I’ve been in the Netherlands for six-ish weeks now. I literary arrived the day before everything shut down, so it should have been a paradise for me. I was already going to have some time off work so I had been psyching myself up to it.
And then I get here and my ability to perform fails.
I’ve made some progress editing the beginning of a novel (which I gave up on). I also started a novella that’ll I have done by the end of this week. I’ve been keeping track of what I’m doing and I feel terrible about all the days where I did nothing. All that lost potential. Why can’t I make writing and editing a 9 to 5? It’s almost like I have burnout again, but I’m not sure if I do. It doesn’t help that I’m having a lot of negative thoughts that have no relation to my life at present. They are taking up a lot of time in me. Maybe it’s because I can’t socialise in person anymore.
It’s not a good day unless I’ve written more than 1k and I hardly ever do that. It’s not a good day when I spend hours playing computer games, even if I do manage to write. That’s still time spent elsewhere. From memory, I used to be so efficient at writing. But now my body and brain says no 😦
So where do I go from here?
I’m slowly getting things done, but not to my liking. Do I just keep chipping away at it? Maybe I have to as I can’t seem to do anything else. Maybe having a day job was something that improved my writing. It gave me some eustress about my finite time and made me manage what I had. Now I have all the time in the world I have no immediate rush to do anything 😦
Stephanie Haggarty 
Totally feel you about writing productivity going down the drain when there’s time!
While I think discipline equals freedom (hence why you feel crap when you play computer games all day), I also think that as long as you meet your daily goal (which should be set low), you have all the right in the world to feel content.
Though a famous online personality did say “Let your guilt guide how you spend your day”, so it really is up to you to see where you want to fall on the spectrum.
I think you’re already doing a lot, from what you’ve described.
My official daily wordcount for my novels is 250, though I often reach 500. Can’t imagine forcing myself to do 1,000 every day.
Anyway, keep up the grind, and yes, slowly chip away at anything in your way.
Thanks for the kind words. I’m trying to make the most out of this situation and I feel like I could doing better. But maybe just chilling for a bit is the best I should be doing for myself atm.