I like writing and recording music.

I like writing fiction.

I like making games.

Why do I never get anywhere fast with any of them?

I think I’ve stumbled across the reason why.

Mostly it boils down to not being able to accept the output of my effort for what it is and moving on to the next project or song. Hell, it’s kept me from finishing another novel for something like fifteen years, and I’ve written, on average, a song a year since I took up this recording thing. As for games, I’ve started any number of projects since Derelict, but I always seem to see the end result as not being worth the effort of doing it.

On Dean Wesley Smith’s site, I ran across Heinlein’s Rules For Writing:

1. You must write.

2. You must finish what you write.

3. You must refrain from rewriting, except to editorial order.

4. You must put the work on the market.

5. You must keep the work on the market until it is sold.

And I realized that I was a miserable failure at following these rules. I am bound up in the thought that my crap is really crap and no one will enjoy it, which really is crap, if you think about it.

DWS states, over and over again, the first big step to becoming a professional writer is to write and submit and don’t think about it too much. Just do it, like Nike. And well, I think about it too much. And certainly, I apply that thinking to all of my endeavors.

I’m working up my New Years Resolution right now, probably the first one I will ever have made in earnest, and I’m definitely going to keep those rules in mind as I do it. I’ve created a fairly comfortable life just going with the flow. Time to push it in a direction I want it to go, for a change.