I recently decided I needed time and energy to work on my book of stories. So I decided not to blog for a while and posted a call for writers one and all to come be guest bloggers. Of course bloggers know what’s in it for them. But for me, well basically, with guests writing my blog, I could keep it alive while I do what I have to do to get my bloody book published. Selfish? Self-serving? Yes I think so too.

The thing is, it’s not my nature to be so selfishly motivated. In fact it’s a well-documented fact from studies taken at work that I am highly altruistic. Yes, we’ve had consultants in to study each of us, and that’s what I am. Caring, compassionate, ready and willing to help others. But not lately, apparently.

Lately, I’m only thinking about me and my unmet goals. Then today I woke up with a backache, and head full of “what am I doing all this for” angst.  Which if you think about it, is a really good question, which I’ve been asking myself all day.

By “all this” I mean:

• Creating a website
• Creating a blog
• Thinking about my blog
• Thinking about my book then thinking what to write next for my blog     
• Thinking about the fact that I’m only writing blog posts
• Thinking about my book of stories
• Thinking about my book and how I haven’t done a thing towards getting it published
• Thinking about the fact that I’m not writing fiction anymore or doing anything to get my book pubished – then sitting down and writing a blog post (instead). Sigh.

Have you ever thought about why you want to publish your blog, novel, play, art piece, book of stories?  For money? Readers? Fame? I don’t know about you, but when I wrote my stories, I didn’t think about who would read them, who would publish or buy them. I just wrote them because they asked to be written.

Isn’t the writing itself the point, the pleasure, the ache, the fulfillment?  Isn’t it a complete thing unto itself? Shouldn’t it be?  Or is this what we’ve been conditioned to think?

Ok, call this my dark side, my down side, or as blogger BitterBen would say, my bitter side. I don’t think so. I think I’m simply having an existential crisis. As in, thinking about ALL the arts, I can’t help but ask myself: why bother?

Sure it’s great to create, but then what? Why look for publishers, art exhibitions, theaters to produce your play?  Who’s reading? Who’s appraising? Who’s watching and what does it matter? Why do artists need others to care when it’s the making of the art that should matter?

So I woke up today thinking these thoughts that were in the back of  my mind all week, then I thought about me thinking these thoughts, and this went on and on throughout the day, until finally, hallelujah! night arrived and I could bury my thoughts in front of the TV.

I’ll snap out of this frame of mind, I’m sure. On the up side, the post by my humorous guest blogger, Pat Childers, was a smashing success. And there’s more coming by Pat, who has graciously agreed to help me. She doesn’t work with me anymore, so she hasn’t gone through the series of studies about our selves (preferred work styles, personality stuff, matches to our jobs, etc), but anyone who knows Pat knows her studies would reveal her to be Witty, Urbane, Humane.

Meanwhile, I continue to debate whether to publish my book or just post my stories on my website in case someone – anyone – wants to read them. Whatever.

So that’s it – week one of my not blogging anymore. Who knows what week two will bring. More angst, or perhaps a simple plague of locusts.

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