Sprout Wings

Hi folks, I struggled with this blog. So many pressures from every side. Writing is not in a vacuum. It is in the real world, and this world is full of troubles, big and small.  I began to think about an idea I have always held this weekend.  If you fall in a pit, get up on the side closest to where you to want go, crawl out, and keep on going. A new idea came to me. 

Why don’t you just sprout wings and fly away?

How? I mean sprouting wings would be a pretty big miracle and this is the age of information and reason. We don’t live in a world that is NOT clinging to the mysterious. I wondered about the idea of sprouting wings. It felt very evolutionary to me.  You know, life adapts, and a lifetime of crawling out of pits made me long for something more. An evolutionary step seemed better than the same old reaction to stupidity.

Perhaps this is the heart of what makes us human -- three dimensional thinking. Your stories will pop if you think about making your characters evolve.  We tend to the ordinary, consider the extraordinary.  I think the best writers don’t wrap it all up. They deal in imagery and theme.  The unseen world is how they live their days.  Writing is to akin to dreaming, except you are awake. Our dreams can be chaotic and meaningless, but they can also help us make sense of the chaotic meaningless world.  Those words you are putting on the page, you are bringing light into darkness.  Keep going!

Finally, I considered my idea of sprouting wings. There is nothing new under the sun. An old scripture whispered within me: They that hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They shall soar on wings like the eagles. It is strange how the words of the Prophet Isaiah from around 720  BCE  resonate within me today. I love writers. They are thinking ahead. They are reaching to the ages ahead.  They see into the murky darkness of the future and they see you.

As you write, think about shining into the darkness of the future. You have the potential to transform the world. 

I will be back next week with more of TEENSPublish. I hope that you keep writing. Someone needs those stories. 

A sneak peek at an illustration for my soon to be indie published picture book: CHICKENS DON'T TAKE OVER HALLOWEEN!

Do you not know?

Have you not heard?

The Lord is the everlasting God,

the Creator of the ends of the earth.

He will not grow tired or weary,

and his understanding no one can fathom.

He gives strength to the weary

and increases the power of the weak.

Even youths grow tired and weary,

and young men stumble and fall;

but those who hope in the Lord

will renew their strength.

They will soar on wings like eagles;

they will run and not grow weary,

they will walk and not be faint 

Isaiah 40; 28-31.   Write this on your heart, folks.  

Chicken by Chicken: Accepting Who We Are.

Hi, folks, this week is another response  blog. I heard a song called Constellations by Brendan James and it resonated with me. This is a long ramble, a thought journey, inspired by that song, and I hope that you find something to take with you.

I feel like don't really understand the world, and it makes me cry. I feel so out of step with the seasons and times. I can't stand reading the news, or even checking out my Facebook half the time. There are too many wars. Nation against nation. Neighbor against neighbor. Here inside me, I hunger to see people come together, to take a deep breath and just figure out where to go from here. I hope bridges are built, coalitions are made, and every voice is heard. I dream that we would all listen and find better ways. I don't want to join the madding crowd that wants to heckle the stupid, drop bombs, and dehumanize others, all in the name of a better world.

I see the Universe at night and how it is able to spin out wondrous things and at the same time wreak great destruction. I feel the transience of life and yet eternity hums in my heart. Everyone I know is trying to get through the day without dwelling on the darkness. Some take the "be positive about everything" route. Some take the "find a cause" route. I swing between the route of despair and the route of hope, that I might be the voice that breaks through the noise and says something helpful.

I have had unshakable confidence throughout my life that if I got a chance on a stage that I would move the hearts of those shivering on the edges. I have believed that I would grow like a wild weed, but now see so clearly that my life is just a breath and is gone. A Monarch butterfly was caught in between the window and the screen in my house. Some hapless caterpillar crawled between the window and screen and formed a chrysalis. The butterfly emerged and now would die if I did not figure out a gentle way to remove the screen and let it go on it's way to the graveyards of Mexico for the day of dead. When I figured out a way to set the butterfly free, it occurred to me that all of my life might be just for that. Perhaps those beautiful wings have more purpose than I will ever have.

