Thursday, March 30, 2006

The Frustration Factor & Time Issues

Have you ever had one of those days where everything is going wrong...? I am sure you have. I try to remember to build in time for those unanticipated detours, such as not being able to recover files you know darn well that you have finished, but sometimes you just have to start again, since continuing to recover/find them will put you even further behind the 8-ball.

Monday, March 27, 2006

"Writers on Writing"

This is from page 46 of the August 2005 Romance Writers Report, the magazine from the Romance Writers of America. It's an excerpt from an interview with Julia Ross, written by Eileen Putnam.

EP: Writers struggle in solitary, which--in the worst case scenario--mires us in an internal dialogue that can spiral into fear and paralysis. Do you have any strategies for overcoming this problem?

JR: Firstly, I try to ignore my emotions about writing and just write. After all, it's not about me; it's about the story. Once, when I was feeling especially overwhelmed, a writer friend said, "Why are you complaining that it's hare? It's meant to be hard. If it were easy, everyone would do it." I'm not sure why, but I find that thought very liberating. Writing a novel is meant to be hard, and our fears are part of the territory. So be brave! If you're scared, write scared.

I think Ross's idea to ignore my emotions and just write, to focus on the story, could be very helpful to me to get past my anxiety and other distress. Although, for me, that distress is PRE-writing, not when I actually get my fanny into the seat.

I also think that "it's meant to be hard" is an interesting sentiment. Because for those of us who think it's a breeze to put sentence after sentence together, as those of us who have always been good at English will attest, writing coherently isn't the hard part. No, something that has always come easily begins to get hard when we are trying to plot well, make it interesting, reveal character, etc. These are new muscles that we are stretching, and the worry that it might not be good is overwhelming.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Distraction and Forgetting


Yesterday was bad and today will be worse.
Nothing terrible happened yesterday. No, it's just that I didn't accomplish the creative work that I wanted to. I will say that I worked on my memoir, and made a break-through that will help me get it completed. Yahoo! But once you make a break-through, don't you want to stay with it? Isn't it just torture to have to put it away and do other things? I had to put away my memoir and go to stats class, because that's how I'm making my paltry living right now, grading stats homework for Prof. L. Once that attention was broken, I couldn't seem to get back to it. Plus, I was exhausted by a late night the night before, so I ended up falling asleep for an afternoon nap. Then, of course, I had to go to my Monday night class, Literacy Studies. Back home, I ate dinner, then went back to bed.

Today, I'll have to dedicate my time to grading stats homework. And it will probably take all day, with one break to go to campus and pick up more stats homework. So this blog is all the creativity that I'll indulge in.

But the cool thing about keeping this blog is that it is at least one creative outlet that I can indulge in and feel like I accomplished something. Finishing a post is like finishing a project, and it's wonderful to have a sense of completion. Maybe there is something to be said about small projects...hum. Let's ponder that.


Addendum
O.K., confession time. I just realized that I did do something else creative yesterday, besides working on my memoir. I worked on my personal website. It's so weird that I didn't remember that when I was looking back over my day. I think it's a fault of mine that I don't always give myself credit for the work that I do. Do you folks do the same? Do you negate some of the work that you are doing, just because you haven't gotten to finish it? Another something to ponder.)

Monday, March 20, 2006

Resistance

When you are working on creative projects, do you finish them?

I admit, I have so many projects that are only half done.

I get to a point where I am tested by the project and I get stalled. Sometimes the test is of my skill level. Sometimes the test is time. I get to a point where I am bored with working on the same piece and just give it up. And sometimes I know that I am resisting a piece because I am afraid of it.

Right now, I have to write a memoir for my Creative Nonfiction class. Its the toughest assignment that I've had in a long time. I don't want to write about me. If you find out my secrets, will you still like me? I'm just plain afraid to be as honest as a memoir requires.

