Learning how to write after depression

By Tammatha R. Conerly

As a writer, I am supposed to live in a fantasy world of sorts. At least, that’s what I’ve always believed and I’ve even had a fellow writing bud tell me that I have to be able to live with my characters and see and hear them to believe they are real or no one else will be able to either. I enjoyed living in my fantasy world for many years and for many reasons. However, one of the reasons was because I was hiding and in some cases running away from life.

Now I have known I was a writer since I was in the seventh grade. I lived in the real world, played in my fantasy world, and interchanged the two constantly in the beginning. Then I became very depressed and I escaped into my fantasy world only functioning in reality but never living in it. That was how I survived.

Now, I have a problem. My life is going really well. I’m having problems writing though. I suppose you could say it is a writer’s block of sorts, I am having problems writing for clients, general articles and I haven’t been able to touch fiction in ages. I can write an occasional poem but nothing that is going to support my family. What’s the problem you ask? My life is interesting and my imagination can’t trump it. I’m having a problem writing for clients and the general articles because they are boring and my life is exciting. I can write some pretty great things and create wonderful worlds but the one I’m living in right now, I just participate in, I feel physically, and when reality is really good, it’s hard to beat. While it truly is nice, it ain’t exactly paying the bills. Now I have to learn how to mesh my fantasy world in which I write fiction, my writing career world and reality into one.

When I first started freelancing and writing fulltime, I was very disciplined. Somewhere along the way, I lost that. I can blame the depression, it truly is hell to live with and work with but I have to take some responsibility here. I allowed myself to get off track and to become lazy. Much of my depression I fueled myself because it was related to finances, or my lack thereof. Yet I had enough work within my reach to make what I needed to pay my bills and actually have a little money left by working roughly four hours a day. Four hours a day and I could pay all my bills and have money left over for some fun. Yet I couldn’t pull it off. I would “go to work” every day by sitting at my desk and turning it on. I would try. I would pull up the site I was going to submit to, I would Google the topic I was writing on, I would open Word, yet I would rarely write anything and certainly not finish an article. From time to time, I would write a few articles but in the end, the depression would take over and I was unable to write. It didn’t make any since to me and I felt even worse. I could see the amount of money at my fingertips well within my reasonable reach and I knew it was a lot more than I actually needed yet I couldn’t pull it off.

Now, I am much better. I am still struggling with the writing though. I think it’s because I went so long without actually living that now I want to make up for lost time as much as possible and let’s face it, playing beats working regardless of what type of work you do or how much you love it. I’ve got to keep in mind though that I’ve got to learn to balance the two or I won’t be able to afford to play at all and I’ll slip back into that dark, dark whole of depression.

Discipline is the key and having a structured schedule works well for me. I actually have a few schedules for my workday so I can keep it flexible still allowing all the fun and still get my work done.

Do you have a set schedule you work with for your writing? Have you ever encountered a problem with disciplining yourself in order to get your work done?