This brings me to the heart of this thought journey. I have hungered for purpose. I have believed all my life that a day was coming that the gifts within me would become visible, like the span over us -- Orion, the Pleiades, the evening star, the moon, and the swath of the Milky Way. I have believed my gifts would come clear like those lights in the heavens. But here I am making less than minimum wage and imploding under the stress of another miss in terms of my intended goal.

In the end we are not in control of our story, and hence I must embrace the days given us. I find embracing the smallness of who I am is difficult. Megalomania is expected in rock stars, but not here in Suburbia. I have to laugh at myself a little and laugh at my little dramas.There is certainly a ridiculousness to me.

Ah, you are just a onion flower in the yard. Most folks will pass by the onion flower but, hey, go ahead and bloom. Touch ten hearts, fifty hearts, A copper star for you.  Not the silver, not the gold. That's all, dear. Work it out.

Thank you for dropping by and remember every little thing shines.  See you next week.

This week is a page from my Halloween project: CHICKENS TAKE OVER HALLOWEEN. 

Here is a quote for your pocket.

The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom. For in all the states of created beings capable of law, where there is no law, there is no freedom.John Locke.

Golden Advice: Henry David Thoreau and a Lazy Life

This last week I'm going to take some more genius from Henry David Thoreau and a Lazy Life. I am offering my take-aways from Thoreau's essay: Life Without Principle. 

Here's what I take from his words.  We live in a busy world with noise all around. We are plugged in and in a hurry. Many of us can't sleep at night, our minds revving with the busyness. Whatever happened to a day off?  Can you a imagine a day when everyone in town took a day off? No stores open. No running to soccer/baseball/football/basketball/lacrosse games. Everyone chilling for a day. Instead we are drowning in work, work, and more work.

And here I am marching to beat of my own drum. I'm living the lazy life. I've made a choice to spend my life scribbling my thoughts down, and I barely have enough money to buy my groceries, much less go to conferences, take courses, or have upgraded software. When people see me at the coffee shop with my computer,  they think I'm at some money-making activity instead of recording my thoughts about alien worlds and hysterical romances.

If I had been born imperfect, you know, without all the marbles up top, or had been so freaked out by some childhood experience, my daily writing activity might make sense. Folks would say, bless her heart, writing is all she can do. But I'm a writer by choice, and I suppose nothing is more useless than that, except maybe being a poet or a philosopher. 

Here I am not making a red cent, while my neighbor is building mini-malls and apartment complexes all over town. He's piling money in the bank for his ungrateful children to spend on flunking out of college and investing in worthless-Amway schemes. Here I am writing and writing, yielding the profit of a well-placed words, but I don't have two nickles to rub together. Yes, I am a lazy bunch of bones.

I'd rather walk through a meadow, dreaming up my stories, than spending my whole life tossing dollars into a stock market that's shearing the world of every bit of beauty in it. 

There you go. Live your lazy life. Write your story. I. Dare. You.

Here is another doodle: "Bouquet"

Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.
Henry David Thoreau. 

Golden Advice: Henry David Thoreau and the Mental Path

Hi folks,  I'm off to the Montgomery County Book Festival today, hence the blog will be short and sweet.

My golden advice is inspired by Henry David Thoreau from his journals. He writes: "As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives."

This makes me think how important our mental path is. I mean you think something over and over and it becomes embedded in the essense of you. It rules you. Your thoughts will serve you or slay you. Think about the thoughts that are coming to you again and again. Is there anything in there you need to stop thinking? Do that now. Do you have some good thoughts repeating thoughts? Rejoice. You won't be easily shaken. 

