You have the perfect b3tan profile - lazy, talented, imaginative, short attention-span, procrastinator, etc., etc.
Very few people on here won't identify and entirely understand your post. I'd guess that most of us never bothered to really push ourselves at school or at Uni or at work. Why do you think so many of us post during the day when we should be working? Attention span of a gnat, yet the ability to get the work done quickly and efficiently just so we can get back to B3ta.....

I've said it before and I'll say it again - if the entire membership of B3ta were to make an effort we'd take over the world in an afternoon...erm...not Wednesday though, obviously.

Take Che's advice - think about what you'd really like to do with your life and if you don't know yet then travel.

As far as the writing is concerned overcoming the inner critic is hard but it is also possible. Try to trick the critic by telling yourself that you'll return to the piece. So what you do is write what you want to write - anything, anything at all. Accept that it's a first draft and that it *will* be rubbish - it's a first draft and all first drafts are rubbish.
Then put it away in a drawer (literal or figurative) and forget about it for as long as you can. Many writers work on a number of pieces at once and look at them in rotation. Sometimes it's enough to leave the piece overnight, some need longer. How do you know if it's been long enough? By being able to look at it critically - by that I mean being able to see the good bits and the bad bits and also knowing *why* they are good or bad.

If you think that writing may hold a future for you then do consider going back to Uni to study it. However, always remember that studying anything at a higher level is dependent upon what you put into the course and your studying as much as it is about what the course and tutors can offer you. It's your course, you're paying for it, get as much out of it as you can and that means by putting as much in as you can - go the extra mile, be in love with your subject.


And always remember that there are plenty of us on b3ta who have more experience than we care to admit to and are only to willing to give everyone the benefit of the said experience by wittering on for ages about it.

;-)
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Tue 27 May 2008, 17:41, Reply)