The Last Time I Cried & What I'm Looking Forward To - Day 28

Whoa... two topics that I either haven't written about, or that I can stand to write about again. How about that? Totally unexpected for this late in the series, but these two are intertwined for me at the moment, so here goes: 

I cried last night. 

Not a little, either. Last night, really hit me hard. I killed someone. Two people, actually, and it broke my heart to do it, even though I knew it was coming. 

Well, now that I have your attention, I suppose I should probably explain myself a little better. These two people? They only exist in my computer. They are, well were, characters in a book I'm writing. One was expected, she was old, and needed to die to make room for the things that push my protagonist to move forward toward her destiny. I expected her to die. I planned for her to die. And yet, it totally caught me off guard how deeply affected I was by her death. The second character that died was nameless, faceless, and she may get revived in the revision of the story. I wasn't happy with how that scene came out in the drafting, so who knows. That's the beauty of being a writer: You can make those changes. Usually. 

I've been trying to honor my commitment to writing for 1 hour a day. Every day.

I'm doing the NaNoWriMo challenge in November, and since I have two solid story ideas, I figured I'd use one to get into the habit of writing, and start finding what does and what does not work for me when it comes to writing. I'm reverse engineering this particular story; rather than developing the characters and setting and all that before drafting, I'm drafting the story, and going back and making notes about my main characters as I go. It's not easy work doing it this way, but I only have about 6 weeks left to get this drafted before my focus fully gets turned to the book I am writing for NaNo. That book is getting done in the "proper" way: I'm developing characters and settings and plots and archetypes before writing. 

Now, there's really no wrong way to write a book, I'm told, other than to not write the book that's in your head. Give yourself permission to write badly, just to get the idea down on paper. You can always go back and edit later. And you won't have anything to edit if you don't write in the first place.

So, this idea of writing badly, led to my tears last night. 

I spent 1 hour writing, probably looking a bit like a mad woman, pounding away at my keys, moving music into playlists as I went (I like to write to music, so I'm building playlists for the writing of both these books), and knocked out about 2,000 words in that 60 minutes. I have my work single spaced, so that comes out roughly to 5 pages of text. I think, just based on how I felt after writing it, that about half of that will get cut in the revision process. But I wrote. I honored my need to write, and did it.

Nothing sucks for a new writer nearly as much as spending an hour writing crap and killing off a loved character all in one night. I had to cry. I needed to purge the crappy feeling. I cried on my writing buddy's shoulder and gave myself permission to let it go. Tonight, I'll write again, and keep my protagonist moving towards her destiny. I'll work on my characters for the NaNo Book, and start shifting my focus just a bit towards their story.

Which brings me to what I'm looking forward to.

I'm looking forward to NaNo. I'm looking forward to write-ins with my buddy at her place in SecondLife. I'm looking forward to holding a finished manuscript in my hands; a story that I pulled out of my head and gave life to on paper.

That said, I'm also a little scared of it. My writing buddy and mentor, Allie McCormack, has encouraged me to submit my NaNo book for a competition that takes place in the months immediately after NaNo, which means getting that book revised, edited and ready for public consumption in just under 5 weeks (throw Christmas holidays in there, too, just for kicks and giggles). 

Her faith in me scares the hell out of me. My husband totally supports this idea. 

But Allie is right: It's motivation. If I commit to it, and pay to enter, then I have a really big reason to see it through. Even if I don't win, my book has been put out there, and that's not something I've ever done.

This whole year has been full of stuff I never thought I could actually do. I never thought I could get my craft business off the ground, and here I am, setting up an online store. 

I never thought I would find a good Reiki teacher that I could afford, and yet, today, I received my Reiki First Degree certification from my Reiki master/teacher, Elle North.

I never, ever thought I would see my dream of owning a bookstore materialize, and yet... Our online shop is open and doing business, with plans coming together for a physical store-front in the next 2 years.

I started this year out with a bunch of dreams that felt like a really far reach. And yet, here I am, standing near the end of the year with so much coming together that it drives me to tears sometimes. 