Here's  another thought to chew on -- a book is a mental path.  You travel through the same thoughts over and over -- we writers fondly call it revision. It is  a journey to create a lasting mental path that will serve hopefully as long as the Iliad. Travel the path of your stories again and again. It is the way to discover the lasting path for the generations to come. Don't be discouraged if you have to travel the same path umpteen times to create the essense of what you want. This is the way of things.

I hope the mental path sinks in. I hope you come back next week for more Golden Advice.

Here's the doodle. Carve out a landscape with your words.

Here is a quote for your pocket.

We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn. Henry David Thoreau

Golden Advice: John Donne and Meditation 17

Hi, folks! I'm continuing my series on Golden Advice. I like to spend the month of February digging into the wisdom that has come my way and that guides my art, my craft and my life. I find having some wise stuff in the soul helps me write stories with purpose.

 

This week I'm turning to poet and cleric John Donne who was a contemporary of William Shakespeare. Meditation #17 whispers inside me. It wakes me up. It pulls my head out of the sand.  It's all about this: for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

 

So let me talk about what I take away from this meditation. When someone dies from a drug over-dose, or from abuse, or from neglect, from persecution, whatever, that wasn't just somebody else's problem, somebody else's loss, not my problem. Mankind is authoring a story. I cannot divorce myself from that story. We are writing one book. I can't tear out the pages I don't like. We are all connected, intimately, irrevocably. 

 

So what am I supposed to do about the pages I don't like?

 

Take those pages and write a better story. I am to take the wisdom of  my years and fight for a better tomorrow. I must translate everything into something better. My cancer? Yes, that must be used to strengthen others. The terrible war. Yes, I must share in the grief  and do what I can to help.  A chance to stand up for justice? Dear Lord, I better hop up.

 

No one is a star freewheeling its way through space. We are all part of a vast galaxy. If one star goes out, hey, the galaxy is less. If your mama dies, or your papa dies, you are less, but listen to this: any person's death makes you less because you are part of mankind. You are involved in mankind, friend. Don't point your finger at those people you despise politically, religiously, those foreigners, those bigots, those zealots, whatever. Don't take a hammer to a sore foot. Cutting it off, cripples you. It needs to be healed.

 

Above all, never say you have enough of your own trouble to be picking up the troubles of your neighbors. You don't have enough trouble  Extra trouble will mature you, make you better. The more you take on, the richer you will be. By taking on the troubles of others, you'll learn how to deal with your own mess. You can try to stabilize your life with stuff -- money, fame, success -- but the thing that is going to really stabilize you is to reach out to as many people as you can in  the days that you have.

 

When you write your stories, paint your pictures, sing your songs, do your best work. Why? So that it helps the most.  Meditate on those connections. 

 

I will be back next week with more Golden Advice.

Here is the doodle: "Bluestars"

 

 

 

 

 

Here is the quote for your pocket.

 

 

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More than kisses, letters mingle souls. John Donne 

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Golden Advice: Ralph Waldo and Self-Reliance

Hi folks, I'm starting my series on Golden Advice. I like to spend the month of February digging into the wisdom that has come my way, and that guides my art, my craft and my life. I find having some wise stuff in the soul helps me write stories with purpose.

One thing that has always dogged me is insecurity as a person and a writer. I struggle to trust myself and believe in my vision as something of worth. Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay Self-Reliance has throttled me, and I really believe has brought me to a better version of myself.

So his advice starts simply. Cultivate awareness of the light within. Stop the inward self talk that dismisses your work as derivative. You blather about the work of others around you and dismiss your own. Stop it now.

Here's the deal. The stuff that will really move others is the stuff that you have thought about but have been too scared, too worried, and/or too fearful "what others might think" to share. The gist of Ralph's advice is this: form your own opinions. YOUR OWN! I find this one of the dang hardest things in the universe to do, but I am trying.

