Oh, the pain of waking up in the mornings… Last night I slept at 1:30AM again. To some, it may not seem very late, but it tends to affect me alot. I usually sleep before 11 and feel the best like that. Any later and I can start to feel the effects of late nights. Worse, it adds up after a while and leads to bad health manifested in a pimple or the flu/cold. Wonder why there’s always people sick during winter almost every day? Probably because most people don’t sleep early anymore. I did an experiment before and slept before 11 for a year. I never got sick lol! Not even once.

Late nights aren’t good, yet for writers it is for a righteous cause. Some of you may know that I’ve committed to a writing goal of at least 6-10 chapters per day. (Why 6? I don’t know, 5 seems to little lol). I’ve held on to this and have written 50k or more in one month! I’m proud of this feat because I’m known to be an easily distracted person who tends to procrastinate and give up. haha I’m especially proud because even if I’m busy during the day, or if I’m not in the writing mood, I will force myself to produce. There is no such thing as writer’s block as I’ve written on before. This production sometimes goes late into the night because there simply wasn’t enough time in the day. Or I procrastinated…

Last night was this blog site haha, the night before was planning for the next chapters of the novel (which proved to be a horrible headache) Fellow author, ryby who discussed with me would know (thank you by the way). xD The final stretch of this novel is so confusing and scary. Red pill or blue pill? What would the reader’s think? Would they hate me or the characters? What do the characters feel themselves? What do they think and what is in their subconscious mind? What are the deeper themes and messages behind what I will be writing? Analyzing every little thing from every angle is tough. And it takes a lot of time and a lot of mind cramping. This tends to happen every day however, because I must re-read my previous chapters, sometimes reading from 5000 words prior. This helps to grasp what is going on and inspire the next few installments. Tough work.

So this time, I went back to the planning table because I was doubtful of my original ideas for the final chapters. After all that discussing and debating and analyzing, in the end what happens all the time? I end up with my original idea again. Talking about it with people always tends to just confirm my ideas and removes doubt. Kind of tedious.

Nevertheless it must be done. Whether it is writing chapters, planning, working on other novel/author related projects, the life of a writer is a stressful one. If a writer has commitment, it is a lifestyle that ends up with late nights…

I take that back, sometimes it is an allnighter because the characters even haunts my dreams. A reader of mine recently had a dirty dream of two of my novel characters LOL. I must say that is not very surprising for the writer themselves. Characters themselves seems to have their own lives and it causes writers alot of hardship! I plan for something to happen and as I write they take over and do whatever they want. Soon, I realize what’s going on and heave a great NOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Especially near the wrap up of book one, everything needs to be precise and precarious with no room for mistake. Usually, the characters can lead any way they want, because that is what it means to write with the flow and write cell phone novels. But now, it’s very dangerous to let them do as they wish. More stress on me. Fun, fun, fun.

In any case. That’s enough ranting on the Life of a Writer series. Til next time 😛