But, hey! I have to evaluate my writing process as a part of the class. That's a whole other assignment. I think that will be just re-writing this blog, so it's at least partially done already.

Sunday, March 19, 2006

Admitting to beginner status

As I recommended to my readers recently, it's o.k. to be a beginner. Really, you have to start somewhere. Well, I'm admitting that I am a beginning blogger. I am slowly learning how to work with fonts and colors, etc. to make this blog more interesting and more easily read. Hey, maybe I'll add pictures soon! I've just changed the font color, so I hope it's easier on your eyes.

Artists Unite!

I just read Anna DeStefano's blog and found it very inspirational. You can read it here (see March 19). She's a fellow member of Georgia Romance Writers, and a terrific published author. I haven't read her new book, but A Family for Daniel is the best Harlequin that I've ever read. Don't think that I mean that Harlequin doesn't have other good authors. They do. But Anna's character development is outstanding. (Confession time. Although I love love love to read, right at the moment, I am doing so much of my own writing and doing so much schoolwork that I haven't been reading purely for pleasure very much. So, if you are another fellow member of GRW, please don't feel bad that I haven't mentioned you in my blog.)

Thursday, March 16, 2006

Practice Makes Perfect

I've talked about anxiety and procrastination, but there are other creativity stoppers out there. One stopper is skill level. I know that I have all sorts of beautiful paintings in my mind, but I have never developed the skill to bring those imaginary works to life. I'm not too hard on myself about that, however, because I am not trying to make my living as a visual artist. There's not a lot of pressure for me there. I love just puttering around with drawing and painting.

Starting to Develop as an Artist
But what if I did want to make my living in the visual arts? Well, you have to start somewhere. First, I would take classes in visual arts. And after classes, then, I would practice, practice, practice. And little by little, I would be able to bring my skill level up. Sometimes, we creative types can worry so much that "we don't know how," that we stop ourselves from making the attempt. There's that old bug-a-boo, anxiety, raising it's ugly, fangy head. Well, how do we get around that problem?

First of all, realize that there are very few Michaelangelos in the world, but plenty of people make their living (or at least parts of their livings) as artists. You do not, repeat, do not, need to worry about being Michaelangelo. And if that is what you worry about, well, good luck to you. It seems to me that not only do you have to have skill, but also an inordinate amount of luck to be remembered by history. It helps to be famous in your own lifetime, but there are a lot of artists famous in their own time that are now forgotten. Art History PhD candidates wouldn't be able to write their dissertations if they couldn't write about forgotten artists and resurrect their reputations.

I went to an art show not long ago and there were drip paintings along the line of Jackson Pollack's--and the artist would customize them for your home, using your left-over wall paint! I thought that was really cool. (By the way, the artist customized them in an interesting way, adding his own little touches that built on Pollack's work.) They were so quirky and interesting, but they didn't require the drawing skill that some art work does. That's one way to get started. Collage might be another way, since an assembled piece might not require the steady hand of a line drawing. The point is that I think that starting small and getting to work on any creative project is important.

Developing Skills as a Writer
What about "beginning" as a writer? Lots of people think that short stories are a starting point for writers, but in my opinion, writing a good short story is harder than writing a novel. Perhaps that's only for me. But practice for writers might be working on scenes. Perhaps you need to practice writing conflict. Perhaps you need to overcome embarrassment when you are trying to write the sex scenes that your romance novel requires. So practice. Write scenes. And then perhaps you need to practice writing transitions. I know, it's hard to pick something up in the middle, like writing these un-attached scenes would be. How about borrowing characters from another book? (I am not advocating plagarism here. Borrow from the public domain!) Say you are thinking you need to practice conflict? Beatrice and Benedick, maybe? Setting: a villa in Italy (or a bar in Houston). Beatrice: "pleasant-spirited" but with a sharp tongue and a sarcastic sense of humor. Benedick: A soldier, always making jokes and puns. Set-up, their friends are trying to get them together, but they are so similar, they annoy one another. Go ahead, write the scene. No. Don't use Shakespearean language. Write it as if it was set now. I see all sorts of possibilities here, don't you?

