Idea Overload

So here’s a problem I still haven’t learned to cope with: Idea overload.

Whatever I happen to be working on at any given moment, well, I’d rather be working on the next thing instead. Sometimes even the thing after that thing. There are always too many projects that appeal to me; too many stories I want to write; too many things I want to try. At times it’s a little overwhelming.

It’s overwhelming RIGHT NOW because there are a solid half-dozen big writing projects I’d like to be working on … but I don’t, because attempting that juggling act is a Bad Idea. I handle it by doing my best to stay focused on just one or two major projects at once. Otherwise, I’d be an unproductive mess.

In the past, before I developed the discipline I needed to stay the course on a big writing project, I’d jump back and forth from one story to another to another to another. Little bit of this one until I was bored, then over to this one, and then start (but never finish) that one.

The result? A load of unfinished stories, none of them particularly focused or polished or worth reading.

I’m better about that now. Mostly.

But I still have this constant buzzing in my belly nudging me towards the thing I’m not writing rather than the thing I am writing. It’s frustrating. It’s especially frustrating because I know I won’t be on this Earth forever, and I feel like I have to get it all out of my system before I’m gone.

Which is stupid, because it’s likely I’ll NEVER get it all out of my system.