Eric Witchey's Blog: Shared ShadowSpinners Blog , page 19

Representation Matters

By Cynthia Ray

We are immersed in a society that exalts young, good-looking white people with perfect teeth and hair.  As an older woman, I had tired of these (don’t get me wrong, I love Katniss!) and decided to search for positive representations of older people in fiction and movies.  That search got me thinking about the bigger picture of representation and why it matters.

Everyone is looking for a story with someone like them in it, represented in a constructive light, especially when they don’t fit into the “young, good-looking, white person” mold.  As writers, we can and should examine who we represent and how.

When I was a kid, cowboys were the heroes of the day-popular in books, on TV and in the movies.  All of them were men.  I remember how thrilled I was to discover Annie Oakley.  Wow!  A woman who could ride and rope and shoot ‘em up with the best of them.

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I never missed an episode.  Even as a young child, I was aware of how people were represented and looked for messages; what did it mean about being a woman, a man, a child, a person of color?

 

When the Alien movies came out, I had the same ecstatic thrill as I’d had as a five-year old child discovering Annie Oakley.  Hooray!  A strong, brave, powerful woman protagonist who wasn’t “nice”.

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I mistakenly thought the movie industry had finally “got it”, that this was the beginning of a host of great women protagonists, but  last year we had Jurassic World-a throwback to the 1950’s if there ever was one (you know, the dinosaur movie with the whiny female executive who wore stilettos in the jungle, and while escaping from the T-Rex.)

I couldn’t resist posting this parody, which captures the essence of the ridiculousness of the Jurassic World movie.  The fact that a parody was made shows that we, in fact, have made progress.

 

Rogue One, on the other hand, gets it right, with a whole line-up of wonderful protagonists from many backgrounds.  Recently, I watched an old movie from the 1950’s.  It was so bad, I couldnt stop watching.  It was filled with misogynistic “jokes” about women, ridiculous caricatures of Italians with bad accents, and every black was either a waiter or a servant, portrayed as ludicrously moronic and/or cowardly.

 

I cringed through the whole thing; in fact, it made me sick to my stomach.  As a child, these were the images and ideas that I was immersed in.  As I grew up, I rebelled and rejected these representations and false ideas but many things are subtle and hard to uncover in our attitudes and beliefs and I am always discovering another underlying assumption that needs to go.

So I went out and looked for more current examples of books with different points of view,  and different kinds of protagonists, I found lists of books with protagonists of older people, people of color, autistic and LGBT, etc.  Yes, they are out there, but there are far fewer of them than we need.

As writers, we can help to ensure that everyone’s voice be heard, and everyone’s face to be seen.  We can expose and express ideas that may not be popular or accepted.  We can be courageous.  Think of the many books that were banned, and how new thought, ideas and people cannot truly be suppressed-not for long.  Let’s be the vanguard of a new era of expression, compassion, inclusion and respect.

NOTE:  After writing this blog, someone made me aware of this upcoming workshop by Wordcrafters in Eugene.  Perfect!

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For information about this workshop:  Wordcrafters Workshop

My Writing Religion: Some Thoughts as 2016 Ends

[image error]By Lisa Alber

Last week I happened to be listening to NPR as I drove my car back from Handy Andy’s, my neighborhood repair shop, when I realized something about myself. As one does, right? In the midst of grumbling about the gift of a split radiator during the most expensive month of the year. Copious amounts of white smoke had billowed out from under the hood right before an unusual snow fall for Portland, Oregon. I managed to get the car towed back to my house, and then I was stuck for nearly a week. Have you seen the horror movie “Cabin Fever?” Yeah, just about it.

Anyhow, so maybe it was having freedom at last, mixed with grumbliness, that readied my brain for a little epiphany. This has been a rough year on so many levels — many stressors (that’s in addition to the political toxins) — and I’d found myself thinking:

Why do I write anyhow? What am I getting out of it? Is writing novels worth endangering my health and the constant anxiety that I’m behind where I “should” be and could be doing more, more, more? Is writing novels worth not having a life as I try to get the writing done (and promotional stuff!) while having a full-time day job?

Seriously. I have a friend who’s been writing novels for a long time. I remember her staying about the endeavor: “It’s heartbreaking.” Meaning, you work and work, but you don’t necessarily get anywhere. Another friend said about the publishing industry, “It’s a punishing business.”

