'm writing this to talk about the ways that I'm working on overcoming it. Maybe they'll hope you too and maybe sharing them will help me a little bit. So here are five things that I am doing to try to manage feeling like a fake.

1.     Remember that I'm still learning.

Yes, I've been around and trying to do this writing thing for a while but at the end of the day I am still learning. There's nothing wrong with that. Let me repeat that for myself there's nothing wrong with not knowing everything. Every time I start beating myself up for not knowing who someone is or what something means I remind myself the world of writing contains multitudes. I don't have to know the intricacies of every single piece of it right now. It’s okay to learn something from a conversation.

2.     My friends are my friends.

It's such a simple statement, but one of the worst things that happens when I'm feeling like a complete phony is that I start to doubt that any of my friends like me. I start thinking they're only keeping me around because I'm just so pathetic, or because they think I'm cute and want something from me or because I just don't have the heart to tell me to get lost. Pretty much all of my friends are very much tell-it-like-it-is people and I see them tell people to get lost or to leave them alone.

My friends are my friends because they like me. My friends want to hang out with me and make an effort to talk to me. I know that. So, when this challenge gets particularly loud I like to think of the quiet moments with my friends. The late-night conversations with just a small, intimate group. The foggy breakfast where we sit in silence over a cup of coffee but we are choosing each other’s company. Those are the moments speak the loudest against this particular monster.

3.     Your accomplishments don't have to look like everyone else's.

Success is a fickle thing that looks different for everybody. What counts as a success for me might not mean anything for you. It's so easy to get caught up in the comparison game. That thought loop of well so-and-so has 15 books out or well so-and-so is a best-selling author or even well so-and-so has 10,000 Twitter followers. Those are some of the arbitrary measurements that I've suddenly decided are a measurement of worth when before I haven't really cared about them or counted them as a success for me. But suddenly when I'm feeling insecure every little thing becomes a game of numbers and I always come up short. For me, it's important to remember what my goals are and that I am taking steps towards my vision of success, not anyone else's.

4.     Get out of your head.

Imposter syndrome frequently feel makes me feel like I’m locked inside my own head. I can't get out of head, and my thoughts and feelings of inadequacy turn into a spiraling silence before I finally flee in humiliation, all without saying a word to my friends of course. What I found helps me in these moments is to ground myself in the world around me. Mostly I do that through a very mundane task like naming every single in animate object I can see. Chair. Table. Glass. Plate. Etc. The simple act of slowing down and forcing my ring to focus on what is tangible instead of the swirling thoughts in my head gives me that instant to pull myself out of this spiral.

5.     Ask for help.

This is by far the hardest one. Honestly, it's still the one that I struggle with the most. I think I've actually done this once and it was a huge help. It was terrifying leading up to that moment of admitting how I felt. What makes it slightly less terrifying is to mention it before you're in the moment. I know that DragonCon triggers my imposter syndrome like nothing else so I reach out to a few friends before the convention even starts and tell them.

I don't need them to play chaperone or guard dog, just knowing someone else is aware that you're struggling can be a huge relief. Usually the person that you're telling this to will ask you how they can help you, and that answer varies widely from person-to-person. What helps me is to just check in. I don't need someone to talk to me every second of every day but if you haven't seen me or if I haven't spoken word in the hour we've been sitting together just checking and see how I'm doing, just a simple ‘Hey what panel are you going to next?’ Can be enough to help me out of the spiral.

These are some of the ways that I am working on dealing with my imposter syndrome and the strategies that I came up with to handle this year’s DragonCon. I'm technically writing this before the convention starts so we’ll see how they go. I’ll update on the success rate!

Almost every writer I know struggles with this but you're not alone in your feelings. Take some time to learn what best helps you and then implement the strategies. Really try to figure it out before you find yourself in the moment because trying to strategize while you're in the self-doubt spiral is not going to go super well. Take a deep breath, find the methods that work for you, and get on out there. The world is waiting for you.