Well, self-discipline hasn't been going great. This month at work - it's been crazy. Quite a bit of overtime which is nice but creative inspiration has been sucked dry. I've just been tired.
I have been slowly working on my WIP, though, by writing scenes that need to be plugged in since I re-outlined everything in August. This outline help me see the holes in my story lines and now I'm trying to fill them in. One scene a week. At this rate I might be done in 10 years :p
But I have a new motivator in place. Something that might just make me get off my butt and work even when I'm tired. The Amazon Breakthrough Novel. I tried it last year, but with only a week's notice and only having my first real manuscript complete I didn't have much of a chance. Even now, I'm not sure I really have a chance, but I have until Feb 2 to prep so I have a better chance than last year and, I think, a better story.
This means I have two months to fill in the holes in my WIP, do a read through, edit, polish, and prep a killer proposal. No problem :P But it's a tangible goal. Something for me to work toward and though I'll be up against 10,000 other awesome manuscripts, I think I have a better chance this year and I know I'll learn something. God willing, I will have the best manuscript yet to submit to the contest. It might not be good enough to win, but if I stick with it, I'll definitely have the best I've ever done and, hopefully, a bit of guidance on how my best can become even greater.
Never aim low. Aim for the greatest you an possibly imagine and allow the Father to take you there. He wants the best for you and for me. I have yet to have a clue what the best is, but I keep aiming high, working hard, and waiting to see what He has in mind. Because whatever it is, will be awesome :)
So it's been awhile since I actually worked on my writing or updated anything on this site, but the month of September was the month of job training and moving half way across the country. Now I'm in Colorado trying to get settled in and hoping to establish a writing plan soon.
I am taking a couple of classes online. One is a basic writing class given by Holly Lisle providing guidance on how to write as a career: how to plan, how to write, how to get set up with agents/editors. The other class I'm taking is on how to write an excellent query letter to win over agents and editors. Both are excellent, though I haven't been able to put the time into either one that I would like. I am saving all the information so I can continuously refer to it again.
Now, I haven't been updating my tips page because I've been in between places with internet and such, but I do have three weeks hand written so I'll get back on those. I've even added a reminder on my computer to help me. I'm going to learn to be disciplined... slowly. Eventually :)
Okay, so I've been ignoring the piles in desperate need of sorting around my apartment and making those painful decisions on what will go and what will be trashed. Instead I have been working on my WIP. Always more fun. :)
Anyway, I realized something a few days ago. I had partially figured out my idea of the calendar for this world (remember this is a fantasy) by naming the months and knowing I wanted a solstice based calendar. But then I stopped and never returned to it. I figured that was enough information and all would be fine. However, as I continue to edit I realized I'm having trouble seeing the flowing of the story in my head. I didn't clearly know how much time had passed between some chapters and I couldn't tell if I had a huge gap in there. Now, a reader might not notice most of this, but as a writer I should know so much more about my story than my readers. I should be seeing scenes through my characters' eyes and in the same context as my characters, but I didn't understand this pivotal aspect of their lives.
Therefore, about four days ago I sat down with a notebook, the list with the names of my months, and some basic information on elements and solstices. (This story uses a lot of aspects of the elements in different areas, including the calendar). After two days and probably ten hours or more I had a satisfactory calendar consisting of twelve months, each with thirty days. I had thought of adding a thirteenth month but I considered a "rule" I've read several times about fantasy and science fiction - the world should feel different to the readers but they should still be able to relate to it. I don't know how much it would throw readers if there was a thirteenth month.
To help me wrap my mind around the calendar more I put two years, month by month, into the computer using a Word template. For the first year at the bottom of each day's box I wrote the comparable date according to the Julian calendar. For example: Adar Yino 1 is December 21. Or my main character's birthday is Adar Yino 24 which is January 13.
In addition to my yearly calendar I have also completed a detailed class list for all six years of the school my main character is attending. This calendar was complicated, even more than the yearly calendar, because the school is divided into four large groups - halls or houses - kind of a play off the Chinese university system and Hogwarts houses. But one class cannot have all four groups in it so I had to figure out each teachers' schedules to know when they could teach 1st years in Inore and Tolom and then when they could teach 5th years in Etama and Sonen. Some of these teachers have awful schedules and I'm considering bringing in a couple extra teachers - at least for the advanced level classes (like AP classes) for later years.
