Too Many Ideas???

One of the toughest (and most exciting) parts of writing a book is having too many ideas swirling in your head. And, no, I'm not talking about too many ideas for your book (which can also be a good or bad thing and will possibly be the subject of a future post). I'm talking about having too many ideas for other books that I could be writing. On the one hand, it's exciting because every new book idea presents so many possibilities and, before you know it, you're thinking of the plot and the characters and wondering about the story these new characters have to tell. On the other hand, it's really tough because it can take your attention away from your current work-in-progress (which is where your attention is most needed). I am currently having this problem. Usually, taking ten minutes to write down the idea and saving it in my "Ideas" file helps, but this is the first time that I've had a manuscript in front of an agent that is meant to be a series, and it feels different. I've tried writing a new story completely (as posted in my last blog) and it was going really well until I hit a little writer's block. It isn't a big deal because I know why it's happening and how to fix it, but the second that writer's block hit, I started thinking of other stories that seemed more compelling. And all the while this is happening, I am in love with the manuscript that is front of the agent, and what I really want to be working on is the next book in the series. So, basically, I feel like I'm in limbo right now. I can't work on the next book in the series (well, I could, but I want to wait until I hear back from the agent that is reading the first one), and I can't seem to focus on a different story completely because I'm thinking about the series idea that I'm in love with.

I've heard of other writers working on 2 or even 3 books at once, but that doesn't seem like it would be productive for me. So, for now, I'm just going to keep filing those ideas into a folder for later and, hopefully, I'll feel like I'm out of limbo soon.

Btw, I know it sounds like I'm complaining about having too many ideas, but I am thankful for it because I would rather have too many ideas than not enough. I just needed to rant about feeling like I'm in limbo, because I know there are other writers out there that have been in the same spot or are in the same spot now.

Thanks for letting me rant : )