Writing is like exercise. You have to set up at specific time each day to do it, and then it becomes habit. I know that if I don’t exercise, my anxiety starts to get the best of me. It’s the same with writing. If I don’t work on whatever project I have, then the anxiety level rises. Like exercise, just get it done. The hardest part with exercise is getting out the door, and that’s the same with writing. The door becomes my next chapter, and if I can just get it started and work on the edits, then I’m good for the rest of the day.
This is one of the songs I listen to when I write. It’s by Pearl Jam.
I’m getting too bogged down in the details of my manuscript. Right now, I’m so concerned about logistics that I’m forgetting to let go and have some fun with my book. You know, fun? Writing can be fun sometimes, instead of some struggle with demons. My mentor always said that when he wrote each night, he would ask for one sentence, just one sentence of beauty. It’s true. Amidst all the gook I produce each day in writing, one sentence of beauty would be a gift. You have to let go, free from constraint, free from how does setting A go to setting B. Of course, you have to get
Relax and Start Writing
back and fix the logistics, but you also have to let it flow when the details are making you nuts. The question is: How do you relax and write at the same time? A glass of wine, perhaps?
I’m working on my second draft of my second novel, and it’s changing. I wonder who is really in control: me or the characters? Right now, I’m in control, but these characters won’t stand for it very much longer and will eventually take over if I’m not careful. I think right now, I need to keep an outline of my changes because the second draft is changing. I think by the third draft, I will flip to 1st person and tell from my main character’s point of view. We shall see. I wish writing was easier. I think I will start blogging more when the frustration hits. It is much better than wasting time on Facebook, a great time sucker.
I started this blog to write about the insane world of writing and publishing, but it turns out that I'm writing more about my life because it just gets in the way . . . all the time. Have fun reading the ramblings from my crazy writer's mind. We're all crazy, really.
Chocolate. Love. Sex. Really, what else could a woman want in life? For Persey, the heroine of Brownie Fix, her days are fun-filled until what is normally one of life’s most fulfilling experiences, the birth of her son, leads her straight into a dark state of postpartum depression.
Wandering in her own postpartum hell, Persey meets people that are absurd, like the swinging neighbors who want a little more than a cup of sugar and a group of mothers who become whipped up in worship to a climactic furor. On top the madness, she keeps seeing a yellow-toothed old man who acts like he wants to breastfeed from her. Or is it her imagination? Add the voices in her head that become louder and louder, and it’s little wonder that Persey reaches for brownie mix to soothe her insanity.
Buckling under the pressure and lack of sleep from motherhood, Persey experiences the five stages of grief that lead her to uncover a buried secret, and gradually she begins to heal with the help of her family, friends, and, of course, brownies.
