Here I am, living my life, maintaining a routine, going about my day to day as best as I can, when the old bastard turns up and ruins everything.
He doesn’t even knock first. He just walks right into my house, marches up the stairs, wanders into my spare bedroom where my little desk is set up, and glares at me until I cry.
Even after I’ve managed to compose myself, he hangs around. He loiters behind me, casting a shadow over me whenever I’m trying to write. He whispers things in my ear so quietly that they’re almost imperceptible:
“You’re doing it wrong.”
“Are you trying to fake it ‘til you make it?”
“You’ll never be good at this.”
His words wear me down until I just don’t want to do it anymore. I take myself off to bed in the middle of the day and lose myself in a book, or I while away several hours cleaning – fucking cleaning, I hate cleaning – so that I don’t have to listen to him.
Occasionally, I’ll throw myself into gardening or I’ll kickstart an unreasonably ambitious exercise routine. Sometimes, I’ll simply take the dog out for an extra-long walk, setting a pace which is a touch too fast for the old bastard so that he is forced to lag behind and his shadow can’t reach me.
I’ll take any and every excuse to be away from my computer and keyboard and to ignore my notebooks and pens.
If I stop writing for long enough, he’ll get bored and wander off. He just lets himself out and meanders off down the street as quietly and easily as when he arrived. But his words still linger.
I try to put fingertips to keyboard and I hear his complaints and snide remarks echo in my mind. Trying to formulate words into sentences feels like wading through treacle.
There will come a day when I manage to post here every day for a month. Just to test myself, just to have fun, just to prove that I can. But June will not be that month.
It’s no big deal. The old bastard Self Doubt pays all of us a visit from time to time. Eventually, though, when he wanders through my front door, I’d like to be able to throw him out on his ear before his whispered words can wear me down.
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You are talking about the same Old Bastard that visits me from time to time. I wish I had the nerve to kick him in the nuts. But the last time I tried, he came back meaner than ever. LOL
Haha! He seems invincible. Maybe if all the world’s writers banded together and gave him a coordinated kick in the balls he’d bugger off for good.
This was so witty and humorous !
Thank you so much!
Whenever I confront self doubt, I doubt the self doubt, which drives it crazy, sort of like when you multiply two negative numbers and you end up with a positive number.
Nice trick! “Doubt everything, even the doubt” will be my new mantra 🙂
well, when i doubt, follow your heart. 🙂
Great advice! Thanks for reading 🙂
Tell the Old Bastard to bugger off!
It’s been my mantra this week! Welcome back, I hope your trip was fantastic 🙂
He sounds horrible, Ellie, can I buy you a pair of headphones to block the old bloke out? You know, the kind which stick to your ears no matter what! 😎
SO relatable! Hope that old bastard doesn’t wear you down too much. Good luck for when he next appears!