{"id":664,"date":"2014-02-27T14:01:57","date_gmt":"2014-02-27T21:01:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/?p=664"},"modified":"2014-02-27T14:03:50","modified_gmt":"2014-02-27T21:03:50","slug":"the-doldrums","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/archives\/664","title":{"rendered":"THE DOLDRUMS"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Doldrums\"<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0THE DOLDRUMS<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/em><\/strong>I\u2019m a bit under the weather today. Not sick, exactly\u2014just slight chills and dizziness and, mostly, a feeling of lethargy.<\/p>\n

If I worked for someone else, I couldn\u2019t quite justify taking the day off. As a writer-at-home, I was so looking forward to picking up drafting on my novel, set aside during a recent family vacation. But now I find myself with so much to do and no will to do it, leaving me discontent\u2014as though my day is wasted while it\u2019s only early afternoon, as though I\u2019ve lost confidence in my life vocation that usually keeps me motivated and productive.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been reading today; it helps me justify my down time. This morning I cracked open a book about the afterlife, started in on my first volume of a new subscription to an academic literary journal, and wiled away some time on the \u2019Net.<\/p>\n

My surfing led me to a lovely post<\/a>\u00a0by a blogger who advised that, though:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cT<\/strong>he world is broken and we are subject to fear, discouragement and loss of <\/em>confidence,<\/em>\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I need only (in the words of Oswald Chambers) to:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cNever let the sense of past failure defeat [my] next step [but instead] . . . G<\/i>et up, and do the next thing.<\/i>\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

So I think I will be good to myself and (in this order):<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Listen to my body<\/em> whispering that all is not quite right, and so take a nap<\/strong><\/em>, and then<\/li>\n
  • Listen to my sister,<\/em> who sagaciously messaged me this morning after I\u2019d complained to her, recommending I\u00a0t<\/strong><\/em>ake joy,<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0and then<\/li>\n
  • Listen to my soul<\/em> that longs to create something worthy,\u00a0take up my pen<\/strong><\/em> (aka, my laptop), and\u00a0get back to drafting.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0THE DOLDRUMS I\u2019m a bit under the weather today. Not sick, exactly\u2014just slight chills and dizziness and, mostly, a feeling of lethargy. If I worked for someone else, I couldn\u2019t quite justify taking the day off. As a writer-at-home, I was so looking forward to picking up drafting on my novel, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=664"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":666,"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664\/revisions\/666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rolledscroll.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}