On wordcount, jealousy, and paradigm

I am a jealous writer, I'll admit it. Normally, I'm a self-loathing writer, a much more common variant for the profession, or a lazy writer, or a frustrated writer, all of which are normal.

I have a friend that I went to grad school with, we had the same mentor, Rachel Pollack, both have occassional trouble with the "basicallys", and let's face it, she's good at her job.

And I am jealous of her wordcount. She can write more in one day than I did in 2 weeks. If she had started writing The King's Confidante on November 1st, she'd be done by now. And it'd be good, and amazing, and it'd probably score a contract.

This, I've discovered, is one of the things writers have to deal with. We all have a friend who's kicking ass and taking names and we wonder why we aren't.

So, trying to be a good Buddhist, I said to myself, "Well, this is obviously showing that you have issues with your own production. If you were truly at peace with your output, this wouldn't be bugging you. You'd just be happy for her."

So I boiled it down further, and asked myself the hard question.

"She's writing every day. Are you?"

Uh, well, you see...

I have a writing schedule, mostly. I work on the FFF story Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.

"So, you do 1000-1500 words a day, three days a week."

So, every day now, I make an effort on The King's Confidante, and when it's done, I'll get ready to work on the Lightning Rod re-write. Seriously, if I'm going to claim to be a professional writer, I should probably act, well, professional about my job.

BTW, if anyone's been following the City stories, The King's Confidante is essentially a "prequel", taking place 4 years before the events of Lightning Rod, or 5 years before House of Stone. I really need to get the timeline updated and reposted.

Also, P.S.: To the writer mentioned above? I am happy for ya, and proud to be your colleague. :)