Stress and Chaos

Listening to: Muse, "Starlight"

One thing I've never been good at is pushing my stress aside to write. This is kind of odd, I know--a lot of writers write to forget about the stress (even when the writing itself is stressful). But when the stress is personal--i.e., family or friend related--the writing part of my brain tends to shut down so it can focus on all the stressful stuff.

Right now, I'm going through a tiny rough patch, the details of which are not important. Actually, it's not my rough patch, but it's a tough time for someone very close to me, and I'm dealing with a lot of the fallout. When this person called this morning with more problems, problems that I know she needs to share with someone and I'm the best candidate right now, I thought, "Well, there goes that 500 words I was going to get in this morning." Because I expected to spend the morning worrying, and my afternoon is already full up.

But no. I won't let that happen.

I'm going to write, dammit. I got 2000 words in Wednesday night, so I'm definitely on a roll. I'm going to throw myself into the writing, at least for the next two hours, and worry about all the other stuff later.

I think I'm getting better at this--the "write no matter what" thing. I guess we'll find out, eh?*

How about you, fellow writers? If you're a writer (or any kind of artist), do you shut down when everything around you is chaotic...or does that make you write more? Feed my curiosity!


*ETA: Planned on writing 500 words this morning. Got almost 1000. Yes, I'm definitely getting better at this. Now I'm going to go brood, then do some chores.