I Think I’m Suffering From Time Travel Whiplash

I think I might be suffering from time travel whiplash. A couple of days ago, I spent most of an afternoon editing a podcast I had recorded at the Elfia fantasy festival in Arcen two weeks earlier. The recording had gone badly wrong. My ancient audio recorder had apparently decided that fifteen years of loyal service was enough, and large chunks of conversations had simply disappeared. So I spent six or eight hours reconstructing what was left, cutting around the gaps and trying to make the finished episode sound as if nothing unusual had happened.

By the end of the day, something strange had happened to me as well. I felt as if I had just returned from the festival. I could remember the sunshine, the people I had talked to, the atmosphere, the conversations. Audio does that to me. The moment I start editing an old recording, I am back there again.

Then I opened Instagram and started promoting episodes of my saints podcast based on recordings I had made six weeks earlier. At the same time, I was scheduling other episodes that won’t be published until November. Past, present and future were all occupying the same afternoon. No wonder my brain occasionally wonders what month it is.

The month I was supposed to write

October was supposed to be simple. I had deliberately cleared the month so I could concentrate on rewriting my fantasy novel. Originally, I imagined myself spending much of October in Ireland, moving between hostels, walking during the day and writing the book in the evenings.

Instead, the first week mostly involved recovering from everything I had done to clear the month in the first place. I slept. I tried to slow down. I looked at travel prices, discovered that Ireland would cost considerably more than I’d expected, and started wondering whether I should change the plan.

Then I started another story. Then I researched medieval monasteries. Then medieval storytellers. Then architecture. Then ninth-century Irish monks living in Germany.

All fascinating. None of which involved actually rewriting the novel.

I know this pattern rather well. When something important feels difficult, I become extremely good at improving everything around it. I reorganize the system, fix my email, rethink my routines, do more research and make a better plan. All of those things can be useful, but they can also become an extraordinarily sophisticated form of procrastination.

The problem isn’t motivation

This morning I finally sat down and asked myself what was actually