Zero. Nothing. It’s where we start each day as writers. Even this blog started with zero. For me, there has been a whole lot of zero lately. Summer travel, events with family and friends, church happenings, and especially, work obligations have often left me uninspired and unmotivated to write.
The past few days, I have frequently thought about my total word count for the day. The French would say it looks like l’oeuf or an egg, from which we get the polite tennis term for nothing, love. And yet, there is nothing to love about having not written in weeks, and sometimes months. I suppose this is something most writers go through, save those truly productive geniuses who are so embroiled in their work that they cannot slip out for dinner with their spouses or a baseball game with their children. The rest of us have real lives, real obstacles that get in the way of our work, and consume long hours of the day when we would rather be typing away at our keyboards.
Some of these are deliberate choices. This summer, I opted to vacation for a week in Costa Rica, a time in which I knew I would complete no work, and was unlikely to be able to write anytime before or after due to other obligations. True to form, I experienced a wealth of inspiration—the kinds of experiences that would fill the pages of a Michener novel or the screen of a travel documentary. Yet those memories have already faded as I have since been pulled hither and yon by matters that—at least at the moment—seem all the more pressing.
There are dishes to wash and floors to vacuum, emails to reply to and telephone calls to make. And then there’s exercise and meals and grocery shopping and church services and everything else that makes life tick by. And those blessed “zeroes” keep piling up. This week alone, I have spent two days hoping to resume writing after a break, only to have been fatigued by work obligations that leave me hoping that tomorrow would bring a better climate for writing.
If I were to value myself by my productivity, those weeks upon weeks of no words written would be an indictment against me, and at some deep and unspoken personal level, my very value as a human being. If you think too long and too hard about it, you become that zero. You are zero. You are worthless.
It’s a trap, one that is deep and wide and deceitful. And one that is all too easy to fall into, especially when we find joy and value and productivity in our writing. For when you love writing, it’s easy to feel as though in these moments you are doing the best work you could possibly do and that this and this alone is what you were meant to do.
But this too is a lie, for those other times in our lives, those chores we have to do, those family obligations, meetings, and yes, those other jobs that feed and cloth us, are areas in which we can be productive. And yet none of this speaks a word to our true value as human beings. For even lying in my bed thinking my own thoughts, words that may never come to fruition or see light as bona fide written work, I am still a human being created in the image of God.
He is everything, infinity, and yet I am not zero. For even when we cannot write a single word, he is there to guide us through our lives and fill us with joy and passion. And when we lack passion and ingenuity and even the ability to write, he is still there to fill us with love and mercy.
When I am centered on God’s will, I take each day as an opportunity. It’s a day in which I can serve God. Writing is one of many ways I serve God. It might be my favorite way. It might even be the best way, given the talents with which he has entrusted me. But it is still just one way. So there will be days with zeros, times at which I become so frustrated and overwhelmed by everything around me that I cannot manage one single word. And still, even at the worst of times, his holiness is better than anything I could ever say or write.
At this point, I have written over two thousand words today. It’s been my most productive in many months. In a very worldly sense, it feels like progress made. But I must forewarn myself not to view these word counts in any way as a metric of success. Because as soon as I put those numbers first, I’ll keep seeing zeros and keep falling into despair. It’s not my progress that matters, but His holiness. Because it’s only by his grace that I could write even one word, let alone thousands.
For that reason, I am okay starting each day at zero. For even when I stay there and go no further, God is infinitely more than I deserve.