Vacation

I mentioned before that over the past few days I was traveling out on vacation. I continued to write, but lacking time and a computer, the pieces I wrote are notably shorter than they usually are. I find it doubtful to be honest that any of them actually reached my 500 word goal. But that honestly doesn't concern me. It's the daily part of writing that I am more concerned with. 500 is just a goal to give me something to work towards so that I don't just write down a haiku and call it a day. Daily writing is the thing that will get me going on writing.

But even with having written every day while I was on vacation, coming back from vacation makes me not want to "get back to work" as it were. I mentioned yesterday about how there are days where I just don't want to write. I'd rather just kick back and not really do anything, or play games, or watch youtube, or whatever. Today is a day like that. Coming back from vacation is like that for me. I can't entirely explain why, but it's kind of like I need a vacation from my vacation. And part of that means that I don't particularly want to write.

But again, I know I have to do it anyway. That's kind of a key piece to a lot of my "On writing" posts, and it's something that I truly believe can not be stated enough. Writing, as much as I love it, is a job. And you take anything you love and make a job out of it and it becomes harder to do. That is an unfortunate but true piece to life. It will still be better than taking any other job in the world, but it will be a job all the same. And that means that you have to get used to doing it, day in and day out, and you have to find ways to motivate yourself to push forward no matter how much you don't want to.

That's something I've struggled a lot with in life. A lot of people tell me I need to take more vacations because of it. But my ideas of a vacation is a little different than other people. I've been a lot of places, and done a lot of things. It gives me a lot of inspiration for my writing, and if you've noticed any of my characters doing out there things, that's probably why. But I don't really think of that as a vacation. I think of it as a trip. For most people, those are one and the same. But not really for me.

To me, vacation is being able to kick back and not have to worry. To not have to do things during the day, to be able to just be alone with my thoughts, few as they may be. And when I do that, at the end of the day, I'm ready to get back to my work. I feel rested, and ready to do the things that I need to do. But when I'm out, going places, doing things, I enjoy myself, don't get me wrong. But at the end of the day, I didn't get that break that I need. I didn't get to relax. And so I don't want to sit down to work. I want to not do anything.

I don't know what exactly it is about me that makes me feel this way, but it's more or less always been there. Writing can be a lot more strenuous than it looks from the outside. It drains me mentally. Not that I think that's a bad thing. It drains me and puts everything it took out from me down on to paper. I'm just saying that it's harder to come back to that at the end of a long day of fun and excitement than you might thing.