Great art will teach others to trust the light within themselves and to ignore a sea of people who cry false at them. The tricky part is understanding the light within in. This is what I know about it. It doesn't upset you. It doesn't make you do anything stupid. It blesses you with happy accidents and still water in the soul. It is never imposed upon you. It makes you a better person. This is the art I am striving to share.

Ralph goes on to share the heart of the problem: You think you are a mouse and are always apologizing for it. Stop cowering in the corner. And don't be sorry. You are a thinking person. You are, just like the saints and sages of old. What are you going to add to the verses of history? Take a lesson from nature. A rose blooms. It is beautiful and doesn't worry about the roses before or after. It simply takes it moment to bloom, to exist in God today. 

At the end of the day. Stop apologizing. Again freaking hard for me. Be original. Again, makes me want to cry.  Be brave. Share your inner light. And finally, bloom.

I will be back next week with more Golden Advice.

Here is a doodle: Roses.

Here is a quote for your pocket:

Man is his own star; and the soul that can
Render an honest and a perfect man,
Commands all light, all influence, all fate;
Nothing to him falls early or too late.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.
          
Epilogue to Beaumont and Fletcher's Honest Man's Fortune

Golden Advice: The Mystery of Omar Khayyam

Hi folks, this is the last in golden advice series. I've been keeping to the ancient paths this year. I'm trying to stick to thoughts that have stirred me up as a writer. This week I will dip into the poetry of Omar Khayyam. I'm not calling his genius, wisdom, but instead, mystery.  He saw how  unknowable the world is and celebrated it.

Omar was a Persian astronomer, philosopher, mathematician and a poet.  It always astonishes me the kinship I feel with him. A Texas Writer Mom is about as far as you can get from Persian Poet Philosopher, and yet I feel we are as close as friends who can always pick up a conversation even if they have not seen each other in years. How startling it is to open the pages of poems written a thousand years ago and find someone who sees what I see and knows what I know.

I first read Khayyam's Rubaiyat (trans. Edward FitzGerald) back in junior high, and it has stayed with me. The listed stanzas below all come from the Rubaiyat. I'm going to chat about each plays into my writing life.

XIII
Some for the glories of this world; and some
Sigh for The Prophet's Paradise to come;
Ah, take the cash and let the credit go,
Nor heed the rumble of a distant drum.

People have a ton of reasons to do what they do.  Many want the fame, the acolades, the money, whatever. Others look to the holy and sigh for the unseen. The next line makes me laugh every time. Take the cash and let the credit go.  This is such a simple, true thought to me.  Don't disparge who you are right now, what you do right now, what you have done up to this moment.  No one may have ever noticed what you have written up to this point, but cling to the cash value of saying something and saying it well. Let go of all those glories and sighs.  Don't march out to that far off drumming but dig into the here and now and live it fully. Live. Write.

XXIX
Into this Universe, and Why not knowing
Nor Whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing;
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste,
I know not Whither, willy-nilly blowing.

Yes, I'm here. A tiny dot in an expansive place. I don't know why I love stories. Water bubbles up and flows to the sea. Stories bubble up and flow out to myriad minds. There is no way to predict the journey stories will take. They come and flow and go. I feel like shouting, "Go! Go! Go!" Write like that. Write like your stories will reach the ends of the universe.

LXXIV
Yesterday This Day's Madness did prepare;
To-morrow's Silence, Triumph, or Despair:
Drink! for you know not whence you came, nor why:
Drink! for you know not why you go, nor where.

Each time there is another Madness -- murders of the innocent, 9-11, Sandy Hook, the drug war in Mexico, I could list a thousand things for this week -- I remember that yesterday was setting us up for today. What will happen tomorrow is all about yesterday. A storyteller sees what leads to the next thing.

You must practice being aware.  In that awarness, don't freeze up, but drink!  Don't curl up and say it's too hard to unravel, it's too difficult share.  Dig into the whence, the why and the where. Dig into the passion and reveal this mad journey that always leads to silence, triumph, or despair. Be fearless as you create -- line on line, bird by bird, brick by brick -- however you roll.

