Perspective is a very, very valuable thing.

I was going through my manuscript today, really feeling down about it because it just felt like there was soooo much about it that wasn’t working. It’s a steaming pile of crap. It’ll never be fixed.

I actually finished the step of reading through and taking notes, and I stepped out to eat some lunch (always a good idea whenever I’m feeling like a failure!), and came back to tackle the second phase of the rewrite project: going through each scene and marking the basic premise/conflict.

And wouldn’t you know it, but just going through the story at that high level, the 15,000-foot, birds-eye view…and suddenly my story seemed quite interesting, quite clever.

That big-picture perspective can be absolutely invaluable. Why? Because it sets a course for the small perspective, the scene-by-scene dirty work. It sets a direction, and its a reminder that, yes, once everything is fixed and wrestled back on the train tracks, the story is going to be dope. It’s going to work. It’s actually fun.

So, that was a wonderful thing that happened today.

Really it reminds me of this mantra, one that I’ll need to re-learn over and over again in my career, I think: TRUST THE PROCESS.

I really only have two bits of advice for writers at this point in my journey: “Just keep writing,” and “Trust the process.”

Those two are really the only advice *I* need to follow right now, at least in the grand scheme of things, the two gravest errors I feel like I’m likely to make. Stop stressing about the story not working yet. THAT’S WHAT THE PROCESS IS FOR. The process won’t let me down. If I just keep pushing forward and doing my best at each step, I’m going to come out the other side with something that’s readable. It may not be Shakespeare, but it will WORK.

So, yeah…perspective. It’s a good reminder sometimes.

I had another full-time day today. That’s only two of them this week when I’d been hoping for five, but it’s better than nothing. It feels so, sooooo amazing to put those days in. I just ran the numbers: this week, even with basically three days that were very nearly disaster zero-days…I put in 17% of my overall work hours for the past four months. That’s 3x what it should have been, based on the number of weeks I’ve tracked. I was THREE TIMES more productive this week (already, I still have work to do over the weekend!) than I’ve been for the rest of my work time.

I feel like I’ve discovered the key to a door I’ve been trying to open for a long, long time. It’s awesome.

That’s all for tonight. I’m so tired, I came home, ate dinner, and promptly passed out for a solid hour in the bedroom while Liz and Kristen did TV night together out in the living room.

So.

Tired.

Zzzzzzzzz.