All of this has given me a bizarre sense of satisfaction which I won't even try to explain - I like making schedules, but it also reminded me how important it is for the writer to know these tiny details of his/her world whether fantasy or not. Some things you can gloss over and readers will never be the wiser, but some things will leave the reader feeling like something is missing, even if they can't say what exactly - but the story lacks depth.
Writers, it is our job to create illusions of depth and grandeur in our books, but it's much easier if we know more of the depths we are alluding to. Okay, that's my 2 cents for today :) It's a long road. But I'll get there one step at a time. Perseverance and faith keep me going, along with an intense desire to learn and improve my craft. The workshops are fascinating. :)
This week has been positively crazy leaving me completely exhausted and distracted. Except on writing. That seems to be the only thing that can hold my attention for more than 20 minutes. So that's what I've been working on. In a brief analysis of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire I realized there are at least 10 stories (plot, subplots and threads) in that book. My current WIP only has 7. :p
As I was thinking about the ten different stories in Goblet of Fire I realized that only about four or five of them actually are focused on Harry. The others are focused on the other characters like Crouches, or Fred and George, or Hermione and Ron. So this got me thinking (as I couldn't focus on anything else, why not...right?) who else in my story could have at least a thread. My main character has probably four stories revolving around him and there's a couple stories focused on his best friend. I've hinted at another story to do with another friend and even one of the adults in the story, but never actually develop them. Perhaps I could build on those two threads. Also, there are some older brothers in the story who could get a thread and even the nemesis, maybe. So many options and so many distractions :)
I know I want to follow at least one of the older brothers in the story for a thread which meant I needed more details about class schedules and such, so I spent two days figuring out ten different teachers' class schedules for six years of teaching. Some of their schedules are quite horrible. Maybe I'll bring in a part time teacher, at least for the advanced level classes offered to older students. 2 days or something like 8 hours late, I can tell you where all the student characters are at most of the day...and I can tell you where my main character will be more the next six years of his life. Fun details, perhaps a bit excessive, but the information will be necessary even if the older brother thread doesn't really work out. I'll keep these schedules and use them to write all the books I have planned around this main character (probably five).
Now it’s Saturday and I spent a couple hours doing grading (like the good teacher I am) and about a half hour working on a grad paper (like the bad student I am). And the paper isn't done yet, but I simply can't focus on it. I know what it needs but I can't seem to write it in a clear way or have even the tiniest desire to find the information I am still lacking. Oh, and the paper is due today :p. So here I set writing a blog because I can't seem to do anything productive. Maybe I'm too tired, overwhelmed or lazy...not sure which.
I do know that writing is what is filling my mind these days and I wonder if I am using my passion as an excuse not to do the things that are necessary or if it is simply something I need to do sometimes. Maybe if I write for awhile, I will get more of a focus back and be able to write more on my paper today. This is what I keep telling myself. Perhaps I am deluding myself or perhaps this is an element of being a writer.
Anyway, I know that which must done will be done, eventually, even if time in the expected or required time frame. I think I've been in China too long...deadlines are so optional!! :)
This weekend my WIP finally passed the 70,000 word mark. Yay! I've struggled with getting this manuscript to a sellable length as I'm learning how to write from a tight outline. However, a subplot workshop and a scene creation workshop seem to have finally helped me pass that 65,000 word mark where I hovered for the past few months.
Now the editing process will likely shorten it, again, but I'm not even half way through going back and examining each scene according to the workshop I just purchased from Holly Lisle so, hopefully, that will mean I'll just keep adding. I'm almost done with my subplot, though I might try to weave aspects of it into scenes focused on the main plot. After all, most people have several things occupying their mind at the same time :)
After this all I have to do is get it edited, find an agent, experience more rejections than I can imagine, and, maybe be published. *sigh*
Recently I was informed (again) that I'm a bit morbid and perhaps a little too descriptive, especially if I want to write for the teen level. Of course like any good writer (or human being) I wanted to defend myself explaining why each supposedly gory scene was necessary. Always good questions to ask, because, actually, one of them has fallen to the cutting board.
At first this made me a little upset because my 67,000 word WIP isn't even long enough to sell now, and it won't help if I keep cutting it apart. But after a second (or seventh) look, I realized it was a tighter, stronger beginning - all around, better.
So now I'm back looking at where things can be added without fluffing it up. I'm sure I'm missing necessary things in my little story and sure enough as I've been going slowly through it (for the third...maybe fourth time) I'm seeing blanks in time or action. Places to add scenes - yay! Now I'll have to edit those again - boo!
