Freedom In Discipline by Elaine Fraser

I had surgery in November last year, my son’s wedding late November and another, major surgery in December. On the first of December I began a one hundred day creative challenge. I knew I would be out of action and perhaps not stick to my writing plan, but I was determined to finish it. What was I thinking?

I had three other novels I was working on and, even though I would have weeks of recovery time, there was no guarantee I’d be well enough to complete the challenge.

Coming out of your comfort zone is tough in the beginning,

chaotic in the middle, and awesome in the end...

because in the end, it shows you a whole new world !!

Manoj Arora

Towards the end of the one hundred days of my writing challenge I was allowed to exercise again, and that began another whole journey. I took it fairly easy my first week back and trained on my own.

The second week I went to a boxing circuit class and almost threw up a couple of times.

The third week I was doing two classes a week, as well as training on my own.

In the first week of March I signed up to do an 8km run in the Perth Hills.

Something broke after that run. Pushing through made me realise that I was stronger than I thought. Pushing through the mental and physical barriers helped me to stay on the fitness journey.

For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, 

but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness 

to those who have been trained by it. 

Hebrews 12:11 

Between surgeries, weddings and challenges, my regular writing slowed down a little but I sent my latest YA novel, Amazing Grace, to be edited in January. When I got it back late February, I spent ten days doing the final edit on Amazing Grace.

Pushing through on this project was challenging. I pushed through at the same time as dealing with recovery from surgery, and completing a one hundred day writing challenge.

As soon as I finished Amazing Grace I was inspired to write more. I wrote out a schedule for my next two books and I’m keeping to it.

I also signed up to do NaNoWriMo and joined a cabin for April. It’s Day 3 and things have been slow, but I’m scratching words down on the page and getting something down, even if it’s rough and raw.  

I've learnt that writing is a process, a discipline, but most of all it's just getting words down on the page. 

Pushing through and writing every day—no matter what—taught me that the benefits far outweigh the pain.

Pushing through is messy, complicated, uncomfortable and plain hard work, but I've found a freedom in the discipline of writing I haven't had for a long time.

                                                                                                                                                                                

www.elainefraser.co