Revel in the mysteries. I hope you have enjoyed this series and will come back next week!  Seize the day!

Here is the doodle for the week: "Direction".

One last quote to keep in your pocket.

A hair divides what is false and true.  Omar Khayyam

Golden Advice: Wisdom from Socrates

Hi folks, I'm continuing my series on the ancient paths to see what I can glean for us. Socrates was one bold-thinking dude, and I have been a major fan since I was in high school.  I can see him, sort of a lazy bum, moving from one group to another in ancient Athens. It's a place of beauty and he's an ugly guy. I believe he gets the irony. He dresses like a homeless person. He won't take money for his philosophical teaching, because he feels that the second you take a red cent for what you think then, blah, they own you and every thought you share.

Instead he's a blue collar guy, and makes his cash as a stone mason (I like to think this is true but it's not verified) when he needs to eat. He's the gadfly of Athenian society, a biting fly that can direct a horse. He doesn't go with popular opinion and always sticks with his own opinion. His whole attitude finally causes the leaders of the city to put him on trial. They ask him what should be his punishment and he has the cheek to say a pension and free food for the rest of his life. He's convicted of the terrible crimes of "corrupting the minds of the youth" and "causing those kids to question their current gods and their government." Huzzah! Of course, he's given hemlock to drink and put to death for his heresy.

So what, writerly stuff do I take from the original "marching-to-my-own-drum" guy?  Well, yeah, let's corrupt young minds!  And add this on, let's do our part to cause kids to question their current gods and their government. Add that into your writer's toolbox and I'm pretty sure the content of your writing is going to get interesting.  You may spend some time out in the cold in terms of publishing though because you don't jump on vampire-fantasy-dystopian-suspense-thriller bandwagons. You will see lots of notes that say, wish there was room for your original stuff in this tight market. When your books come out, finally, the storm stirred up by people who find you subversive won't be pretty. But don't let that stop you.

I'm going to wrap this up with a favorite Socrates idea. Don't just believe stuff. Turn over every stone. Don't live an unexamined life, not just for your writing but for yourself too.

Hope this little story lights a fire under you.  You go ahead and stand up for what you believe, even if its not politically-correct or popular.  Seize the day, creative folk.

This week's doodle is called: "Tangled Hearts."

This quote is Plato's account (old Soc knew how to pick friends) of how Socrates felt about being put to death because he was willing to think his own thoughts. I hope we will all be swans.

From Plato's Phaedo: Socrates said and smiled. . .
I am not very likely to persuade other men that I do not regard my present situation as a misfortune, if I am unable to persuade you, and you will keep fancying that I am at all more troubled now than at any other time. Will you not allow that I have as much of the spirit of prophecy in me as the swans?

For they, when they perceive that they must die, having sung all their life long, do then sing more than ever, rejoicing in the thought that they are about to go away to the god whose ministers they are.

But men, because they are themselves afraid of death, slanderously affirm of the swans that they sing a lament at the last, not considering that no bird sings when cold, or hungry, or in pain, not even the nightingale, nor the swallow, nor yet the hoopoe; which are said indeed to tune a lay of sorrow, although I do not believe this to be true of them any more than of the swans.

Golden Advice: Wisdom of Solomon

Hi, folks, I'm continuing my golden advice series. This is an exciting time for me as a writer. After several years  of working on my current book, I'm about to send it out to agents.  I'm seesawing between manic joy and and quaking fear. 

It's hard to put yourself out there. I leave a lot of myself on the page and who wants to find out that their ms doesn't suit needs, doesn't connect, or the worst, there's no room for your brand of storytelling in the market right now.

A person needs a serious anchor to  stay steady in the storms.  I like ancient paths. It's just hardwired in me. This week I'm turning to the wisdom of Solomon to face the road ahead.

