Messing up, progress, and a book plug

So I have been talking about getting my priority straight and doing what I should rather than wasting time on crap. Well, I messed up last night. So to be honest I don’t even what to talk about it because I’m still ashamed of myself. But I’m going to anyway, to be honest, and open. I work ten-hour shifts at work, and I am not a morning person so I only get up with enough time to get to work. So in the evening after work, I only have a limited time before I need to get my butt to bed so I’m not dead at work. I know all this very well, and I have/had multiple things I wanted to work on doing this limited time. But last night I allowed myself to get sucked into another crappy online novel. I knew it was not very good right from the start. I was interested in it for all the wrong reasons. And what makes me really ashamed was that multiple times I had little pings and a small voice asking what I was doing. Why was I still going on? What did I really want out of it and should I be wanting that? But I blatantly ignored it. I made half excuses in my mind that I knew were no good, and pushed the voice away. I tried to quite the Holy Spirit. Why?!

I have verses written out to read every day and so memorize. The first one today was Matt. 26:41 “Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” How appropriate. I am weak. In James it talks about, I do what I don’t want to do and don’t do what I want to. How that can fit me.

When I was done I knew I had done wrong. I could pray for forgiveness (which I did), but it felt hypocritical. There were other things I could do to relax and still be productive.

So I still feel bad. I knew better, but I fell. I’m a grown adult and a firm believer, but I still screw up too. The day before I realized how bad I was getting with excuses and all and was more determined to get my rear in gear. I felt like the Devil heard that and knew just how to quash that.

Now all of that being said, I have done well in a different way. I might have someone willing to read some of my books (unpublished ones), so I pulled out one of my early ones and have been working on it. I have been thinking I need to do this for a while, I just haven’t. It’s good to let your work sit a while and then come back to it. You are not quite so protective of it and willing to see its flaws. In a book I read by Steven King he says “Kill your darling.” You have to be willing to go back through your book (darling) and rip it apart. I’m not doing anything to that extent, but I am trying to polish/fix it up.

This always makes me half question myself. Part of me knows I am a good writer. At the very least I like my own work. But I wonder if anyone else will. My stories are always much shorter than other novels and such. It makes me wonder what I’m missing, and what I need to be adding. Yet I hear that you should not be adding to your work. In editing, it’s all about taking unnecessary stuff out. But if you take out much you won’t understand my stories at all. I don’t think I have much of any fluff. It’s just the way I write. But do I need to be adding some to make it all fit right and sound good? I don’t know. It’s why I long to have someone read my stuff and tell me just what they thing. Forget grammar and spelling and all that. Did the story make sense? Is there stuff I have in my head but did not make it on to the paper and so something is lacking?

Its times like this that I think it may be years until I get anything else published because I need time to learn and refine what I have. But I also know I will be learning all my life and will get better, but I should not waste my time and talent by waiting. Anyway, I have no answers to all of this so I will keep working as I can, trying not to be too picky but still put out the best I can.

Well, this is already longer then I thought it was going to be, but I want to do a quick little plug for some books. It’s been a while since I’ve done this, and since I just found the one I was missing (and read it) I thought I would quickly mention them. They are children’s books by Thornton W. Burgess. I don’t know if there is really a series name, but they all start with The Adventures of. There are The Adventures of Peter Cottontail, Reddy Fox, Johnny Chuck, Sammy Jay, and many, many more. Some were close to 30 books. They are about wild animals that live in the Green Meadows, Green Forest, Smiling Pool, Laughing Brook, and other places. I grew up with these books, as did my Mom I think. They are a little strong on the no hunting and all that. But even in a family that does lots of hunting (I have hunted myself), they were still well-loved. (I hunt and love animals. That might seem like a contradiction to some, but it’s the truth.) If you’re looking for fun, clean reading for bedtime stories or for some young readers, I highly recommend these books. Your local library may well have some of them.

Well, that is all for today I think. Oh, and happy Friday the 13th.

God Bless.