So, yes, the question I’ve been thinking about lately is: Why do I write?

Driving home last week with my new radiator, listening to NPR, Martin Scorsese spoke to Steve Innskeep about his newest film, “Silence,” a film about faith and compassion set in 17th century Japan. It centers around two Jesuits priests who infiltrate Japan to recover another priest who may have “gone native.”

Innskeep asked Scorsese whether making movies was his religion. I found this quote that summarized Scorsese’s answer:

This is what I do. If I could paint, it might be better; or if I could write, it might be better. But this is what I know and what I do. And so in a sense they [the films] are religious acts and you could, you know, ridicule that or you could take offense at it, but they are religious acts, even the profane ones. … I’m trying to find out who we are.

This struck me, and I remembered a moment maybe a decade ago when I realized that writing had become my religion. I’d forgotten that early on I’d realized this about myself, that this notion kept me going. For years, I had been searching for something. I experimented with many religious and self-help practices. A few years after starting a serious fiction writing practice, I realized that I had stopped my endless search. I had found my “religion.”

I write to process the world and myself in the world. I write for connection. I write to understand, as Scorsese says, “who we are.” What is this thing call we call “humanity” — the humanity within human kind?

In the car with the new radiator, I realized that I’d lost my way. In religious terms, I’d lost my faith. Faith is a funny thing. It’s just belief that you wrap up in your mind as “truth.” It’s circular reasoning, for sure, but that doesn’t lessen the comfort and purpose it provides people as they negotiate treacherous, unfair, unjust life. (Life is beautiful, too, but I’m not talking about that side of it right now.)

For me, it comes back to the practice of writing. Maybe it’s a little like prayer. It’s the practice of prayer or any kind of meditation that brings peace and groundedness. Could writing stories be my prayer? Had I lost my prayerfulness as I tried to keep up with the publishing biz?

This is worth thinking about, and so I shall in 2017. I may have to make changes, alter course, I’m not sure. I’ve got to figure out my faith again, and that’s okay.

What are you thinking about as we head into 2017?

Tagged: Martin Scorsese, NPR, prayer, religion, writing, writing practice

Be The Reader

by Christina Lay

There’s no shortage of people who want to give writers marketing advice.  The problem is that given the ever shifting reality of the publishing world AND the world of marketing, what is true today might not be true tomorrow.  What works for one person might prove worthless for the next.  And then there are simply a lot of ideas out there based on guesses, conjecture, what worked for that guy, and advertising hokum.  We have to remember that from the e-mag mavins who sell ad space to the speaker/gurus who sell workshops, advertising is a business, and we are the target audience. They worked out an angle or pitch and then try hard to convince us theirs is a sure fire path to the bestseller list. The bottom line is the bottom line; buy my book so you can convince other people to buy your book.

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The particular pitch that caught my eye and then made me slightly queasy was about turning readers into “fans”.  Fans are the super-readers who will buy every release, write glowing reviews, tweet about your appearances, and possibly stalk you at conferences. Every writer dreams of having a few.  In this particular workshop, they promise you will “learn how to serve them (fans) better” and also learn how to love “providing content and service”.  This is where my introvert writer self reaches for the antacid. I love how writing a novel is now “providing content”,  lumped in right along with all those endless bog posts, interviews, how-to articles, timely newsletters, fascinating tweets, friendly Facebook posts, eye-catching Pinterest pins, on-trend tumbler shares, and so on, and so on.

Without a marketing budget in the thousands, it’s true that all of these outlets are the best avenues open to writers to get the word out and let readers know you exist.  But how effective are they? This is the question that no one really has an answer to.  I do most of these things, and I do know without a doubt that it is better than doing nothing.  Writers can no longer rely on their publisher (if they have one) to do much of anything.  So yes, providing content beyond the books is pretty much a have-to if you want readers to know you exist.

About this business of “serving” your readers, I have to ask; do readers really want more than a good book? I’m no more of a guru than any of the people claiming the title, so I decided to look at my own habits as a reader, because I’ve been a reader longer than I’ve been a writer.  And I polled some friends.  Do we really want to be served by the writers we read? If so, how?