I like the book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible. (I'm no scholar and many feel that Solomon didn't write this book, but the folk way is he did and I'm a folk.)  Anyway, ever since I heard "Turn! Turn! Turn!" by Pete Seeger back in my munchkin days, it's stayed with me and kept me on task.  So this week I'm sharing the writerly version of "to everything there is a season, and time to every purpose under heaven. " 

There is a time to write, and a time stop writing; a time to start a new manuscript, a time to send it out and snag an agent, an editor and an audience.  There is a time to throw a manuscript in the circular file; there is time to pull out a manuscript and finally, finally fix it; there is a time to delete whole chapters from your WIP; there is a time to add a stack of new chapters. 

There is a time to weep when you think you won't succeed. There is a time to laugh when a new idea comes. There is a time when you get really close to succeeding but it doesn't work out. There is a time when you finally succeed and, yes, you put on some disco and dance. 

There is a time to start sending out a new manuscript. There is a time to start writing a new manuscript. There is a time keep working hard even though you feel you are not making progress. There is a time to put a WIP up on a shelf for a while.  There is a time to get an agent and a publishing contract. There is a time to lose both.

There is a time to rip up a book and donate it to other stories; there is a time to let a good story idea percolate.  There is a time to plan what you will write; there is a time to say the things you've never been brave enough to say. There is a time to love what you have written and fight for it.  There is time to really hate your book.  

There is time when you must fight to find time write.  There is a time when it all comes together.

I hope you understand the times and the seasons this week and that this golden advice stays with you.

This week's doodle is called "Happy Blue Blobby."

 

And a quote for your pocket. I know I keep this one in my pocket. 

 



Every great and commanding movement in the annals of the world is due to the triumph of enthusiasm. Nothing great was ever achieved without it. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Truth

Hello, friends, hope you had a creative week. I've been thinking a lot about honesty lately. Here is a thing I've learned -- if I am brave and write down the things that I'm afraid to write down, then I find that my writing stretches beyond me. Locked doors open inside me as I let the deep things I think live on the page. I find this whole bravery thing snowballs into my work. My vision clears. Writing what I think helps me. I see what is right and true. And if anything is wrong with what I am thinking that comes out to. Putting my thoughts on the page helps me get at heart of things.

I've also found all this honesty spills into my work. I am more willing to take risks. I don't feel the weight of censors or critics, and I get to the business of shaping my stories the way they want to be shaped. I'm able to make my way into the deepest water of understanding. Emily Dickinson wrote a little poem that sticks with me. "I never saw the moor. I never saw the sea. Yet know I how the heather looks and and what a wave must be. I never visited God, nor visited in heaven, but sure am I of the spot as if the chart were given." Her assurance of things unseen gives me boldness. Her truth changes me. I hope you are getting the sense of the absolute power of writing what needs to be written.

So this week, write down your secret, write down that thought you don't write down because you know it will offend others, write down your anger, your grief, write down something hidden. See what happens when you open wide the door of honesty. I'm just saying, try it. Seize the day. See you next week.

My doodle this week is a little collage. I call it "Sunrise".



The highest compact we can make with our fellow is - "Let there be truth between us two forevermore." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Virus and Thinking

Hi, folks. I spent most of this week in bed with a fever and an incessant cough. A week like this can be discouraging. It's a setback. All the goals have to be pushed back at least a week. In a normal week, there is hardly ever any time to get anything done, and I spent most of this week, huddling under the covers and struggling to be patient for my body to heal.

The good news is that I've had time to think. And thinking has led me to consider what I am trying to say. What I love about novels is when they reveal something about the human condition that I was either unaware of, or I was aware but never had the right words to express my feelings about. A good novel brings me to understanding -- what it means to be human, what it means to be me. It is some deep alchemy that wrests this from my heart and soul.

