The Terror of Finishing a Big Project
It’s really a thing
I figure that I am 98.2% finished with my current big project: a middle-grade sci-fi novel. Three weeks ago, I guess that I was about 97.5% finished. At this rate, I might be done, when? Never?
Yup. That’s the problem. I’ve been working at this thing for three years, give or take, and I am gob-smacking terrified of being done with it.
The funny thing is that through no intention of my own, I’ve been reading a lot of late of how this is a real thing. This last little bit of a push to be done with a thing can be the hardest part of a project for some people. Apparently, I am one of them.
Now, this isn’t really news to me. I have always preferred process to results. I revel in the zen state that comes from spending hours doing a repetitive task hours on end. I probably deceive myself into tasks that permit me to keep from finishing a project far more than anyone should admit.
No, thank you very much, I don’t want to do the same task day after day. I crave doing lots of different things. I delight in doing multiples. One current project is to make 100 bells. All alike? Of course not, all different, but within a fairly narrow set of constraints. I like to explore the possibilities.
