Work and Edits

Last week was my first week back at work after the Christmas holidays, and it was... trying. Being off for two weeks, although hard on the wallet, was excellent for morale. I edited my manuscript every day, read several books and slept a lot. But now that I'm back at work, things are more difficult.

I know, that's not a surprising revelation. A full time job makes other goals difficult. Duh. I was prepared for having less time to allocate to editing (although still determined to give it as much of my attention as allowable), but I wasn't prepared for the large bite it would take out of my patience, my sense of self worth and my ability to receive constructive criticism... well, constructively. I managed an hour of editing every evening all week, but on Saturday morning when I sat down to look at my mentor's edit notes, I kept taking everything personally.

Eventually, I had to walk away, shake it off. I took a nap, read a book and let the edit notes settle on my brain. And, after some time away I was able to see that her thoughts were accurate. But it took some time. I had to step back for a bit. After a week with an entirely new system at work and all the criticism that came with trying to master it, I just wasn't in any shape to hear more and especially not about my writing.

Now, I'm in my second week of work and determined not to be burned out by the weekend. It means spending more of my energy caring about my writing and less caring about the new system at work. The new system will take time and patience, but I can't let it get to me the way it did last week. It just isn't worth it. It requires only a small portion of my concern, while my larger, more important goals require more. It's just that simple.