Feeling Unproductive – The Climb #272

Friday 20^th October 2017

So I feel I’m not being productive of late. Part of it is all the swordfighting activities. What with Romania, Swordfish, Wessex league and all the training for those events, it feels like a lot of my focus has been sucked up.
I have genuine nerves about Wessex League. Up until now, whilst I’ve wanted to do well, I was happy to take any sort of result. I wasn’t sure if my string of quarter finals was luck or skill, and whilst I wanted them to be proof I’d levelled up, I think it took until Astolat before I started to believe it was actual skill.
But after everyone said I fenced well at Fightcamp, and my medal win at Wessex League Bristol, I now go into Wessex League Reading with expectations on myself. If I do bad, I’m probably going to lose my chance at winning the league, and so it’s no longer a case of wishing to do well, I HAVE to do well.
And I’m not sure if that pressure is going to make me or break me. There are so many good fighters coming to Reading, and I’m not sure I can find the same form I had at Bristol or Fightcamp. And given my performance on Wednesday, it would seem any attempt to up my game just results in a mess.
So I worry I won’t find the same level of ability as I did in those last two events. Plus there are fencers that I feel outskill me even when I fight well.
It’s why I’ve decided (now that the car is back from the MOT) to go to both Waterloo Sparring and Sunday Sparring this weekend. I can tell myself that it’s for Swordfish but I already know I’m not going to win Swordfish. Wessex League Reading on the other hand… I find I really want to win that. I want to face Matt in the final and have a really epic fight. But most of all, I want to win.
I spent the day working out the logistics, as Waterloo is a pain to get to from Swindon. The plan is to drive to my parents, leave the car there then get a lift to the station and take the direct line up. It means leaving ridiculously early, especially as a storm is forecast that could cause “travel disruption”. But with both Pim & Sasha going, I’m hoping it’ll help give me an edge next week. That edge being having been hit lots by both of them.
But all this planning and worrying has taken me away from the novel. I guess waiting to hear back about book 1 makes the writing career feel so distant right now. I feel a bit unmotivated. One of the reasons I keep the swordfighting and writing running in parallel is so that if I feel unmotivated with one, I still have the other.
I guess that means next week when I crash out of Wessex League, I’ll be all about the writing career again. This is how it’s supposed to work.
Yet, I still can’t help but feel bothered by the lack of motivation. That’s usually a sign that my subconscious is telling me that something is missing from a novel… but it just might be that with all the recent stresses, I’m just getting myself level again.
With so many events this month coupled with a lot of extra training, perhaps the swordfighting is just taking up all my writing time. Once Swordfish is out the way, there should only be a major event each month, instead of the 3 I’ll be having over 4 weeks. Hopefully I’ll feel more productive then.
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