According to Wikipedia, acedia…is a word from ancient Greece describing a state of listlessness or torpor, of not caring or not being concerned with one’s position or condition in the world. It can lead to a state of being unable to perform one’s duties in life. Its spiritual overtones make it related to but distinct from depression. Acedia was originally noted as a problem among monks and other ascetics who maintained a solitary life.”

I heard an interview with Kathleen Norris about her book, Acedia and Me. She talks about how she can be all gung-ho in the morning and flattened by acedia by noon.

In a Publishers Weekly review on Amazon it says, “Norris is careful to distinguish acedia from its cousin, depression, noting that acedia is a failure of the will and can be dispelled by embracing faith and life, whereas depression is not a choice and often requires medical treatment.”

I agree. I do not in any way feel depressed. In fact I feel quite okay but between the rain and the thought of working on some of my writing projects, I feel barely able to lift my limbs. And yet, the prospect of doing absolutely nothing appeals not at all. It is this strange purgatory of torpor where I want to do something, anything at all,  but think that perhaps only eating chocolate is worth the expenditure of energy.

And so. All the advice on this topic seems to point in one direction; the only real option is to use sheer will to carry me forward. Hence this blog. This is to start me up and enable me to tick one thing off my sorry little list, which reads in part, “Update blog.”

Tick. Done. Check.

I feel a bit more of a snap in my typing already. The keys are being clicked just a little harder. Now this is either a result of that big fat chunk of dark chocolate finally kicking in to my blood stream, or because I can see an accumulation of a few sentences here. True, I copied and pasted a few things to get started but I feel this is allowed when you’re facing off with the monster SuperAcedia dude who wants to keep me knackered and rundown.

Devil be Gone I Say! Ha. I’m sure those desert hermiting monks said something to that effect…

What I know is this. From here I can jump straight to my big writing project and these warmed up fingers will keep tapping away, having finally found their momentum. Yes, they will.

It’s certainly worth a try.