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So for a week now I've been trying to write these two 500 word essays that I need to submit to this website that reviews books.
I want to write the essays. I'm a decent writer. But because the outcome matters to me, I've been putzing around, freaking out that the result isn't "perfect" and not finishing the work and moving on. It's as if I feel that not doing the work will somehow result in a perfect product, whereas anything I actually do will be inherently flawed. This is the kind of stupid attitude that Jennifer Michael Hecht, one of my favorite poets, talks about in a poem where she describes applying for grants after the deadline has passed.
It's silly, really, because either I can do it or I can't, and procrastinating isn't going to change that, or improve the impression I make one little bit. But some part of my brain is completely unconvinced. I've done five drafts already, fired up email to send them twice - and still not sent the things. Procrastination may soon be getting another picture in the dictionary, a tasteful little headshot I've got here that I'll send in to the dictionary ... any day now.
I want to write the essays. I'm a decent writer. But because the outcome matters to me, I've been putzing around, freaking out that the result isn't "perfect" and not finishing the work and moving on. It's as if I feel that not doing the work will somehow result in a perfect product, whereas anything I actually do will be inherently flawed. This is the kind of stupid attitude that Jennifer Michael Hecht, one of my favorite poets, talks about in a poem where she describes applying for grants after the deadline has passed.
It's silly, really, because either I can do it or I can't, and procrastinating isn't going to change that, or improve the impression I make one little bit. But some part of my brain is completely unconvinced. I've done five drafts already, fired up email to send them twice - and still not sent the things. Procrastination may soon be getting another picture in the dictionary, a tasteful little headshot I've got here that I'll send in to the dictionary ... any day now.
