Tag: Twitter

Share The Love

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Love Heart

Image by Pink Poppy Photography via Flickr

I wanted to start a new feature on my blog that I can do on a regular basis, but couldn’t find one that I felt I could commit to. Then, I thought about what I loved most about blogging and Twitter, and realized that I enjoyed sharing, no matter what it was. I love promoting good books I’ve discovered, passing along great advice I’ve heard, and recognizing awesome people I’ve met. So, I’ve simply called this feature “Share The Love,” and will post it on Sundays, hopefully every week.

I traveled around the blogosphere this past week and loved these posts:

I played on twitter and loved these tweets:

http://twitter.com/#!/2morrowknight/status/92384666618834944
http://twitter.com/#!/Zen_Moments/status/92304354039697408
http://twitter.com/#!/Lord_Voldemort7/status/92220320618004480
http://twitter.com/#!/LauraJMoss/status/91334383839092736

(Yeah, with Laura’s tweet, it’s safe to say you “had to be there” to understand it) šŸ˜‰
I borrowed these books from the library, and would love to read them before they’re due back:

  • The Last Olympian, by Rick Riordan
  • Will Grayson, Will Grayson, by John Green and David Levithan
  • Eon, by Allison Goodman
  • Among the Hidden, by Margaret Peterson Haddix
  • Black Hole Sun, David Macinnis Gill

I listened to my Snow Patrol station on Pandora Radio. Run started playing, and I fell in love with Snow Patrol, and my WIP2, all over again.

So Tell Me: Do YOU have any LOVES to share from this past week?

Why I Write

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Hands

When I was really focused on my fitness goals, I put up pictures of my version of an “ideal body” to give me the visual I needed to continue on my fitness path. I also internalized motivational quotes and used a lot of focusing techniques to keep me driven to reach my goals. Though ripped abs and ever increasing weights are not the central focus in my life, I still have an awesome graphic of a strong woman doing squats as my computer’s desktop image. It comes complete with this statement: “A firm behind like mine comes from the old school leg exercises–deadlift, squat, and lunge.” (For the curious, I stumbled on the pic at Jen Grasso’s Renegade Fitness website here.) I keep this image up to remind me that I have reached my goals before, and to use that success to fuel the success in other areas of my life.

So far, this action plan is working. I am writing and learning more about the process and myself each and every day. However, there are times when I’m just plain tired. Tired of life, or being my own personal cheerleader, whatever. And, though I parallel my writing journey to my fitness journey a LOT, the one thing that doesn’t quite fit is the “pay off” that comes from doing something even when I don’t want to do it.

For example, when I don’t want to train for whatever reason, I could always coax myself to do something which inevitably snowballs into a really good training session. The pay off was, once I started moving I physically felt better (yay endorphins!). Plus, I got great feedback visually because week after week, the result of the constant training was a stronger, more svelte figure. Easy straightforward science.

On the other hand, writing isn’t quite so straightforward. Sure, I can go off of pure word/page counts. And, I do kinda feel like the god of my own universe when stuff starts working and flowing. But, those times that aren’t quite working…when consecutive writing sessions aren’t adding to the story at all despite growing word counts…I begin to feel like…what’s the point?

Why show up?

That’s the feeling that I started with today. Though I was on fire to write yesterday, a long day (which stretched into 5:30AM this morning) turned my writing mindset for today from “on fire” to “blah.”

http://twitter.com/#!/lizakane/status/70872609486671872

Thankfully, a few of my darling NerdSquad members were on Twitter, and gave this little pep talk:

http://twitter.com/#!/AnnieLCechini/status/70873419503239169
http://twitter.com/#!/AnnieLCechini/status/70873538491461633
http://twitter.com/#!/AnnieLCechini/status/70873729231618048
http://twitter.com/#!/AnnieLCechini/status/70874014679179264
http://twitter.com/#!/AnnieLCechini/status/70874179137830913

And of course, I reminded myself of what Margaret Atwood tweeted at me a few months ago:

http://twitter.com/#!/MargaretAtwood/status/33273959608745984

On a usual day, I absolutely love the challenge of working through my WIP, either ripping it apart or adding scenes or both. But sometimes, there are days when I’m tempted more than usual to stop progressing. Days that I forget that dreaming up worlds and using words to paint a picture of them is the goal in itself. That I don’t need approval or permission to write; that even if I stop writing, I would invariably return to it (and curse the misspent time of my writing hiatus).

