Advice Overload. Or: Too Much "How do you do..."

I haven't posted in over a week. So much for that post-at-least-every-other-day tip/recommendation/guideline that I read in several places on the Web and set as my goal a month ago when this whole thing began. Four weeks in and failing already. Or not. I'm still here. Still thinking every day about what to write, even if I'm not drumming away at the keys.

So, what have I been doing (besides trying to keep all the usual plates of my life spinning and atop their poles)? Well, my daughter and I planted some sugar snap peas. I've been checking out lots of other blogs -- including blogs about blogging -- to help me figure out what the heck I'm supposed to (or want to) be doing here. And I've been chipping away at a book I started reading two months ago and don't really like, which sounds like a waste of time except that I'm trying to figure out where this best-selling novelist went wrong. And since I can't help but consider all the reading I do right now to be part of my education as a writer, if I drop this book, it'll be like bailing on an assignment. (See, this is what happens when a teacher tries to teach herself something.)

I can't help it; I'm a learner. I seek information. I want to know how it's done. Almost more than that, I want to know how it's NOT done. I want to benefit from someone else's hindsight. So I read. I glean. I absorb. And sometimes I get so wrapped up in trying to figure out How To that I don't Do. I could spend the next, well, forever reading about how to be a better writer. There are books, classes, blogs, magazines, articles and newsletters all so chock-full of good advice that I can get lost for hours reading, bookmarking, copying, filing and thinking, Oooh, that's good. I need to remember that. I need to make sure that I did/do that in my manuscript.

But it can get to be overwhelming, too. It can make me think, I'll never be able to get all that in! And what if I don't? Will the manuscript bomb? Bring me nothing but rejection? Oh, God, it's all too much! Get me a white flag! A towel! A shot of bourbon! I give up!

Then, somewhere in the depths of an interview or a bio or a post, I'll come across a small tidbit that reminds me of the immortal words of Nike, Goddess of Victory:

Just do it.

And I'll stop picking at that pretty-damn-good novel and send out a few more query letters.