The most overwhelmingly common way a reader finds a new book is through recommendations by friends.  And, as far as I can tell through my very unscientific study this is still mostly done via face-to-face chats (in the three-dimensional world known as “reality”) and occasionally, through book clubs.  So one way an author can serve readers is to be willing to make appearances at book clubs.  This is something many gurus will poo-poo because instead of creating “thunder claps” with thousands of shares you might create a friendly murmur among dozens.  I’d argue, however, that the murmur ends up having a much more significant impact than the tweet that is lost among a sea of pointless twittering.

So what about friends’ recommendations via Facebook?  I honestly can’t remember ever following up on a post about a book, but I have had friends comment that they were interested in a book that I shared.

I’ve also never taken note of a book recommendation on Twitter. I do follow a lot of writers on Twitter, but it is only as a fellow writer, not a reader.  I get the impression that some fans do track their favorite authors this way, but I also sense that they are looking for giveaways more than book recommendations. The nice thing about Twitter is that it is free and relatively painless. If you’re blogging anyway, automatically posting on Twitter is a no brainer.

And what about blogging?  This is the most time-consuming, content-providing marketing activity a writer can engage in, but is anyone reading your posts? This one is harder to untangle, because I am constantly reading blogs as part of my activities online as a writer.  Would I be reading them if I wasn’t a writer looking for info and connections? I don’t know.  I can say this is the main way I’ve found new-to-me writers.  Specifically, an engaging excerpt is by far the most effective “content” as far as getting me to click that Amazon buy link.  I participate in a lot of blog hops and so end up reading a lot of short excerpts.  So what makes a writer stand out?  Simple— excellent writing.  It helps to have a professional looking website and easy to follow links to book blurbs and buy links.  It is also essential to always come across as a nice person.  If you go this route, you’ll find that most of your visitors in the beginning are other writers looking for connections, so be responsive, be helpful and whatever you do, don’t hide any weird viruses in your website that automatically sign people up for your newsletter, or any other creepy reverse stalking cyber-tricks (yes, this is based on actual experiences).

According to my survey, one of the most popular ways to find a new book is via the dreaded Amazon recommendation widget.  Dreaded because it is based on an indecipherable-to-the-common-human algorithm of great mystery and awe.  Skipping over that whole morass of conjecture and hoodoo, let’s just say your book actually makes it onto the line up of recommended books; what then? The cover is very important—make sure it’s professional and eye-catching.  Nothing turns me off quicker than an amateurish cover.  And then, once again the most important thing you can do is make a sample easily available, make sure it is perfectly edited and once again, excellent.  The definition of excellent is of course up to you and the reader, but you know what I mean.

What this all boils down to is that while you can bury fans in all sorts of giveaways, FB parties, chatty tweets, photos of your hunky heroes and on and on, what it really comes down to, in this reader’s opinion anyway, is–prove to me you can write.  All the social networking might catch a reader’s eye, but once the eye is caught, have an intriguing excerpt or sample chapter available for them to enjoy.

To wrap up, I’d say when faced with the overwhelming landslide of “Must Do” marketing activities, channel your inner reader and ask yourself what you want from a writer, and how you find them.  Then put your most excellent face out there, and keep on writing.

 

Tagged: blogging, fans, Marketing, readers, social networking, writer, writing

The Magic of Everyday Life

by Matthew Lowes

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Well, my post is a little late here but there are reasons. Right? I mean, first of all, I got sick. Then there was the ice storm. Then the power went out for some twenty hours or so and it got pretty darn chilly. Then we headed up to the Belknap Hot Springs lodge for the night. Wait a minute, you say, you were soaking in the hot springs with a past due deadline? Okay, the truth is although all this happened, I just forgot about the post. But because of this whole turn of events, I now have something to say about magic.

Friday morning we woke to snowfall up in the mountains. We hiked through the woods, had another soak in the hot springs, and on our way back into Eugene we saw the most amazing sights. All the trees were still covered in ice, and the sun had just broken through the clouds, making everything glitter like jewels. The whole city looked like it was built among the trees of a crystal forest. It looked like something straight out of a high fantasy novel. And all this got me to thinking both about the sheer magic of everyday life, and about the magic of contrast.

Why is it that the first snowfall of winter always seems so magical? Why does the ice storm delight us so much, in spite of the destruction it causes? Everything in life is noticed through contrast. Without contrast, nothing could be discerned. We would not even feel alive. That we are, and that there is beauty and wonder and awe is a function of this contrast. The first snow contrasts with summer and fall, and we so rarely see the beauty of the crystal forest that when we come upon it we are enchanted. Contrast creates all this magic.