Also, the gore factor has definitely dropped (at least I think so) and there should only be two or three times that readers should outwardly cringe (or have to put the book down as my friend did after reading one of the scenes - she's got a vivid imagination) but shouldn't be over the top. Perfect for 13-18 year old readers of any gender :D (At least I think so, now I just have to finish the stupid thing and sell it)
Okay, as long as Weebly is working, I'll keep you updated on how I progress, be it ever so slowly. And I might drop some hints at useful workshops and such for any other wannabe writers out there :)
Once again it has been too long since I’ve been on here with either a personal update or writing update. I just can’t seem to strike a balance with life, but this is not a lament on my weaknesses and frustrations. Instead it is a note about what I’ve been learning and doing even during continued boughts with illness and high stress situations crashing over me. Most of it personal and much if tying into my writing (the little that has happened in the last month).
When stress levels increase and health decreases a perfect blend for loneliness is created. And loneliness is one of the quickest emotions to get me off track. I start thinking about finding “the one” and wallowing in self-pity on why I’m still “alone” and don’t have many friends. Basically, I get very focused on me and that is a dangerous place to be. Not only does it not help with the stress or health struggles it compounds these issues. So it sit on my bed or in my bathtub thinking about me and all the things wrong with my life until I feel completely lost and hopeless. This is the state the Father found me again. He did not judge or condemn me, He never does. He simply asked me a question, “Do you want me as much as you want someone to love you?”
In that instance I knew that once again I’d taken my eyes off my Savior and needed to do something to get back on track. I started flipping away from “dating site” commercials and put all my “Godly dating” books in a box. I pulled out “Celebration of Discipline” and created a fun little schedule to get me on track.
I’d love to say that this has all worked with great success, but the enemy also saw this change of heart and direction and trouble after trouble pulled me away from my cute little discipline schedule. Changes in my work week, increased headaches, and even a pretty bad case of some stomach bug (which is just now coming to an end). My sick time at work is gone and my energy about as far down as it can go (at least I’m actually awake now).
I look at my little schedule taped to my bathroom mirror and feel frustrated a bit, but I also recognize that the steps before everything fell apart did a lot for my peace of mind. I started writing again, finally seeing more of where I wanted my new WIP to go and even got through eight chapters of sensory edits on my “Isaiah” project. I also haven’t given up on my little schedule though I think I’ll be taking one step at a time.
Step 1: Survive a 4 day (10 hours a day) work week Step 2: Add meditation on His Word 4 days a week (even on nights I work) Step 3: Add focused prayer time 2-3 days a week
That’s as far as I’ve gotten in the Celebration of Discipline, but I think I’ll stop reading until I get to Step 3 or I’ll start looking at all I still need to learn and grow discouraged rather than revel in the success of each step. For each step is a gift in the Father’s strength and grace and worth a celebration.
January, what a glorious month of settling in, enjoying the freedom only found after finishing classes, and starting to feel at home. And also the month that saw my body on a rollercoaster.
I started the month with ear aches and a mild cold. The ear ache came and went for the next couple of weeks, annoying but not debilitating. The last week of January (last week), I ended up with a massive headache(migrane? tension headache?) that lasted three days. Just when my head started to feel normal my stomach turned on me and I ended up at home for 2 days curled in the fetal position, eating toast and applesauce. Thankfully my stomach decided it liked me again and I was able to get a few things done (like buy real food) before I was smacked with allergies - you know that feeling when the inside of your ears itch so badly all you want to do is grab a stick and jam it in your ear just for a bit of relief?? I'm there. Plus a soar throat, mild cough, and being completely drug out - Welcome February :p
I am hoping for renewed health for this month and maybe actually getting to enjoy my freedom and tentative settled feeling. And my birthday - I've been sick 2 of the last 3 birthdays. Odds are against me, but I'm hopeful :)
So, have I dropped off the face of the earth? It must seem like it. December was positively insane. I was finishing two large papers, fighting a bad cold, and then Christmas in which my grandma came out to stay with me until after the New Year. And January hasn’t started out much slower.
I can happily say I have completed all my work for my MA and am almost official a graduate (just need that pesky paper). Also, I have found a fellowship which I’m starting to get involved in and I am so close to being completely done with my WIP that I can taste it. It’s down to a polish and then the submission package stuff.
