You've been sitting there, staring at a blinking cursor so long you want to do some curs-ING of your own.  You want to write, you really do.  But you can't think no matter how hard you try (or try not to try, which doesn't help).  Your mind is fried, your butt hurts, your eyes are bleeding, and you have a copy of Halo 4 that's still in it's shrink wrap.

Or

You're just tired.  Not really "in the mood".  It's kind of there, but the thoughts aren't really aligned.  You know you really should get something written.  But it's not that easy.  You're sick of fighting with it, and you have a copy of Halo 4 that's still in it's shrink wrap.

Both times, let's be honest, you're probably cracking into Halo within the next ten minutes.  And why not?  You're justified.  You "earned" it.  Right?

Uh, no.  "WHAT?!"  Hear me out here.

There is a time and place for "fun".  Anyone stuck in the first situation, it might be time to play a mission or two to get you head out of your own world.  "Wait, you go from a computer screen to video game?"  Sure, at the right time.  Though I understand your thoughts, and even agree, to a point.  Society is hard on video games, and who can blame them?  You hear stories of gamers dying of a blood clot because they sat in their chairs all day.

But the game is just one choice for us.  And that's what I'm here to talk about.  Choices for us writers.  We all have those days where we know we should write, but we really don't want to.  Yet, we find times where we also want to write, but can't.

Let's talk about the second first.  Writers and agents will preach for hours about "keep at it.  Write something no matter how bad."  Uhm, do they know how bad that writing can be?  Well, okay, they do, and they're right most of the time.  But I've found many times where I'm better off taking a break.  And I don't mean a day long break.  I mean, step away, get into something else, and forget what the *bleep* you were just thinking about for an hour or two.  Before you start raging at me I'll go on record here and say; no, video games are not the only choice.  You can; go on a walk, work in the garden, paint something, go shopping, change the oil in the car, work out, whatever.  Anything that you can do to get a mental reset going.  Let your mind step back and let the world you built live.  Games work best for me.  An author I know goes straight to her garden.  Nether choice is "wrong".  It's what we need.

As for the other situation, sorry, you gotta find a way.  I know, wrong answer, well, welcome to the life of a writer.  There comes a time when you gotta commit to the world of BIC.  Errr, that's Butt In Chair, not the pen company (thank you high school teacher that first told me that).  It's sad to say, but even if the world of writing is just a hobby, it still requires work and lots of it.  James Patterson didn't become world renowned because he was in the top five in his gym class.  He had to work for it.  Even the least among us must fight the good fight to write the good book.

"*Groan* But it's so hard."  I know it is.  Believe me I know.  But if it were easy, it wouldn't be worth doing.  Also, if you keep giving in to the "want", you'll find yourself getting more and more upset because that book soon-to-be-blockbuster-movie you're working on is taking FOREVER to write.  And your Halo work will suffer too because you're so frustrated you get pissed the first time you die.  Not exactly an effective balance.

So what's your balance?  Come on now.  Been a while since I had any comments.  I want to hear from some of you.  When your work, be it fiction or what ever you do, gets trouble-some, what do you do?  Or what are some of the things that try to pry you away from said work, and how do you fight them off?  Share some ideas.

Or a confession or two.  Lord knows I've failed the self-control battle a few times.  Been known to dive for Halo like an Olympic gold medalist rather than work.  Then my mom threatened things.... we just won't go there.  :D (just kidding.)

I want to share another conversation with you.

Friend: "You watch the Charger game last week?"
Me: *sigh* "Yup.  Sad to say, I did."
Friend: "Man, I thought they'd pull it out.  I really did."
Me: "I didn't.  Somewhere about middle of the third quarter I could sense it.  The whole stadium knew.  It wasn't going to happen."
Friend: "You were there?"
Me: "Yeah.  Parents have season tickets."
Friend: "So, you were there for the Raven game too?"
Me: *Sigh with a nod* "4th and 29.  We stop em, we win.  We don't.  We lose in overtime.  Even from the Chargers, I didn't see that coming."
Friend: "Must have been a miserable day for you then."
Me: "Not at all.  I rather enjoyed it actually."

Wait, what?

A pair of heartbreaking losses, and I enjoyed them?!  There something missing here?  The short answer is sort of.  The long one is as follows.

There's more to a football game than just the victory.  Ok, being rolled over by the Falcons, that wasn't so fun.  Or was it?  I don't just go to the games for the game.  I can get that on TV for free (well, mostly free).  It's so much more than that.

You know, we've had the same seats for over 25 years.  We're even with the back of the end-zone.  Under the overhang so we're never in the sun or rain.  But low enough to see the score-board and everything else we want to see.  Though we do wish we were closer to the 50.  Even being on 20 or the 10 would be better.  So why stay?

Mary and Linda in front, and Robert the user at the top of the section.  Been there as long as we have, and we're good friends with them.  Same with most of the people around us.  We're so close we trade Christmas gifts every year.  And as for the game, well, there's just something about it that helps us unwind.  So even after a terrible loss like our last two games have been, we can look back and think, "Well, that sucked.  But we had fun anyway."

It's not the only place I run into it.  That online game I play?  Just last week, did a weekly event.  For sake of ease, we'll just say it didn't go well for me.  But I enjoyed it.  And it's not the first time I've been on the bad end of an event, only to find after the sting of the loss faded, I found myself feeling the joy of being there.

Makes you wonder why, doesn't it?  Kind of like those times we say, "I enjoy doing it, but I'm glad when it's over."  Well, if you want it to end, how can you call it fun?  It doesn't make sense.  Either something is fun, or it isn't.  Right?

To that I say, not entirely.  It depends on what you want.  If you only care about the win, then yeah, the last couple of weeks have been terrible.  But I'll go back to that online game to explain the difference.  When I joined the faction I'm in now, I didn't just want the "best".  Another faction had that title.  I wanted a place that was fun to be in, and when we went to war, win, lose or draw, it was a fight.  A brawl.  A test of their metal against ours (or in my case, a test of their firepower over my ability to stay alive).  I did want to win sometimes, but so long as the fights were fights, I could deal with losing a bit too.  I just wanted the battle.

I've been in Nemesis (the faction) for over two years now, and have never been disappointed.

And back to football, let's face it.  Neither loss was a blow out.  The Bengals secured the win in the final minute, and the Ravens beat us with under three minutes left in over time.  Both were good, close games.  You didn't know what would happen till the very end.  People talk about games like that for a long time.  You don't get to see many games that good.  And I was there for two of them.  Ok, we lost, but the game itself was fun.  I cheered for the good, groaned for the bad, hoped for the best, and enjoyed every minute of it.  That's all I really need.  At the end of the day, let's just have some fun and enjoy the game itself.  Don't get me wrong.  I want to some day buy a San Diego Chargers Super Bowl Champion hat.  But until then, I'll just enjoy the games as they come.

I'd say call me crazy, but I already did that.