So that's one way to practice and develop more skill. And you can do it in secret, without any of your friends laughing at you. Too bad we end up practicing skiing out in public.

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

My Perfect Day

Class Assignment
I was recenlty asked, for a class, to write about a perfect day in the life of a writer. I had fun with the assignment, so I thought I'd share it here. It's several paragraphs. I hope it's easy to read.

A Perfect Day as a Professional Writer
My perfect writing day is a necessarily imaginary confluence of time, place, weather and brain activity, sort of like a perfect alignment of the stars to influence world peace and understanding.

I wake up with bright sun streaming through my window, gently, not in a way that sends razor blades of light through my eyelids. My cat is calmly sleeping, curled up in a ball at the foot of my bed, quite unlike her regular routine of stepping, one sharp little foot at a time, onto my breasts, in an attempt to make me get up and give her what is obviously the best spot on the bed—the one where I so comfortably sleep. After I stretch and rearrange the magical cat and dog-hair repelling, self-cleaning covers, my clean and fresh smelling dog leaps up onto the bed (avoiding landing on the cat, or even scaring her in any way) to snuggle a moment, before he leaps back off the bed, goes downstairs and lets himself out through the magical doggy door—the one that is big enough for him to go through, but not big enough to let in burglars and other threatening types.

As he leaves the room, I reach over and pick up my laptop, which has been cured of its annoying display problem and boots up quickly and efficiently. I know through the wonderous new mind-machine invention that there are no important e-mails in any of my 4 e-mail accounts, so I don’t need to attend to any current correpondence from my agent or publicist. The e-mails from my fans will have to wait. I get right to work, with the words of my romance novel pouring out of my fingertips onto the bright white screen before me.

After that successful writing session, I get up, stretch, and exercise. My body enjoys the workout, my heart and muscles are strong and healthy. Next comes a refreshing and relaxing bath, where I read my friend’s recently published, best-selling novel. I finish bath-time with a quick shower-shampoo, after which my hair effortlessly transforms itself into perfect waves. My magically-pressed clothing is handy, and I am able to slip into a comfortable, fashionable outfit and go to lunch with another one of my successful writer friends.

I come home and decide that my afternoon writing session will take place in my lushly flowering, mosquito-free garden. I carry my computer to the specially designed, ergonomic lawn chair and turn my attention to the essays and articles that I have been assigned to write by national magazines. After finishing two or three of them, I quickly send them off to the appropriate editors.

When my husband sees me stretching, that is his cue to bring me a glass of wine, and over a leisurely dinner, we compare notes on the writing that we each accomplished this day, and make plans to join up with several of our writer, artist and musician friends over the weekend, since we know that our writing will flourish the more we are connected and invested with other real, live human beings.

Since there are no magical, cat and dog-hair repelling comforters, nor size-shifting doggy doors, nor self-pressing clothing, and my hair continues to be curly and uncooperative, my real-life perfect writing day obviously doesn’t contain those things. What my real-life perfect writing day does contain is a brain that is free from creativity-blocking anxiety, long expanses of time in which to write things for which I will be paid, broken up with periods of time when I can meet up with my friends for lunch or dinner, a walk along the river with our dogs, or a night out at a play at Dad’s Garage or the Alliance Theater. Although I fight anxiety daily, and there are never really enough hours in the day, particularly if the work is flowing well, I do have the writer-friends, all of whom, to my knowledge, support one another, not envy nor denigrate one another. I am, however, still looking for the wine-glass carrying husband. Please e-mail me about any available candidates.

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

Quick housekeeping notes

Housekeeping Note #1
When I clicked on "comments" on my last post, I found that one of them had been "removed by the author." I think that means that the commenter removed it. But being new to this blogging thing, I'm not one-hundred percent sure. I know that since it was a duplicate comment, I deleted it from my e-mail. Would that have taken it from the comments list here? Nah, I don't think so. I think that DrM took it off herself.