So what does this have to do with writing? Just this: if you’re going to put a crystal forest in your novel, don’t make it the place your heroes visit just after the crystal meadow. To create a sense of magic, or to make a place, or a character, or an event stand out in the reader’s mind, you must create contrast. If characters are always arguing, their argument won’t have much impact. If they usually agree but finally have a blow up, there’s more contrast, and more impact. The storm is all the more impressive because of the calm before it.

But magic does not always have to be so dramatic as a crystal forest in the middle of your novel, although that can be fun. When you really notice, there is nothing mundane in this whole world. Everything is sheer magic. The flow of water, the rising of steam off a cup of tea, the drop of a leaf, a stranger’s voice, the play of light and shadow across the land … it’s all magic! And in your writing this magic is conveyed with the magic of a well chosen word, the magic of an original phrase, and the magic of a beautiful sentence. That is the wind in the trees. That is the face of the ever-changing sky. That is real magic.

Tagged: creativity, fantasy, inspiration, Matthew Lowes, writing

Five Ways National Novel Writing Month is Improving my Writing, by Pamela Jean Herber

For those of you who are not familiar with National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), it is an annual event scheduled for the month of November, which is hosted by nanowrimo.org. Hundreds of thousands of people across the globe accept the personal challenge to write a 50,000 word first draft of a novel in 30 days. This year I succeeded for the eighth time in ten attempts. Along the way I’ve learned a few things about how to work toward quantity and quality simultaneously. These are the first five that come to mind.

1. Maintain Mad Typing Skills

It’s only obvious that typing speed and accuracy will help in pounding out those 50,000 words. However, my ultimate goal is to write a story of value to myself and others. So, I maintain a skill level that renders typing to the instinctual level, where I’m not thrown out of the land of story to search for a key or fix a typo.

2. Exile the Censor

Even with mad typing skills, the words can come haltingly. This is where I tell myself that no one ever has to see anything I write. Even then, sometimes it’s uncomfortable to come face to face with my own raw thoughts and feelings. Allowing my imagination to flow freely through my fingers has taken practice. Writing as fast as possible has proved to be the most effective way for me to get over myself. The benefits are great here, not only in word count but in connecting more fully to my inner storyteller.

3. Set the Timer

Timed writings serve multiple purposes. First, by starting out with short sprints and increasing them, you can build stamina, get your brain into writing shape. Then by setting the timer to the same length for multiple sessions and then switching to another, you will develop a sense of the relationship between word count and speed. Also, by maintaining a habit of timed writings your words will gradually take on shapes that fit the time lengths.

4. Write to Constraints

This is where the fun part begins. By now you are able to write with such velocity that you can dial it back to focus on story. Start by giving yourself random prompts to write to, either to a specific time length, or simply allow the words to determine the length. This is not easy for me. I’m still strengthening my ability to take multiple elements such as character and setting and place, and insert them into the story place in my mind. But it’s getting easier. Once you’ve achieved competence at impromptu story writing, you will be on your way to writing to an outline.

5. Transition from Time Chunks to Story Chunks

Here we are at number five, where the previous four come together. I like to think of this as the place where I inhabit the time-word count-story continuum. Now, instead of focusing on timed writings, write to story chunks. These can be scenes, chapters, whatever. The chunks might be loosely defined or highly specified. They might come directly from the outline to your novel. The timer isn’t off limites here, but may not be necessary.

Use these five practices to remove obstacles to putting words on the page, and to tune your imagination to your inner storyteller. Then go out, or stay in, and write the best shitty first draft of a novel you can.

Tagged: creativity, fiction, Novel Writing, story, writing, writing habits

Finding Pine Martens, by Eric Witchey

Finding Pine Martens by Eric Witchey

This is text. As writers, we manipulate text. We fiddle it. We rearrange it. We edit it. We proofread it. We test it and rearrange it again. We do this until we believe that the text matches the story in our hearts and minds.

While engaged in this nearly obsessive focus on forcing the text to match up with the story, we sometimes forget why we engage in this insane effort to make the little black squiggles on a contrasting background line up in pleasing orders.

We do it to cause an expansive, revelatory emotional experience in the mind and heart of the reader.

