Routines

This week I have set a routine in motion: I get up every morning at eight, arrive at this pond at nine and then come back at home to read and write. There are few variations to this schedule on other days, but on the whole I try to remain faithful to it.

I realised that I am only able to concentrate on reading and writing if I get up early in the morning. When I oversleep until 12:00 AM I'm not in the mood for anything.

And that's what the year has been like prior to this week: lethargy. I used to sleep in ridiculous hours, which left unmotivated for the remainder of the day.

I really despair at how I only came to realise this late on. During this week I have been (for the most part) at my most fruitful, using my time to the full. This has only come about as a consequence of having a routine and getting up in the early hours in the morning.

Though it isn't all that rosy. Because of having such a fixed schedule, any intervention that comes about infuriates me. Since it was my birthday this week, my sister stayed for about three days and was unable to do anything for an entire day. I am very sensitive to sounds of any sort and, add to that the presence of my sister, and I was fuming. I had my first full-blown tantrum in years, which traumatised my sisters and prompted my parents to have a 'serious' discussion with me. I'll have to learn to make my schedule flexible.

What's worse is that the Job Centre have bullied me into work experience. Next week I'll have to work at a clothes shop from 5-9 PM every day. Again, I'll have to think of ways of accommodating it into my schedule.

Now I understand why so many writers write in the early hours of the morning. I used to follow the Kafka route by writing at night and going about it only when the inspiration kicked in. The problem is that, if you follow this approach, it only comes off when you are very inspired.

When I get up earlier I feel sharper and it all just flows out of my fingertips with greater ease. I have always placed myself in 'hedonistic' camp, but now I feel very tempted to move into the 'craftsmen' camp. I guess that I waver between the two at the moment.

I guess the Flaubert maxim is fitting: "Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work." I just have to look at writers I admire, like J. G. Ballard, and realise that this is true.

Real shame I only had this epiphany now... I should have practiced it throughout the entire year. In two weeks' I'm going to Chile, then three years of uni and finally I'll probably get a job, where I won't have anywhere near as much latitude and freedom as I have now. Oh, well.