I've been on sabbatical almost a full week now and while I'm happy for the time off because of all the stuff I've had in my personal life, I'm starting to itch.

No I don't have a rash. My mind is itching to go back to creating.

I'm so ready to get back to work, but I know that I can't yet. Why can't I just end my own sabbatical? I mean, I'm the one in charge of my career, how am I not in charge of my time off? It's a bit more complicated than that.

Back in July (I think it was July) I took a week off, intending to take more, but I cut my time short because I wanted to get back to work. I thought I was inspired and ready to finish. Then two months later, I'm wondering why I didn't take more time off. This sabbatical now wouldn't be necessary if I'd taken all the time off I should've taken back then. Besides, the edits for Forbidden aren't done yet, and Coco's pups aren't very old. It's better to have this kind of time on my hands instead of wondering how I'm going to cram my writing into the schedule I have right now.

I'm actually thinking about staying on sabbatical until November 1st. Then I'm ready to go for Nano and I'll have another month before I start worrying about what I'm going to do with Legacy. A whole month without creating any kind of story line. It's scary and exhillarating at the same time. I want to write, I've got all these ideas bouncing around my head. But what happens when I work through them all and have nothing new?

Sometimes in life we all need to take some time away, time to step back and evaluate our lives. While I hate having to do that with my writing, it's necessary to make the writing the very best it can be. I don't want to look at a manuscript later on and realize that I have to start from page one all over again because I wasn't writing well.

Don't be afraid to step back and let your mind breathe.