It’s been so long since I’ve blogged, I almost forgot what a blog was. I will say that I have been struggling with same major mental health issues (and that is my first time ever mentioning my mental health or anything related to it online – cue hyperventilating). Just pulling myself out of the muck to do this blog post required a backhoe, but I figured, I have to start somewhere. So here I start…

The five biggest writing distractions. I have to narrow it down to five, huh? Number one for me lately is, as I’ve already mentioned, mental health. I’ve actually been struggling with some pretty deep depression for close to nine months now, but it’s gotten worse over the last two or so. I used to want to write but couldn’t make myself. Now I don’t want to. I know it’s temporary and I know it will pass. Eventually. One day, hopefully before the universe ends. But right now it sucks.

When I’m not fighting my brain, the number one distraction is my day job. Mostly in the form of, I spend nine hours or so on the computer at work, so when I get home, the last thing I want to do is get on the computer. I’m not sure if that’s really a distraction or not, but it keeps me from writing.

When I actually get to writing, those rare times, I get distracted by…the internet. Who’s surprised? Anyone, anyone? Bueller? I’m guessing no one else out there is ever distracted by the internet. I mean, no one else looks at pictures of baby elephants bathing, or cats jumping and missing their landings or dogs trying to walk in new booties or ALL of Pinterest. You lucky people with self control.

What else distracts me from writing? Oddly enough, the actual act of writing. I get so bogged down in wanting everything to be perfect that I don’t get much writing done. This sentence needs to be the best sentence ever written! Three hours later I have four words that mean going to the store…which are probably “going to the store.” It’s infuriating.

I also tend to get distracted by everything else I SHOULD be doing besides writing. Writing isn’t my day job. It’s not even a paying side job (yet). So every time I sit down to write I start thinking that I should be cleaning or doing laundry or spending time with my husband or working on any number of home improvement projects that are piling up. I need to just get over that. My husband tells me that all the time, I need to just go write.

So, those are my five biggest distractions from writing. What distracts you from the task at hand?

Check out the other Wednesday bloggers below:

Brownyn Green
Jess Jarman
Kellie St. James
Gwendolyn Cease
Kris Norris