For the first time in a long time I actually feel that I can take a deep breath and not just a breath before dropping back into so much stuff it’s amazing I never drowned, but a deep breath followed by a relaxed sigh. In the last 3 weeks I’ve been able to reflect more on my time in China than I had in the last 3 months. The desire to return is even stronger, but the release to return is not quick in coming. I still wonder where I fit and what my ultimate niche is, but I’m beginning to think there are simply some people who are not meant to stay in one comfortable niche forever being stretched and jumping into something different. I don’t know if I have embraced this idea for me, but I am acceptant if that is what the Father has for me.
For now I am going to simply enjoy my freedom and continue to learn to live in the now. Get involved now without worrying about what’s next. Enjoy the simple things like bubble baths and a hyper cat and the freedom to drive where I want and go home when I want. Something waits for me, I’m certain, but I don’t need to know what right now. No, now is the time to finally begin to be restored in the Father’s awesome simplicity. J
So what do you do when everything seems to be falling apart and just confusingly wrong? Go back to the heart, the core.
Here I sit in Ft Collins, CO still fighting the insane desire to hop a plane and get myself back to China – the place I know, the place I have a purpose. How can everything feel so wrong in my own country? How can I feel so alone? It’s gotta be wrong… doesn’t it?
Where have my eyes been focused these last couple months of transition? On my circumstances, my fears, my pain, on those I miss and the work that seems important, but I’m not doing anymore. People said I was brave (maybe a bit crazy) when I moved to China 3 years ago. I was stepping out in faith doing a work the Father would commend. During the awesome times of watching toilets burn, long talks with teammates and students, and studies that forced me to think deeper and different than I ever had before… I knew, this is a work the Father can commend. During the times the rats stalked my apartment, and I wandered the packed streets feeling completely alone and I screwed up the language…again and a lesson plan fell flat and students just didn’t show up… I knew, this is a work the Father can commend.
And then He said… go back. And in my blind faith I barely questioned the command and returned. Now I sit in front of a computer every day, punch in data, try to understand the wide variety of newsletter desires from 600 teachers and I can’t see it… is this a work the Father can commend? Why would He call me away from blatant faith based work and put me in front of a computer in a city where I know nobody?
Everything was wrong. But the Father didn’t let me stay in the despair of my plans/ideas collapsing. Instead He subtly drew my attention to a book I hadn’t read in about 3 years… Hinds Feet on High Places. A cute little allegory. But this cute little allegory highlights (for me) what the core is, where my heart is and where my eyes should be. I went to China rather reluctantly allowing the Father to guide my steps, trusting He was beside me telling me “go this way or that way”. And He was. I went to China because the very idea of not going when He said go, to turn my back on His guidance was like stepping into a blackness not worth living. And these reasons for going should also be the reasons I returned.
At my core is Him, my desperate desire to follow Him, cling to Him, lean on Him, and, above all else, trust Him. If He wants to lead me in what appears the wrong way, He can. If all His promises seem to be getting further away, I would rather lose those promises than Him “If He can deceive me, He may” only “Do not let me turn back. Do not let me turn away.” And that is what I need to remember, no longer looking at all that appears wrong, or focusing on the discomfort and pain of leaving what was right for a season.
After Hinds Feet on High Places He has pushed me to read through Job… the pain of a man who kept speaking words of a future hope, and kept trying to cling to his core, his heart in the midst of weeping. And the Father wasn’t finished with that. No, all this reading is just tilling the hardened ground to hear the words of a friend in China who is struggling but can still offer words of encouragement. A heart of a friend and a reminder that even in China there are times everything seems wrong. Even in China, I need to keep my core in focus. The ground, gradually breaking, is then watered with the words of a woman I barely know who took it upon herself to go to each workspace in the new office building and lift up specific needs. And I told her I was struggling and hurting and she went before the Father with words of encouragement, assurance and a special word (two words) He gave her describing me “Brave heart”. And I started to cry. Definitely appeared the Brave heart here, don’t you think. Coming back to America has taken just as much courage as going to China and that courage has been formed by my Creator. I step with no idea where I’m going trying to trust and then I get scared and pull into myself and hide – still He called me Brave Heart. He sees me as I should be and, hopefully, who become. But He also sees the woman I have been, sometimes, in recent years and through this wonderful woman and distant friend, He reminded me. He is my core, my center and I am His Brave Heart J
27year old administrative coordinator for the Communications department of a non-profit in a new state, Colorado. Welcome to my life of eternal transition!
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