On those days, I’m so grateful to those who walk this path with me to remind me of why I write, and gain strength and encouragement from that.

“When you can’t run, you crawl. And when you can’t crawl, when you can’t do that…you find someone to carry you.”

The Message, Firefly

A Year

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A year ago, I wrote this:

Iā€™ve been 30 for nearly four months now, and quite honestly, have enjoyed this year so far.Ā  Iā€™ve burned off the fat that I needed to, Iā€™m writing again, and at this point, my only regret is that I didnā€™t do this 5 years ago.

I know itā€™s stupid and a little trite, but the proverb that, at the end of your life, you only regret what you havenā€™t done, has been playing itself in the recesses of my mind lately.Ā  Knowing how to balance patience and consistency while moving in the direction of my dreams will be the skill I will need to cultivate.Ā  Hopefully, I donā€™t make myself crazy in the process.Ā  But, more importantly, I donā€™t want to be in the same place next year as I am now.Ā  Each step needs to take me closer to my goals, and in a year, I will achieve my goal of finishing a story.

This post was my very first post on this blog. I was high from a successful year at my paythebills job, and from regaining my ideal body composition. I worked really hard at both, and saw the fruits of my labor. I was happy. I reached my goals. But, strangely, I was still restless. I was not content. And I think reaching those other goals only increased the discontent.

Before this post, I only dreamed of writing a novel. I toyed with the idea for years (YEARS!), but that was something Other People did. Not me. Besides, I wasn’t smart enough, experienced enough, good enough, whatever enough to write a novel, so why bother?

A year ago, my mindset shifted. I obviously CAN reach goals. Actually, if I was honest with myself, I have always reached goals. I just never set myself up to choose goals that mattered to me. And writing mattered to me.

So, instead of “Why bother?” the question became, “Why not?” If I can spend so much time and energy to achieve goals that, at the end of the day, I don’t really care about, why not chase after The Goal that I’ve been dreaming about for years?

A year ago, I said this: “I donā€™t want to be in the same place next year as I am now.” Now, let’s see how far I’ve traveled on my writerly path.

A year ago, I cringed at the thought of anyone knowing that I was trying to write a novel. Or, even be identified as A Writer. Now, I embrace that identity. I am a writer.

A year ago, I started several novels, but was easily discouraged from finishing any of them. Now, I have a novel, WIP1, which is now in the revision phase, and am drafting WIP2.

A year ago, I was overwhelmed with low writerly self-esteem, and pre-rejected myself from submitting my writing to anyone (even to potential writing partners…I felt I was doing them a kindness). Now, I’m writing some short works to submit to various publications. And, my writing partners will be getting part 1 of WIP1 shortly.

A year ago, I felt very much alone (which is probably why I was so easily discouraged!). Now, I have amazing writer friends who I met through the magic of social networks. I even went to an annual writer’s conference last week and chatted with Other Writers about books and stories and other nerdy things. (Indiana SCBWI’s annual conference…highlights of that conference coming soon!)

I’m so thankful for this past year, and look forward to another year of progress toward my goal.

Thank you for your company on this journey.

What I Know About Writer’s Conferences

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Basically, nothing. And, this is where you can help me! Yay! *confetti*

This weekend (April 29-30), Iā€™ll be attending my very first writerā€™s conference: Indiana SCBWI’s Annual Conference.

I know I should look at this from a networking stand point, and take advantage of being around editors, agents, and fellow writers, but being the nerd I am, Iā€™m just so ridiculously excited to go to the sessions, and take lots of notes! *shiny notebook and pens* *check*

Ok, ok, of COURSE Iā€™ll hang out, circulate, and meet-and-greet with all The People, because thatā€™s really where you get the experience and learning, and letā€™s face it: I DO love meeting new people. (BONUS: I get to meet some of my Twitter and Blog friends there too! *waves hi to Alina, Carol, Clara, and Michele*)

I just like feeling like a student again, and embrace any opportunity to re-live studenthood.

