Consequences and Choices

Consequences and Choices for writers....

And for Sheri, a talk about boxes. :::snicker:::

And to really think of them as buckets rather than boxes.

But for the rest of us out of the boxes -- boxes, not boxers. sheesh people. And I know it wasn't just my brain going there! ....... Was it? Of course I was thinking of boxer dog breed, of course. :::whistle, scuff::::

Anyway - This is a Great article I stumbled across. Of all places, on Twitter.

Yes, I have finally succumbed to the pressure. I have a Twitter now. And a twitch too probably. And yes, it's probably not a coincidence.

While I'm still floundering all over the Twitter tweet-scape I tripped over this -

A Bucket List for Writers

A guest post by Larry Brooks of Storyfix.com

........ "When your writing ceases to be commercial you’ve just shot yourself in the foot – at least if your goal is to turn pro – perhaps in the name of art.

The concept of selling out isn’t about writing commercially, it’s about writing at a level that’s beneath you, which is a completely different thing." ......

Check out the whole post for some great insight and ideas. It is really good. Even if just for a new way to look at boxes. :::sly grin::::

NaNo…Well…hmmm…Well

Well… I never thought of NaNo as something to have so much controversy over. I mean, you like or not, do it or not.

Or you try it and ….well, whatever you do and wherever you get to. It’s all a Good thing Right?

Or so I thought.

I admit this is the first year I have done it ‘officially’ but I have done it unofficially for a few years now. And I can’t say I’ve ever felt a failure for not completing the 50,000 words thing. Even unofficially that wasn’t the draw for me. I feel like getting Any words down, at any time, that’s a win.

I do happen to like the writing energy that is flowing around everywhere each year at NaNo time. Not to mention all the camaraderie and help. Like at no other time of the year I can think of.

Okay so mostly I’m coerced and badgered into it, but still I take it for what I learn and get out of it. And just like everything in our lives I feel it only becomes a waste if we make it that way. That road less traveled might be a lot more scenic and less hectic but sometimes we still have to take that busy fast paced highway to get where we need to go. Does it make either one the Right way – or the Wrong way? Unless the highway department deems it so then it simply becomes our perception of which is the best way for us. Which might, or might not, end up to be true. I believe we can learn valuable lessons no matter which road we are on at the time and it only becomes wasted if we allow it to be.

As for NaNo teaching bad writing habits and bad writing and filled with a bunch of bad words that have to be cut later. Well, bad words are what we deem them to be. My mamma had her version of them, just as your mamma most likely has a bit of a different version. In fact, I’m pretty sure she does.

But as most writers quickly find out, Writing is Editing! And those of us that have been around awhile know about that. The words that are taken out are not bad, they can just perhaps be replaced by better ones, more descriptive, more succinct ones. Or just Less of them. But No Matter HOW they get there, whether by slap dash NaNo slinging or painstaking sweat soaked time intensive way, at some point during the editing process you are going to have to cut some of those words. Seems interesting to me that some that decry the NaNo process as a waste because of having to cut so much word fodder from the NaNo work have talked about how much they had to cut from their work that they had just spent months, or even longer, agonizing over and working on. Did it matter how quick the words went down when they had to be lifted away?

Writing just like any other creative expression is simply a matter of opinion. We all have an opinion of what we think of as good writing and bad writing. And sometimes the publishing industry seems to have a whole different view of that. Silly them. Okay, most likely. Doesn’t really make anyone’s opinion more valid than yours, even when publishing industry pays for bad writing. ;)

And bad writing habit – well, to me the worst writing habit to have is Not writing.

It is so Easy to allow our full, or over full, lives to overflow and take over Everything. Including our writing time. Or time we should, and could, be writing.

While I hate the time of year that NaNo falls, November is just way too busy as it is with family obligations and all, I also realize that it forces us to look at ourselves as writers and what we are really saying to ourselves about writing and its importance to us. Others certainly aren’t going to take our writing as serious if we don’t. And by at least setting aside some time in November to write we have to acknowledge that we can do it at other months in the year as well.

If we manage to write at all and get words down and out of our heads then we win. Regardless of the word count.

If you support someone else, and yourself while doing it, we all win.

What’s bad about that?

Defined by our choices.

Each decision we’ve ever made in our lives has brought us to where we are in this exact moment.

Whether they were good ones, or bad ones – and what really would be the difference, being that we learn from all of them in different ways.  Or whether we have Really learned, or even want to.

In the movie “Under the Tuscan Sun” the main character says - any little turning along the way she’d be different, she’d be elsewhere.

And so would we.

So if we desire to be different, to be elsewhere, we must make different choices.  Right now.

….we define ourselves by the stories we tell others…..So says a character in Megan McCafferty’s book charmed thirds.

And in her fourth comings book another character writes ‘….The tales we tell ourselves about ourselves make us who we are…”

So really we All are storytellers in our own ways.  Whether by profession or not, we all tell stories to others, and to ourselves.  They help us understand each other, and hopefully, ourselves.

And they help us to be better storytellers as we write.  Which is what a writer should really be doing, right?   Telling a story.  Hopefully really good stories, and learning as we live and grow to do that even better than when we started.

And contrary to some popular advice, I don’t think we have to write what we know or about ourselves at all.  My stories aren’t about me.  At all.  And whether some might believe we are all our characters and our stories, well, I don’t see me in mine at all.

My decisions I’ve made along the way, the choices I’ve made, the things I’ve experienced, give me an insight into myself and into others.  It helps me to understand others, a little anyway.  Or at least to get somewhat of their feelings, or what they might be feeling.  And the choices they might make.  The choices my characters make, while so totally different than what I would do or say or even think, are not so alien when touched by the experience and edges of my own.  I might not understand someone completely, even one of my own characters, but I at least have a touch into their inner life that tells me, whether I feel their choices are right or wrong, they are the choices they choose to make.  And as with me, brings them to where they are right now.

And while I need to work more on actually sitting down and getting my characters' stories down – in coherent form at least.  At least I’m learning each day how to tell their story better.  And how to make my turnings be where I want to be.

Where are your turnings, and choices, taking you?