Why I never won the Lottery

LOML and I put up our Christmas decorations last night, ready for our first Christmas in the USA!

I am one of nature's worriers. I worry about everything, all the time. I know that a lot of you are in the same boat. Worrying is all about jumping ahead into the future - it starts with "what if I can't pay my phone bill this month?" and escalates to "I WILL DIE AND BE EATEN BY COCKROACHES," in no time at all. This can paralyse writing, as well. Thinking "what if this never gets published?", "what if this gets terrible reviews?" or "what if I die halfway through the book and am eaten by cockroaches?" is not at all helpful when you are in the throes of creating. (And, as a side-note, you are much more likely to be published if you have actually written something). To produce anything halfway good, you have to be really immersed in the story, and you can't do that when half of your brain is leaping ahead gleefully to examine all the dire possibilities that might be lurking for you in the future.

When I was about nine years old, I decided that I was going to win the Lottery. Yes, I was delusional. We were in the UK visiting my grandparents for Christmas, and the Lottery jackpot was something ridiculous like a zillion squillion dollars. I bought my Lottery ticket from the corner shop and decided that, if we concentrated enough positive energy onto my chosen numbers, I would win. I wrote my numbers out on bits of paper and gave one to each family member, telling them to concentrate on those numbers all day. I sat back, confident in the knowledge that I would soon be a zillion-squillionaire and could finally buy that pony.

Then I started to worry.

What if I did win? I mean, it was a pretty foregone conclusion. Would the money bring more troubles than benefits? Would it change our lives for the worse? Would it mean that ROBBERS and BURGLARS would descend on us en masse, bringing their scary black masks and loot sacks? Would my friends still want to be friends with me, or would they think I had become a rich snob (with my new pony)? I chewed my nails down to the quick. I worried all day. Finally I ran around to all my family members again, confiscating their bits of paper, and told them to concentrate on NOT WINNING instead because winning was going to bring DIRE CONSEQUENCES.

I didn't win, which I'm sure is only because I aborted my mission. I mean, otherwise I would totally have won.

I am trying to avoid this sort of thinking at the moment. My work is going so well right now that I am afraid to be aware of how well it is going, if that makes sense. It feels like guiding a trapped butterfly out through an open window - you have to be gentle in case you damage it by trying to be helpful. So I'm working behind my own back, as it were, while the conscious part of my brain whistles and twiddles its thumbs. I have to watch out for worries and squish each of them as they appear ("LALALA I'm not listening"), because if I allow myself to think about the future, about anything beyond the present moment and what exactly I am working on, I will become paralysed and unable to write anything. It's a delicate balance.

I think that mastering the art of "LALALA I'm not listening" might be the key to maintaining sanity, no matter what you're working on. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to stick my fingers in my ears and get back to work while simultaneously pretending that I'm not working at all. It's kind of exhausting.