I've been spending the past few weeks resting, healing, and putting in my hours at work. On weekends, when I don't have anything planned, I find myself bored. Usually, I would be tackling something creative. I have some creative energy, but no projects I have in progress look appealing right now. I'm trying to rest with crochet for a bit since my wrists need a break, and I don't really feel like drawing. (More often than not, my energy for drawing is inspired by roleplay and writing projects anyway.) I keep looking back at my text adventure project, Afflicted, but I'm not motivated to type. I love the project, I love what I wrote, but I can't push myself forward to work on it. I think that sometimes, you just have to START something to get going. Other times, you have to wait until the right moment. In this particular case, I just think I'm too different of a person than I was back in July to return to Afflicted right now.
In Stephen King's book "On Writing", he mentions how he writes manuscripts very quickly, and doesn't take days off. He says that he does this because the manuscript will look foreign to him if he waits too long. I feel the same about creative projects sometimes. I think that I'm always changing as a person, and that the person I was last year won't be the person I am this year. Next year, I'll be different too. For Afflicted, I knew it would take years to write, and I counted on the fact that I would make slow but steady progress. I would change at a gentle pace, and my writing would change with me. It would still be cohesive enough, and my final proofreading and editing passes would tie it all together.
I'm now at a point in my life where I've changed as a person drastically, after my Dad's death. The things I was writing about in my plans for Afflicted look familiar, but those themes aren't at the forefront of my mind anymore. I get where I was going, but it's just not as compelling to me now. I'm early in my grief, so I might find those themes compelling again in six months, or a in a few years. They're still interesting, but they're just not what I want to write about right now. Maybe I'll find them interesting again if I have lots of time off work, or as soon as the new years comes around. Who knows.
I think right now, I'll have to put Afflicted on hold, and explore other creative projects. It's hard to start new things, and I feel bad about abandonding something I was so excited about a month ago. It's not helpful to beat myself up over it though. I've been through a lot, and I'm not surprised that the person I am today wants to write about something new.