I am hopeful.

                  We are at midweek (happy hump day y’all). It’s the first week of July. And I know I will hit 50k by Sunday.

                  To say I’m a bit floored is an understatement.

                  For a while now I felt very stuck and had a hard time seeing the end of the line. I genuinely questioned whether I was even capable of writing a full-length novel. I was contemplating so many other avenues and gearing myself up for the let-down that I just wasn’t cut out for it.

                  And now? Now the light at the end of the tunnel is so gosh darn bright I’ve got shades and a baseball cap on just to survive its shine.

                  There have been, and continue to be, some truly amazing people in my life that have read my work, given me feedback, or simply just listened to me rant about the imposter syndrome that set in so hard on a random Sunday I just stared at my tv the rest of the day feeling numb.

                  There has also been criticism that made me sit back and feel as if the weight of a pen was too heavy to ever handle.

                  And yes, I’m being dramatic. But I’m an artist, man. What do you expect?

                  But truly, I think every writer at the very least faces that feeling. That maybe you can’t write that beautiful story. Maybe novel length word counts just aren’t in the cards for you. Maybe you can’t develop characters beyond a couple pages.

                  And they say that the difference between those who accomplish the feat of writing a book and those who don’t is sheer determination.

                  So, despite the voice in my head (and despite that one person who I’ve now realized maybe just didn’t like my writing style) I kept going. And now I know it’s going to happen.

                  Writing is hard, and editing is worse. But man is it all worth it!

Current Word Counts

Project Prophecy (Should I just share my idea of the title…its sticking in my brain like glue): 46,148

The Afterlife Sucks (She is but a babe, merely one day old and by that I mean I haven’t touched this manuscript in days): 3,389

Stay writing (and buy some shades for when it’s your turn).