Consequently, I think of myself as a reader advocate. I am not a writer advocate, nor am I an agent advocate, an editor advocate, a market advocate, a sell it to New York advocate, or a hit the Amazon number one slot in my sub-subgenre advocate.

As a reader advocate, I don’t give a rat’s ass if the story matches my vision. I only care whether the story causes the reader to have a vision and an experience that is emotionally powerful and satisfying to them—to that individual reader—to each individual reader.

As a writer and human being, that means that I am willing to give up my vision if I can see a path through the story that will give the reader a better experience. It means that sometimes the patterns of text that interact to allow the reader’s possible extracted or projected meanings can be manipulated in ways that allow the reader to experience something I did not plan but that I can bring to light.

It’s like the moment when we are looking for an eagle high in the canopy of the Northwest rain forest. We peer upward into the tangled canopy and only see the crossing of the branches, the fluttering of leaves, the intermittent release of rays of sunlight through the foliage… Then, as if the entire moment were structured to give us the gift of a vision, our minds resolve a pattern—the voracious elfin face of a pine marten peering down at us from the crook between two branches. Certainly, we weren’t looking for a pine marten. In fact, we hadn’t considered at all that we might see a pine marten because they are so rare and so elusive. However, that moment sweeps away all thought an eagle because the weasel-cat-squirrel face of the pine marten is so much more interesting and exciting.

Working with the patterns of text and the minds of readers who will interpret those patterns requires more than an understanding of grammar, punctuation, and the linear events of the story we plan to tell. It requires the mental agility to know when the patterns that we are creating can suddenly reveal a pine marten instead of the eagle we planned on. It requires a willingness to look at what is possible and release what is intended. It also requires the ability to reinterpret all of what has been done in favor of new, richer possibilities.

When I was in grade school, I became angry at a girl who often wore dirty clothes to school. She smelled funny. She always seemed dull and stupid. I tried to tell my father how stupid she was and how wrong it was for her to be in my class. My father became quite angry. He took me by the shoulders, knelt, made direct eye contact, and almost whispered these words: “Eric, righteousness is a crutch you use to avoid understanding.”

All thanks to my father for that moment of insight and understanding. My father was a reader advocate. No. Not quite. He wasn’t a writer, but he was a perceiver advocate. He wanted me to look see more complex patterns of truth than my imposed judgments and expectations allowed. He wanted me to see facets and reflections and possibilities instead of falling back on small-minded, rigid patterns of righteousness. He was a good man, my father.

I did not understand that I had been looking for an eagle instead of seeing that the girl was a pine marten. I did not understand that she was from a very poor family—poor because their father had been taken from the family livelihood in the steel mill and from the family by cancer, because they had lost their health insurance, because the widowed mother was very sick with what we all now think of as trauma-induced depression. I didn’t understand that the girl’s uncle had come to live with and help them and liked to have his niece sit on his lap a little too much. I didn’t understand that the only clothes the girl had were from their church charity bins. I didn’t want to understand. I wanted the world to fit my desires, expectations, and ideals. More than that, I wanted the girl to be lower in some way than me.

She was certainly not an eagle. Yet, she was the pine marten.

By releasing my righteousness, my desire to have her conform to my desire for simple, easily understood and imposed hierarchy and correctness, I came to understand the much more complex, more powerful story of her family and its universal connection to the struggle of all families.

Our stories are often like that. In our minds, our stories are clean and simple. We fiddle the text. We fix the text in an endless effort to get them to conform to our expectations, our sense of how they should be—of how they must be if we want to sell them. However, when we release our sense of what the story should be, we discover that what could be is much more wonderful and powerful.

Every story is a long line of little black squiggles in a row. That’s all it is. We, as creators, fiddle and fix and rearrange the squiggles. We, as human beings, can sometimes release our righteousness and step back and see what is possible. Sometimes, just every so often, we can stop looking for the eagle just long enough to see the pine marten and realize that our simplistic sense of what should be is the righteous crutch we use to avoid understanding the possible—the deeper, richer, more powerful truths that our readers could pull from our text, could find in our patterns, or could bring from their experiences and project into our words.

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Let The Light Shine Through

Let The Light Shine Through by Cheryl Owen-Wilson

Throughout history story has spoken. From papyrus pages, to the blue light of the electronic devices of today, story speaks.   And it speaks in many voices.

First there is the actual story. It’s spoken through the words woven together by the author. It will have a protagonist, an antagonist and hopefully an interesting plot.

