Am I Running Out of Time?

how to keep going even if the finish line may disappear

I’ve been writing a novel for the last two and a half years. I’m halfway through my second draft. It’s the farthest I’ve ever gotten on a rewrite, having given up on my previous three attempts in various stages. I hope to have a finished novel to shop around in November.

When friends ask me how the writing’s going, I quip, “I just want to finish the thing before I die or before it’s game over for the planet.”

Sometimes I add, “And before AI takes over and human writers are obsolete.”

Those are my personal “I may not make it in time” worries. They’re real concerns. I’m 62. Friends are dying, family members are sick, bad diagnoses abound.

The threats to our planet grow more dire daily. My novel's premise is middle-aged women using magic to tip the climate back toward a livable world — that could truly become a fantasy if things get much worse.

AI is going to decimate the job market as we know it, and it’s already threatening writers’ viability.

We all have real fears about the future. We always have and we’re living in a planetary dumpster fire started by men with an insatiable need for power, money, and attention. These selfish, myopic idiots have created a whole host of existential reasons why many of us might not get a satisfying conclusion to our dreams, whatever yours may be.

It can feel like we’re frantically building our gorgeous sand castles too close to the incoming high tide.

But I refuse to give up. But what does that mean on a practical level?

One answer is obvious and you already know it: love the process enough that you’d do it regardless. I used to garden a lot, especially when I lived on Bainbridge Island. I didn’t garden for the flowers I produced. I gardened because I loved every aspect of it — choosing the plants, seeing how they combined, random accident and volunteers, the delight of walking outside on a chilly morning, and seeing something you planted blooming.

We’ve got to find satisfaction in what we are doing, day by day. It’s never been more important.

The other answer might sound a little grim but here’s what I’ve been trying: accepting the horrors without drowning in them.

I’m an optimist. Sometimes, to a fault. I naturally, often willfully, look on the bright side, hope for the best, ignore the tiger in the bushes, and hope it slinks away. But I’ve found being an optimist, given the current world situation, is not working for me.

I’m trying to learn to sit with reality, or at least, give it the side eye.

NOT because I’m turning into a prepper or even a realist (although that would make Bob happy) and not because I think you or I need to follow the news blow-by-crazy-ass-blow (highly not recommended!) but because when I pretend the world is the same place it was when I started my novel, I don’t write as much or as well, and even more importantly? I’m not very present for my life.

Instead of veering between savior fantasies (a hacker will expose something terrible and the U.S. government will fall apart, and the women of the world will take over) or numbing out (the sandals I’ve oogled, the necklaces I’ve put in my cart, the dog videos I’ve watched and rewatched) or doom spiraling (everyone is going to die tomorrow!!), I’m trying to be with what is.

To settle in with it.

If you’ve ever used mindfulness to deal with pain, it’s like that. You approach the state of the world while breathing and being curious, while also being aware that the state of the world is not you.

Head in the sand or running around like a chicken without a head, neither is how I want to live or write. I want to try to embrace the truth I might run out of time to finish my book and reach readers. I want to use that truth to taste the whole experience of writing and living more deeply.

Life becomes more precious the more precarious it is. But only if I acknowledge its precariousness.

“Since death is certain, but the time of death is uncertain, what is the most important thing?” Pema Chodron teaches us. My writing is so important to me but whether my novel is ever released isn’t within my control. That’s true for almost everything else, too.

Except how I live this moment.

I know I will fail at this. I will shop for shoes, maybe as soon as I schedule this post! I will read too much news and freak Bob out with my end-of-time scenarios. But every time I don’t, I will be grateful, and savor how good it feels, hoping to teach myself a new question: How am I running out of time?

Love,

Jen