So, in a way, writers are modern day alchemists. We stir together the elements of life, in hopes that we will find the gold of meaning. We mix together circumstances and personality in search of the elixir of longevity -- perhaps our words will cure some of disease of heart and soul, or, at least, alleviate it with our words. In the end, we spin out the wisdom of the ages, the ancient paths, so true and noble. Great story telling is grand adventure, it's self discovery, it's excitement, but it's ancient, a cord that ropes together the generations.

Let's dig deep and shake the foundations, folks. Will we find the foundations solid? Will we find stuff built on sand? Whatever, let's find out. Good luck.

Today's doodle is "Tree".



This week's quote:

The Road goes ever on and on down from the door where it began. Now far ahead the Road has gone, and I must follow, if I can, pursuing it with eager feet, until it joins some larger way where many paths and errands meet. And whither then? I cannot say. J.R.R. Tolkien

Novel Writing: Kaizen

I'm taking a few posts to discuss novel writing. This is again a nuts and bolts week for my blog. I will focus on personal experience with an eye on the universal. This week I'm discussing my methodology of writing. I came across a Japanese efficiency method called Kaizen that calls for gradual incremental changes. The heart of this philosophy is that every area of life can be improved. This philosophy absolutely mirrors how I write books. The Kaizen philosophy embraces five foundational elements: team work, personal discipline, improved morale, quality circle, suggestions for improvement. I find these elements are essential to writing a book.

First team work, this is the reason why building writing clips is so necessary to your writing life. You need the experience of working on a team, even if it's just you and your editor. Writing a book is not something I want to do in an ivory tower which I descend from every 10 years with one of the great masterpieces of the world. My mojo is born out of teamwork. A vibrant team environment is the star nursery of greatness.

The next element is personal discipline. You must write every day. I have found that I can lean on the experience of discipline in other areas of my life to help me become a more disciplined writer. I especially like to think about the mountains of laundry I have folded, the large concrete floors I have busted out, the many chemical reactions I have balanced, and the thousands of diapers I've dealt with -- obviously the spark for personal discipline can come from many places. Without building on a project in a daily incremental way the piece will lack focus and cohesion.

Another element is improved morale. You've got to have a positive attitude to write books. Listen, I'm cup half empty sort of person, so I find this a personal challenge. Thankfully, over time, I have learned how to keep myself up at least part of the time. I take time to celebrate every success. When I write a query, I give myself props. If I write a page, I then take time to experience the pleasure of having added to my project. If no big stuff is on the horizon, I pick a little thing that I'm sure I can achieve and then go for it. I let myself laugh with glee and cry with joy when I achieve a new milestone: a started story, a completed story, a submitted story -- I take time to improve my morale.

Quality is a piece of the writing equation that I long avoided but now embrace. I've found many writers focus on the big picture but neglect the details. You must become a person with finesse when it comes to grammar and vocabulary. For me this has meant worksheet after worksheet of grammar related exercises. It means taking the time to go through each manuscript with a thesaurus and doing whatever I can to punch up the language. This is technical stuff, folks. Every word shades your meaning. Words must be chosen with great care. Grammar also shades your meaning. My best advice: invest in the quality of your writing.

The last piece of this: seeking suggestions for improvement or critique. I have found that to create top notch work you need to listen to the sensibility of your readers. Open yourself to the opinion of others. Listen to them and revise with their thoughts in mind. Expect to have more critique in the end than the length of the novel. Expect for each novel to go through two or more critiques. Try to keep a balance. Your intent should be twined together with the advice of your peers. There is excellence to be achieved by relating to the critiques of others.

I hope that you have found something useful here. Happy writing.

Constant dripping hallows out a stone. Lucretius

By request of Janet Lee Carey, I'm adding a little feature to my weekly blog.

I'm a lifelong doodler. So...

From the imagination of Molly Blaisdell: Doodle of the Week

©Molly Blaisdell, all rights reserved. If you want to use my cool doodles ask permission first. It is so wrong to take people's doodles without permisison!