The second story is spoken within the recesses of the readers mind. It speaks through the many filters of the reader’s own life experiences.

The third story remains silent, waiting for the reader to understand its language. It is the hidden voice, the underlying message, the writer intended the reader to receive beyond the story itself.

In my vision of these three scenarios I first see words dancing on a page. They line up perfectly to create the original story. But as they enter the readers mind, they rearrange and become filtered through that reader’s knowledge creating the second story. I visualize the final story as a bright light shining through each blank space on the page. This bright light is the underlying message the author hoped to convey to his reader.

A very simply analogy for this would be the story most every child has heard “The Boy Who Cried Wolf”. The light shining through this story is quite simple. Don’t lie.

What is the bright light shining through your story?

The words written above were to serve as my very simple blog for today. However, I felt compelled to add the following.

Today, many of my writing friends are struggling with creative paralysis.   Said paralysis is due to the aftermath of our Presidential Election of last week. I was also paralyzed for several days. So, I will address this strictly from my perspective.

I had a very visceral reaction to the headline in my local paper on November 9th. I knew when I went to sleep the night before, what the outcome would be. I did not anticipate my severe reaction upon seeing it in huge black lettering splashed across the front page. Such is the power of the written word. I’m not going to go into the “whys” of my reaction. But I do feel my journey to understanding and ultimately breaking through my paralysis bares relevance in regards to having an artistic block of any kind.

After my initial reaction to the newspaper, I attempted to plug ahead. I tried placing words on the page for my current work in progress. But the voices in my head, my muses, my friends, would not speak to me about my WIP. No, they were a mess, confused, angry and yes very depressed. I tried silence them, but they wouldn’t listen. So I sat down and listened to them. They had a lot to say. Then I did what I always do. I wrote what they had to say. What came of it was this poem. Not a great poem, but I hope my message does shine brightly through the words.

I Believe

I believe in equal pay, for an equal workday.

I believe in a woman’s right to choose. It is her body. It is her views.

I believe no one should dictate whom you can, and cannot choose as your life partner. With love there is no compromise, no barter.

I believe Mother Earth needs more tender loving care. Climate change is here. Just look. It is all around us. It is everywhere.

I believe the seeds of hate are sown through fear, and some wield it like a victory spear.

Above all I believe in the innate goodness I see shining from every face. Regardless of its color or its race.

Finally, I believe, it is what we believe that shines through between the blank spaces in our stories.

Once my voices felt heard, they settled back into the rhythm of my current WIP. However, when I started placing words to page, I realized I had a new, hyper sense of being. I recognized my antagonist had become darker, and my protagonist more determined in her quest. My plot had grown more complex and strewn with innumerable obstacles. When I began, I had a vague sense of a positive resolution in my story. While that hasn’t changed, I now know it will be quite a long road before the final victory.

Then there is the flip side of my creative mind. It is my painting world. I can’t wait to start placing color, much color.   You might even say a rainbow of color over large patches of red.

Yes we artists speak in many ways. We have many voices.

What is the first thing a civilization saves when it is threatened? It saves the writings and art created by that civilization, because it is the only way to record for all eternity the diversity of so many.

So dear friends if you’ve found yourself, if not blocked, at least at odds with your current environment, I encourage you to write. I encourage you to paint, draw, and create. Let your voices be heard, let the light shine through speaking loudly.

“Story Time” Original Art by Cheryl Owen-Wilson

Tagged: art, blogging, politics, writing

Trust the Path

By Cynthia Ray

“As I looked back at the mountains and forest that had just held me in their jaws I realized I’d been given a gift with that phrase, Trust the Path, and I pass it on to you. It means that when you are lost and confused, you can trust the journey that you have chosen, or that has chosen you. It means others have been on the journey before you, the writer’s journey, the storyteller’s journey. You’re not the first; you’re not the last. Your experience of it is unique, your viewpoint has value, but you’re also part of something, a long tradition that stretches back to the very beginnings of our race. The journey has its own wisdom, the story know the way. Trust the journey. Trust the story.   Trust the Path.” Christopher Vogel from the Writers Journey

Vogels story begins with a hike that goes terribly wrong.  He becomes lost and as dusk descends, he panics.  At the point where he was ready to give up, exhausted, hungry and shivering, a voice whispered to him, “Trust the Path.” He looked around, seeking that path, but found nothing. He questioned that voice, but he looked down and noticed a line of ants moving in the grass. He followed the ants path, which eventually led to a narrow deer path, which, in turn, led to another, wider logging trail, which led to a road which led to the highway.

