Into the Dark Forest

Schedules and trust

Photo by Sergey Besch

It’s been a busy couple of weeks, busy with life stuff, things that really do have to be done, like the eye doctor, and some fun things like an art opening, where one of my paintings placed third, with an actual cash prize (I know!), and trying to get the garden in. The weather has shifted to spring mode, which means the wind is blowing hard by ten am, so I have to juggle my schedule to get my walk in.

I’ve also had a disappointing diagnosis on the annoying back pain that’s been nagging for a year. It’s not awful, but it’s not particularly good. I have a plan and can manage it, but it’s annoying. All the things I love aggravate it—sitting at the computer, cooking, gardening. Not painting, because I stand up, but maybe there’s some help there—maybe I could stand up to write, too.

Anyway, the book is at the place where schedule irregularities freak me out. I get quite pissy about things that interfere, and then I get myself all in a twist. I have been listening to Oliver Bateman’s Meditations for Mortals (highly recommend) and I’m limiting myself to a chapter a day, as he suggests. One of the suggestions was about schedules, and keeping them, and I started fretting all over again. I have a schedule, I thought, walking on the beach in the bright beautiful morning, but everything is getting in the way!

But when talked about the kind of schedules writers and other knowledge workers need, he reiterated what I do know—that most of us can’t work for longer than about three hours. He cited the example of Virginia Woolf, who ate a leisurely breakfast then made her way to her writing cottage at the top of the garden by 10 am. She worked til 1, then knocked off for lunch.

Virginia Woolf’s writing cottage

Well. This was a revelation. 10 am? I could write from 10 to 1. At the moment I heard that, I was on the beach, and it was only 8:45. I had plenty of time to get back, make a fresh coffee and settle into the work.

Revelation!

Is it absurd that I couldn’t get to this on my own? Yes, but things show up as they show up. If I aim for 10 am instead of 8:30, the pressure is off. Like, completely off. I’m sitting here now, writing a Substack at 9:38 because I can sneak it in before the real writing starts for the day.

In a few minutes, I’ll open the book file. I’ve traveled deep into the forest, having traveled too far from the start to remember the intense push to get the book in the world, and the delight in the idea, and too far from the end to anticipate finishing. I’m in the wilds of the book, with only my character to guide me. This is the part that always freaks me out—I don’t know what I’m doing! I don’t know where this is taking me!—until I remember it’s always like this. This part, this lost in the forest bit, is the whole deep messy joy of writing. It’s where the actual book is born, apart from anything I thought it might be or planned. It becomes itself. My job is to trust that. Once I remember that this is the stage, this is where I am, I can take great joy in the path I traverse today, with Elsie holding up the light.

So let me go walk on the path for today. Is the sun shining? Where are we going? Oh, I think we’re going to a swimming hole…

How do you feel about schedules? Are you able to go with the flow or do you need things on a calendar?