So it’s 2am in the morning. You’re sitting in front of your work in progress, agonising over plot lines, edits and whether it’s good enough to send in to even your beta-readers.

There are no more nails to chew. You’re thinking about figuratively starting up smoking or heavy drinking…addition to the coffee and the tea and the soft drink…or perhaps finally finishing off the groove in the carpet where you’ve already spent hours pacing back and forth.

You take a break from your manuscript. Perhaps you could get a head start on that synopsis. After all, you made an outline, didn’t you? Wait, did you? You start to question everything. You read and re-read everything. You make a checklist of your checklist or you don’t because you think you already have one. Somewhere.

Your biography sounds too egotistical so you tweak it a bit only to think you’re underselling yourself now. You rewrite it and wonder if modesty even exists anymore. It’s passed 2am. It’s not like you can check with someone else. Oh wait, you can, that thing called social media where you wonder if you’re abusing the hell out the hashtags or you aren’t using them enough.

What the hell are you even doing? You don’t know anymore.

The night passes. You have versions of things you’ve written. You have options. Submissions. Do you keep going? Do you finish?

What do you do?

You finish it, of course. You go as far as you’re willing to go because if you don’t, I can promise you this…

Regret is far worse and disappointing yourself with “What If I had taken that extra step?” “What If I had submitted that piece of work? “What If I spent all that time in fear when I could have in success?”

Just be you.