Saturday, July 23, 2011

Unfocussed

Have you ever had one of those months were you can't keep your head or nose in a book long enough to keep yourself interested?  Over the last two months, I've been barely interested in anything; and it's frustrating me beyond belief! 
I have had books pretty much thrown at me from all directions, but no real need or passion to read them.  However, I know for a fact that this is a temporary thing as it's happened before.  Being unfocussed is something that happens to me when I need to clean out my house or get into my writing more (which really does need some work). 
I have tried to read some short story books - without success - and attempted reading a few other books that aren't really about anything in particular, but I'm taking a break from reading until I find my mind is going to be more focussed on my reading and less focussed on cleaning out my house... I believe I'm doing the old Spring Cleaning earlier than expected this time around! 
Have you ever had this kind of thing happen to you?  If so, how did you get around it?  Did it worry you, or did you just wait until the passion for the words come back?  Until my next post, happy reading!

3 comments:

  1. Yeah, I've had focus issues when it comes to reading. One thing that I've been doing since the beginning of June is reading one chapter of whatever book I'm on per day. (More than that if I'm participating in Bookcrossing's read-a-thons...unfortunately, I have yet to fulfill the full twenty-four hours.)

    Another area where I tend to have trouble maintaining focus is when I'm doing a project with no defined end point if you know what I mean. Take for instance editing my novel drafts (three so far). I have a history of poking around in them at best if I edit at all. This is one of the many things that my dad has been known to ask me about, and as his daughter, I cannot in good conscience tell him, "I don't want to talk about it." And I feel guilty if I have to admit that I've fallen behind/slacked off on that or anything else I'm accountable to him for, as it becomes a "cause for concern" at best (which sometimes leads to questions and/or lecturing), and it's against my morals to displease or otherwise do a disservice to my older sister, let alone either of my parents. So, what I've been doing is alloting fifteen minutes of (attempted) editing time per draft per day. That way, I can say that I am spending some time on it, which will make him happy, and yet with doing fifteen minutes, I can treat the editing more or less like a shorter, more straightforward task, and not feel like I have to give every waking hour over to it, which will make ME happy.

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  2. I walk into a library ... I wander between the shelves. I let myself be lead to the discovery of incongruous disciplines such as: "Sewing for dummies", "Learning Chinese in 10 Days" or "Cooking the leftovers as a Chef." Sometimes in my random trip, it can happen that I find some good ideas ... Not always! Ok, to be honest only one time !
    Otherwise, I go to my bookseller, look toward the new comics, or manga. Browse the "must read" scribbled by the seller to pick up some ideas. If not I go to the bloggers pages to see what motivates them at the moment. It's like that I came across yours. I wanted to know: Your reading list! Some of your posts make me smile so here I am trying to cheer you up with my bad english. Be patient.

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  3. I'm actually doing a big Spring Clean around my townhouse. It's looking pretty good on day 4... where I'm tackling the home office (and that's the hardest room of all!).

    I will be taking this room over a couple of days seeing how much there is to be done in here. It holds my entire library of 950 books, my handbag collection and most of my art as well as other junk that hasn't been sorted through in the last 4 years. Wish me luck! :D

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