I don't think we would ever have been given the gift of dreaming, if our dreams were out of reach. So dream big, darling. Dream Big.

Oh, and if you are curious about this NaNoWriMo thing, check it out. If you're brave enough to write 50,000 words in a month, sign up, and grab me as your first writing buddy (JennBradshaw is my user name). If you're curious, but not sure you're ready this year, join me on my Sage Wolfsong Creations Facebook page, and let me know you want to be my cheerleader. I'd love to have you! If you happen to be in SecondLife, look up our NaNoWriMo Obsession group, and join us for write-ins, sharing, feedback and mutual cheering on. 

If you're enjoying this series, please hop over to Facebook and let me know! Or, you know, you could just drop a comment below. If you've missed any posts, you can skip back to the Intro and read from there.

Are you a blogger that's flailing for content and need a little break from your normal topics? Or perhaps you're just getting started, and would like to populate your blog with some great posts that help readers get to know you? Feel free to snag this challenge and run with it. Just... do so ethically, please. Cite your sources, And then, pop over to that Facebook page and let us all know you're doing the challenge so we can follow you, too!

Take Notice! Sense Focus Brings Fun to Exercise.

Spring has sprung.

We're now well into April, and a few weeks into Spring. I know that some places, the winter weather is hanging on for dear life - my heart goes out to those still buried under blizzards and snow. We're still having nasty Winter storms here on the Washington Coast, though they're loosing strength, and I'm making the most of our sunny days.

Even in the places where winter's hanging on for dear life.

But even if you're stuck in a place where Winter simply refuses to let go, little changes are happening. You might have to focus a little harder or look a little more carefully to see the differences from one day to the next.

You might have to look a little harder.

If you look, the snow doesn't last quite as long. The storms aren't as intense. You have more sunny days. Even though we started this morning out with sun, and we've got a lot of rain and wind only a couple hours into my Monday, I dashed out to get my walk in before the storm hit, and noticed how many yards are full of grape hyacinth and bluebells. The barely alive grass is punctuated with tons of brilliant blue, white and indigo. We've got hummingbirds starting to zip around, and the crow population isn't as visible as they turn to nesting.

Use your outdoor workout to see changes.

When you're out on your run or walk for the next several days, see how many different changes you can notice.

Make it a game.

If you walk 6 days a week, you can get most of your senses in, and focus on just one per day. On Tuesday, keep track of how many new flowers you can find. Wednesday, make it all about what smells you notice that weren't there a week or two ago. Out here on the coast, the air smells a little different during the height of the different seasons. Right now, I step out my front door and get a nose-full of a very sweet beachy smell.

Pick one of your senses, and track all the little changes you notice.

For the next week, assign each day of your walk or run workout to a sense. I actually use this exercise with my coaching clients in our 10-Week Tune Up, to get them in touch with their senses. It gets you engaged with your surroundings, and helps you notice more, while your workout goes much faster, because you're not focused on how many more miles, blocks or minutes you have to keep going.

Journal the changes you notice.

When you get home, jot down all the changes you noticed on your trek that day. You've exercised parts of your brain that you don't often work out just by focusing on that sense for the day; you can now strengthen your memory by actively remembering what you noticed on your walk. If you'd like to add just a little extra "pop" to your brain workout, spend a moment in gratitude for each of the changes you've noticed that signal winter is on it's way out and the cycle of life has begun again.

Your workout goes by much faster.

As I mentioned above, your workout goes by faster when you're focused outside your body. Check in periodically with your physical body to ensure that you're not injuring yourself in anyway, and to make sure that you're actually working your muscles and not meandering (though a lot can be said for a casual walk that focuses on your surroundings). But spend the bulk of your outdoor exercise focusing on just one or two senses, and see just how quickly the time goes by.

Further Reading:
Just to get you thinking about this, I'd like to offer up another perspective. Unfolding the Heart's blog this past week looks at how reflections in water prompt the writer to reflect on her surroundings and her own wholeness.