And, I’m an irrepressible nerd. Truth.

So Tell Me: do YOU have any writerā€™s conference tips youā€™d like to share with this newbie? What should I bring? And, more importantly, what should I wear?? ^_^

10,000 Hours

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Outliers (book)

Image via Wikipedia

ā€œIn study after study, of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice-skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals, this number comes up again and again. Ten thousand hours is equivalent to roughly three hours a day, or 20 hours a week, of practice over 10 yearsā€¦ No one has yet found a case in which true world-class expertise was accomplished in less time. ā€

~Daniel Levitin, as qtd by Malcolm Gladwell, Outliers: The Story of Success

Since I started becoming serious about my writing goals, Iā€™ve allowed myself to experiment and play, knowing that I have many more hours of work ahead of me before I will ever feel comfortable bearing the label “writer.”Ā  So far, I’ve learned to prioritize my time and focus on my goal (which in my case was to write a novel).Ā  I’ve learned to turn off my internal editor and push through obstacles, like feelings of inadequacy, to finish a novel no matter what (thanks, mostly to NaNoWriMo).Ā  And, I learned that Stephen King’s rule of “write first with the door closed…” definitely applied to me.Ā  I needed to play with my ideas alone so that I can hope, dream, and fear without self-consciousness (read: embarrassment).

My favorite A-ha! moment, though, actually came from unlearning a habit.Ā  Let me explain.

If you’ve read my “About” section, you’ll know that I majored in English in college.Ā  My favorite classes were those in literary theory, and to this day, I can’t read any text without thinking about it from post-colonial, deconstructionist, Marxist, feminist perspectives (my favorites!).Ā  Criticizing and analyzing texts became instinctive to me, which is great when I had to churn out 20-30+ page papers or critique a writing partner’s work.Ā  Not so much when I have to write primary text, and my brain is full of meta text and distancing language.

It took me a long time to refrain from or cut out all the non story that I was prone to writing (back story, character studies, culture studies, whatever) before I was able to write real text, like narrative and dialogue…basically a story that a reader can expect from a novel.Ā  It was a hard shift in my mindset since my primary instinct was to dissect, and not create.Ā  But, with each new novel attempt and failure, I have slowly progressed from being a writer about books to becoming a writer of books.

Iā€™ve begun to develop and trust my instincts for creating worlds. Iā€™m still a sketcher and Iā€™ll always need a big picture goal for direction. But, I will write a scene with more polish and depth than I’ve done previously, and allow my subconscious to play with the ā€œnext stepsā€ as Iā€™m exploring the current scene. Iā€™m letting myself focus on the quality of my words rather than merely the quantity of words (though I will keep my word count goals, since I’m still goal-oriented).Ā  Even if it kills me, I will not leave a scene until it makes sense.Ā  My goal for this next story is to finish with a first draft and not a rough draft.Ā  (Some people think theyā€™re the same thing; for me, my rough and first draft are definitely different.)Ā  Iā€™ll always go for the big picture because itā€™s heartening to see the page count progress.Ā  But in exploring the depth, rather than breadth, Iā€™ll see more of a world than I previously anticipated.Ā  At least, thatā€™s the hope.

Random Note:

I intended to post this last week (January 25, in fact) but I thought it was too silly to post (and I was kinda distracted by Veronica Mars, season 2).Ā  I mean, really, what value can come from posting my infinitesimal progress toward my writing goals?

But, today, I saw the #followreader chat on Twitter, featuring Margaret Atwood, one of my literary heroes.Ā  I decided to ask her this question…

http://twitter.com/#!/LizaKane/status/33273297638662144

…and she answered with this…

http://twitter.com/#!/MargaretAtwood/status/33273683296395265

http://twitter.com/#!/MargaretAtwood/status/33273959608745984

(By the way, how cool is it that I was able to ask her a question and have it answered immediately??)

Turns out, I just need to keep reminding myself that the only way for me to get better as a writer (and teller of stories) is to continue writing.Ā  And the best way for me to continue writing is to celebrate the progress that I’ve made so far, regardless of how small that progress may be.Ā  I plan to keep churning out crappy words, so that one day, I’ll be able to find better words with which to capture my stories.