Giving Up The Guilts

There was one thing I really, really, REALLY did not miss when I took my long break from writing and that was "the guilts" - that haunting feeling that no matter what else was going on or I wanted to do or even needed to do, I ought to be working on a book.

I consider this is one of the biggest downsides of being self-employed and working from home - the work is always there, calling to me from the basement office, threatening all manner of gloom and doom if I don't spend every waking moment at the computer or thinking about what I should be doing at the compute to write and promote my work.

I've been living with this sort of haunting dread and guilt for about twenty years. Believe you me, it takes a toll. Living without that was one of the best things about my long break.

I'm back to work now, and in the past couple of weeks, I've started to feel that nagging guilt again. Unfortunately it seems I've been too conditioned by twenty years of deadlines to work without that nagging feeling eventually returning.

However, I've learned the hard way that all work and no play is NOT the way to lead a balanced life, so I'm doing my best to ignore the guilts. Maybe it means I don't write every day, something writers are told over and over is the key to success, but I've been there, done that (including working on Christmas Day, holidays and birthdays) and I am determined not to fall into the guilt trap again