If he had dismissed the voice as foolish, not logical or unrealistic, he would have remained lost in the woods, and possibly died there. How often do we dismiss our own still, small voice of guidance? It whispers, or shouts, or nudges, but we have to be willing to trust ourselves.

The good news is, that no matter how deaf we may have been, or how dismissive in the past, the voice keeps whispering and once we start tuning in to it, it rewards us with even more wisdom. It is a beautiful gift that every single person has access to, if we will only trust it.

Trusting ourselves and listening to that voice, leads to surprising places that we would have never found with our logical, analytic minds. It can be the scariest thing in the world, but it is the only thing that can save us–it leads us out of the mire, or to the heart of our story, or at least to the next step of the journey, one small step at a time.

Trust the Path. Trust YOUR Path.

 

Tagged: art, creative process, guidance, writing habits, writing process

It Doesn’t Matter What You Write

by Elizabeth Engstrom

When I was young, the only thing I ever wanted to be was a writer.  I always knew that some day I’d see my name on the spine of a book, but it wasn’t until I had a little life under my belt, a few gray hairs, a few credits from the school of hard knocks, a little life experience and something to say about the hope for mankind, that I was ready to sit down at the keyboard and pour out my mystifications.  The “message” that burdens every writer had finally floated to the top of my psyche.  My message had gelled.  It was time to write.

But everything I wrote sounded pompous or opinionated or biased.  I couldn’t make good fiction out of my message for mankind.

Then science fiction great Theodore Sturgeon came to town to give a workshop.  I had grown up reading his work; his influence on me as a young reader had been enormous.  I paid my fee, mailed in the manuscript he agreed to read as a part of the workshop curriculum, and I sat down to bite my nails and wait for his judgment.

The incomparable Theodore Sturgeon

During this time of waiting, it occurred to me that over the two-week course of this workshop, he and I could run into each other at the coffee machine or something, and actually speak to each other, one-on-one.  The thought left me star-struck.  What on earth could I possibly say to the great Theodore Sturgeon?

I could ask him a question.  I knew the prospect was not likely; surely there would be thousands of people at the workshop.  Nevertheless, I set out to prepare myself so I wouldn’t be caught flat-footed if the opportunity came to speak with my hero privately.  I wracked my brain and spent sleepless nights, torturing myself over this idea.  What would be The Definitive Question to ask Theodore Sturgeon?  In retrospect, I think this was my way of not dwelling on the fact that he was reading my first attempt at novel writing.

My musings came down to one question that seemed to synthesize all that had been troubling me.  The question was: “What do you do when you want to preach?” I had the urge to write, I had a message to disseminate, I had the time, the space, the knowledge, and a teensie bit of talent for the task.  But everything I wrote sounded preachy.  Every time I reread what I had written, it felt as if I ought to be writing Op-Ed pieces, or essays, or how-to books.  At one point, I even talked with my minister about actually preaching.  His response?  “My collar closes the door to 90% of the people in the world.  You, as a writer, have no such boundaries.”  Wow.  A fiction writer has such opportunity.

Such responsibility.

So what do you do when you want to preach?

Satisfied that I would not only find out the answer to that question, but that I would have something intelligent to talk over with Ted Sturgeon, I set about to wait with calmer heart.

The first night of the seminar, I was astonished that there were only about ten students.  This was going to be an intimate setting.  I would probably get to know him over the course of the two weeks.

And I did.  He and I became friends in the limited time he had left on this planet, but I never had the opportunity to ask him that question, because the first words out of his mouth on the first night of class were these: “It doesn’t matter what you write, what you believe will show through.”

I was stunned.

I’m not sure I heard anything else Ted said that night, because this was so clearly the answer to many of my questions, and it was so simple, and tasted so strongly of the truth that I was awash with the possibilities for my future career.

Did he mean that I could write a vampire book and my message would come through?  I could write a romance novel?  A western, science fiction, horror, a comedy about dogs?  A blog? And still, that which had been shown to me, that which had been given to me, the life-saving philosophy that I had developed (and that surely would save the world) could still be served?

