Fall Slump

Well, well, well, I knew it would hit eventually, and now it has. The terrible fall slump. Even with my light box fired up every day, my inner glow feels very dim. Some of my lack of ambition comes from the time change, ushering the darkness in earlier. The brownness of it all also plays a role. The leaves are mostly fallen, and the ground is beginning to look more like mud than pretty leaves. The few snowflakes that have fallen melt almost immediately and add to the muddiness of it all. It is an in-between time, a threshold, a breath before winter.

I wish the change in the seasons was the only thing making me feel this way. November is a hard month for me. A few years ago I suffered a betrayal that broke my heart and now every November I am reminded of what happened. I try to plan for this, knowing that it’s coming, but there are some things you just can’t plan your way through. I’m also doing some really deep trauma work right now. It’s all good stuff but it’s also exhausting.

I’ve said all this to say I just don’t feel like writing. This is very inconvenient. You might remember I’m in the midst of a writing challenge right now. Whenever a thought surfaces about writing or sending out queries, my brain begins to flood me with other options. You could clean that shelf, or put some laundry in, hey…what you really need to do is work on the Thanksgiving menu. As I slump around the house, crossing unimportant items off my list, shame and guilt rise within me. All this leaves me feeling depressed, uninspired, and just wanting to go to bed.

As I’m writing this, I am reminded that there are so many out there suffering way worse than me. The governmental shutdown has hurt so many, and I’m sure the pain is going to get worse before it gets better. All of the terrible political stuff happening in the world just seems to pile onto everything else going on.

Yep, I’m a Debbie Downer. I’m not sure why I’m writing this tonight except to say everything feels hard right now. Part of me wants to work on my current project, and the other part of me wants to write anything else. If you’re having a hard time right now, I hope it gets better soon. I will get up and back on the horse. I might even work on my project before the night is over. I just keep having to remind myself that my best has to be enough, and we all have times like this.