Courage: Part One

I found a Borders Gift Card in my top dresser drawer last week and, considering their sad situation, I decided I'd better go use it immediately to good purpose. While browsing the shrinking inventory I found a book on writing that is worthy of mention here. It is called "The Courage to Write" by Ralph Keyes. Subtitle, "How Writers Transcend Fear".

First I must admit I am only on page 42. Only about one fourth in. Somehow I can finish any fiction book in 24 hours (who needs sleep?) but with non-fiction it is a slower journey for me.

I have found this book affirming. Many of the pages and examples are from and about published authors. What? To think this anxiety, this feeling of extreme vulnerability that comes from presenting a few sentences for anyone else to read, is universal? And that it won't go away when the agent, editor, and public finally discover my work?

Ok, in some ways it is a hard little lesson too. Much easier to envision all my problems will be solved by (trumpets sound effect)...publication. All fears washed away. To instead read over and over again that this isn't true, that authors continue to feel nauseous levels of self-doubt almost every day, even on their twelfth novel. Even if they sell well.

But I feel both enlightened, and lightened. As if a truth has been revealed. And as if the burden of "pretending to be a real writer" were lifted -- they are all pretending. We are all pretending.  

I will continue to batter my way through job woes, back-to-school time crunch, moving one daughter into college and hopefully share further on this book. And on courage in general. Where to find it. How to keep it from drifting away.

Blessings,
Toni

Progress towards goals, this week:
     Finished "The Year of Magical Thinking" by Joan Didion
     Read "Between the Tides" by Patti Callahan Henry
     Movies I saw: "The Help" (give it a solid 'A') and "True Grit"

Planned Denial

Things I have done this week to encourage the seed of the desire to start writing again I discovered last week:

• Started following the blog "Writer Unboxed" http://writerunboxed.com/
• Started following the blog "Writing with Style"  http://grosvenorsquare.blogspot.com/
• Started taking notes on characters and setting for my next novel
• Started purposely daydreaming in my daily commute, picturing myself writing. Picturing myself revising. Picturing myself happily writing without any dread of outcomes.
• Finished reading two novels, "Solomon's Oak" by Jo-Ann Mapson and "Life is Short but Wide" by J. California Cooper.

I'm purposely focusing on the pleasant parts of writing.  I know reality will eventually set in. But my little seed of desire could easily blow away in the wind, so for these early weeks, I'm allowing myself to just enjoy things. Kind of like the joy of pushing your cart through miles of perenials and annuals at the greenhouse in May. Imagining the beauty to come in your own front yard, ignoring the invasive weeds, whining mosquitos and the occasional dead bird you encounter in actually gardening.

I'm denying any possibility of the insecurity felt while you allow someone to read your work, the doom of knowing everything you have written is horrible, and the frustration at your beautiful thoughts coming out on the page in a tangled mess.

I still feel my seed is in the seed packet and not even planted let alone watered, so for now I'm going to stick to strictly non-reality shows in my mind. Here's to living in denial -- at least for a while.

Blessings,
Toni

Failure is Just a Label

"Failure is just a label we place on events." A quote from this morning's sermon. And it fits in nicely with all the parts of the universe that are clicking into place again for the re-birth of my writing life.

When I say 're-birth' I'm not talking about a rip-smacking new 10 pound baby boy. I'm talking more like a firefly. Small and persistently trying to shine a light over my few blades of grass in the world.

I have some seriously different goals. I am approaching writing this time as an avocation. Something I love to do and that I want to spend time doing. It is not a new 'career'. I do not ever expect to quit my day job to write full-time. Well, I guess I expect it with about as much likelihood as winning the Illinois Lottery.

I'm resuming writing as a practice that brings me fulfillment, microcosms of sanity, and a fresh perspective on many things that happen in life.

As such I'm changing the title and subtitle of this blog. While getting a novel published is definitely still one of my long-term goals, I choose to move my emphasis from 'becoming a writer' to 'writing'.

Thus, a new look, a new title. It is back-to-school season which makes us all yearn for unmarred green spiral notebooks and bic pens that slide across those pages. Fall is always my time to turn over a new leaf, and so here I am, again. See that leaf turning? I can feel it.

In joy --
Toni