Housekeeping Note #2
I got my 'stuff' enough in order last night to 1. make up my bed (with clean sheets) 2. use my laptop on my desk this morning. I have 5 piles on my desk--and a great big "in box" of papers that I deemed could wait to be sorted--they seem to have no connection to the classes I'm taking. But the 5 piles are small and manageable, and the other stuff...well. I hope there is nothing too important in there.

More
I am attempting to work this morning in an organized fashion. I haven't let myself wander around the internet too much...seriously, I set a timer, so that I wouldn't lose track of time. But this staying organized doesn't come naturally. Next, I'm on to writing up some micromovements for the creative projects I want to work on. I haven't decided whether I should make the micromovement list look cool, or just jot it on post-it notes. Making it look cool (SARK illistrated it in her book looking like the wheel from Wheel of Fortune) seems fun, but time consuming. I think I'm going the post-it note route (which SARK also recommends).

Monday, March 13, 2006

Procrastination, Poor Planning, and Disorganization

"When we refuse to learn the lessons, the lessons keep showing up."
--Barbara Winter
This is such a great quote. I should keep it handy, since it applies to so much of the way I conduct my life...specifically, I'm talking about my tendency to procrastinate, to plan poorly and to be disorganized. I know that these habits really cut into my ability to create...I never can find the tools I need to write, paint, draw, when I want to do so. I end up wasting all my time looking for them, or cleaning up the mess the paints, paintbrushes, pencils are lost in, thereby losing the time to create.

And I procrastinate because I see a great big forest, not the individual trees, and get overwhelmed by the enormous task of clearing a field to plow.

Micromovements
I know I've written about SARK's idea of micromovements before. (See her book "Make Your Creative Dreams Real.") Micromovements are really a way of planning your creative projects that will help you get them completed. I really think it's a useful idea. I sometimes fail at implementing it. If I have a big task on my brain, I get so overwhelmed that getting out of bed is the problem. Right now, I am letting the amount of work I have to do to get through the rest of my semester at Kennesaw State really get to me. However, when I really look at the number of tasks, and break them down into tiny steps, then I know that they are manageable. Although, lets face it, I've procrastinated for a bit now...which just expands the to-do list.) Carolyn See, in her book, "Making a Literary Life", recommends writing a 1000 words a day, 5 days a week. It's the same sort of thing as the micromovements. And if I would do it, then my young adult novel would be farther along than it is.

Disorganization
Disorganization is a really big stumbling block for me. I think it is for a lot of creatives. I have been working on getting organized for years. And no, I'm not exaggerating--years. I am better organized now than several years ago, but I'm still disorganized. When I go to class, I sometimes forget to take my notebook. So I grab a sheet of paper from a classmate, jot my notes, but then, it takes me weeks to get that sheet into the notebook where it belongs. And when I get my mail, it just piles up. I know that if I went through it right away, and put the Toastmasters magazines with the other TM information, and the Romance Writers Report with the others, that I'd be much more successful when I try to do research. But that's not what I do. I seem to spend as much energy avoiding tasks like sorting the mail as it would take to do them! I end up waiting until I literally have so much stuff on my desktop that I have to hold my laptop actually on my lap. That's usually when I end up doing a great big clean/organize project. I'm having to do one right now, since I just cleared my desk by putting everything on my bed. If I don't fix it, I won't be able to sleep tonight. And it's a huge task. I couldn't go through all that paper if I had 26 hours in which to do it, which I don't. I need to finish up this blog and get onto other class projects.

Prioritizing might be my next topic!

P.S.I got to the following webpage from Barbara Winter's site. (I visit her site often.) You must read this, it will make you both weep and sing with joy.
http://www.dannygregory.com/2006/02/advertising_and.php