I’m blocked tonight. Why am I blocked tonight? I really don’t understand.

I wanted to write about Motivation, but I’m having a hard time finding any. I did find an article I really liked on the subject at A List Apart: Staying Motivated. (I often find interesting articles at this website, but until hadn’t actually added them to my feed reader. Crisis averted – I subscribed today.)

Writing Den, or 4th Bedroom?My absolute favorite tip was to build a creative den. I thought about where I do most of my writing, TV watching, and web surfing – a not-terribly-comfortable-after-two-hours rocker recliner. That’s not a den. I think I would like a separate space in the room just for me. DH has the desktop computer on a makeshift desk, and soon he will get a real desk for the computer. So where will I work? There are no extra rooms for me, and at this point there aren’t even any empty walls. There is a very long, narrow closet…

Of course, picking a Den would require space that isn’t unusable at certain times during the day – or night. For example, it wouldn’t make much sense for me to set up my space in our bedroom. DH goes to bed with the kids at 8 p.m. (tonight being a notable exception – he just went up), and is a very light sleeper. I wouldn’t be able to work with him sleeping, thereby only giving me time to write on the weekends when I’m not at my parents house doing laundry or driving my son to Boy Scout things or taking both kids to church. Oh, wait, I don’t have any time that’s not doing those things.

When my husband gets his desk, I will evaluate the remaining space in the room. Perhaps I will be able to create a Den out of what his new desk has displaced. I can set up my sewing machine, and have an outlet for my laptop, and keep a book on the side for when I’m waiting for my laptop to kick up, and that little piece of wall can be my one-and-only creative space. A bit of wall would be ideal, so I could put up sticky notes and cover the wallpaper noise.

Staying motivated. Repetition. Doing it so often it’s simply habit, and not doing it leaves a void.