Anxiety at the wheel, fear of messing up the bowl- start anyways

Sitting before a great idea can sometimes be paralyzing. You feel like a potter at the wheel, a beautiful, untouched lump of clay in front of you. You've got the final image of how you want it to come out in you're brain. All you have to do it make it real. Don't fuck it up.

This doesn't skim the surface of the other soul shattering fears; what if it's not a great idea, what if no body likes it, what if I can't finish, what if I have to write dialogue!? (I do, and I'm exceptionally terrible at it.)

I had to resist a strong urge to use a still from 'Ghost'

 

 

 

None of it matters.
For as many crazy fears as I can generate, I can use the same level of crazy to spur myself on. The biggest step in any project is simply starting. In case you're not up to date, I'm composing a book. This book will cover my move across the state and subsequent adventures in a college town. It's some absurdly funny stuff that revolves around my acquiring a job at a bar, working up from door to server to bartender and the calamity that ensues.
What kind of shenanigans do you really have to keep us entertained?

There is an anarchy symbol carved into the hood of my car. I didn't put it there and the person who was responsible did it because he thought I clothes lined him off his bicycle. You can't make this shit up.

After beginning this great literary adventure, I was on fire. I wrote 22 pages in a week. Then I turned off double spacing. In the next week I was back up to 22 pages of semi-usable content.  I write like I'm playing battle ship, jumping across the time-grid where ever my nostalgic mood takes me. That was until I finally came upon describing my bar (I knew it was a speed bump and had been avoiding it as such). It locked me up. There is so much emotion there and text doesn't lend well to the sights and smells you encounter as you walk in. Combining all of those things meant conveying an entire mood- a sensation. I was so stinted in my progress that for consecutive days I only managed to write a sentence or two. The immensity of the project was paralyzing.

Still, sentence by sentence I continued. Word by word, the picture was being painted. It was not easy and it's still not done. The important part was starting. Each day (preferably in the morning) I write for an hour or two. By 'write for an hour or two' I really mean stare at the screen trying to fling ideas out of my brain and towards the computer screen, hoping they stick. There are days I don't get anything done and for no reason whatsoever, I take weekends off. I don't have a set deadline for the book and nearly zero plan for next step after completion. If you've read this far though, you get the idea. Half the battle is over, I just need to keep trying.