Of course.  I have only one story to tell, and that’s my story.  I can’t tell yours.  But mine is large and encompasses much, and it can be sliced into myriad tales of truth and fantasy.

I realized that it was the message showing through in the writing of my favorite authors that attracted me to their work.  Singly, a book may not contain impressive spiritual insights; but over the entire body of work of a certain author, a reader cannot help but get to know the writer’s heart.

When I realized the truth of what Ted Sturgeon said to me that night, not only did my career spread before me like a vast playground, but I was filled with confidence and questions.  Before he died, Ted Sturgeon and I spent a lot of time together, and in fact he wrote the introduction to that first book, When Darkness Loves Us, which went on to be well published.  But more importantly, I could relax.  My job as a novelist needn’t be unnecessarily complicated; it is difficult enough to tell the truth within the fiction; I don’t have to consciously worry about what message the reader is receiving.  That isn’t my job.  I don’t have to save the world.  I only have to ensure that the reader enjoys reading what I’ve written.

It has been my fortune to have a challenging career as a writer, teacher, editor and publisher.  Through my relatively brief association with Theodore Sturgeon, I learned that the surest way to make my own dreams come true is to help others achieve theirs.  The fate of empires does not hinge upon my work or upon any one piece of work.  But those of us to whom this gift has been given have a responsibility to be persistent about writing and publishing our work until a sufficient body of work has been assembled.  Our message is important.  The world needs it.   That’s our job.

Never forget: It doesn’t matter what you write.  What you believe will show through.

(Note: An earlier version of this essay first appeared in Chicken Soup for the Writer’s Soul.)

Tagged: inspiration, Preaching, Responsibility in Writing, Theodore Sturgeon, writing, Writing Fiction, Writing Workshops

In Which I Muddle Through a “Blah” Writing Day … Week … Month …

[image error]By Lisa Alber

I don’t know what’s going on with me. I’ve written 700 words on three different topics for this blog post and nothing’s working.

Goddess-y neighborhood coffeehouse anecdote? Yeah … Could have been humorous or thought-provoking. Now, it’s just as dull as my thoughts.
Novel development process? Perhaps, but this has been a problem for the past month–whatever process I thought I had doesn’t seem to be working.
Novel research topics? Feels like you gotta be here in my head to be interested in these topics, and, frankly, I’m not even enthused right this second.

This is a truly strange feeling. Normally, once I get going, I’m OK. Blog posts are *never* an issue. I can always spin a thought into 500 decent words.

So, I don’t know. Whatever it is, it’s the same thing that’s hampering my novel development process. A few days ago, on my personal blog, I was certain it was the election cycle clogging up my brain. Could be. Have you read the articles about the anxiety that this cycle is causing? Election anxiety is apparently a thing–and this thing is affecting folks in record numbers. If this is what it is with me (and I won’t know for sure until later in November when I can look back on these weeks), then, holy crap, what kind of toxic environment are we living in at the moment?

And why am I susceptible to this anxiety? (That, my friends, is probably a question for a therapist.)

You’d think I’d be able to shuck off BS and rhetoric and worry and fear … I succeed for a little while then find myself online again, sunk in articles and commentary. My brain’s been taken over by — politics. ACK.

There’s something worrisome going on that’s larger than either of the candidates–don’t you feel it? Something might have to give, to seriously give, at some point … But maybe that’s just my anxiety talking.

So how to muddle through? I’d actually rather not muddle. I’d rather just do–but if muddling is where I’m at, I figure there are a few things I can do:

Show up at the computer at my regular writing times.
Open Scrivener (my writing software) and the last file I was working in.
Engage in one thought related to whatever’s in that file.
Write something in relation to that thought.

That’s about it. Normally one thought leads to the next–but I can’t count on that at the moment, it seems.

One thought does keep going through my head: This too shall pass. I didn’t understand the simple yet sublime wisdom within these four words when I was younger; now I find them a comfort. The election cycle will pass and so will this funky headspace I’m in.

Here’s my contract with you: I just opened Scrivener, and I see that my last brainstorming thought for the next next novel (for 2018, cross fingers!) related to a character named Kevin, and his quest for answers about his birth family. So here’s what I’m going to do right now: his character sheet, which is to say his character arc and motivation for this story.

OK!

How do you muddle through when the going gets sloggy? Are you feeling any election anxiety–how are you coping?

Tagged: anxiety, elections, novel development, writing