30 Days of Thankfulness in Writing – Day 2: Mentors

It’s easy to focus on the negative in the world around us. In observation of a month many dedicate to counting their blessings, I’ve started a 30-day challenge in which I’ll focus on one aspect of my writing life for which I am thankful. I’d love to have you join by sharing about something that has blessed your own writing life in the comments section below. - Jen

An editor I used to work with once said that if you wanted a bigger piece of pie, you had to make the pie bigger first. In other words, if you want to see more benefit from your efforts, you need to be willing to work with others to expand the territory. At the time he was talking about a couple of manufacturers who were squabbling over who had the rights to a certain bit of emerging technology, but what he said works for writing as well. The publishing world can appear cutthroat to outsiders. There are only so many book slots available in bookstores a year (though e-publishing is changing that), agents only take on so many new clients, and editors are a precious commodity. Once you get your start, if you want to make a living at writing your work really has to sell.

Then there’s the pie. When it comes to readers, there are only so many pieces to go around and those tastes are constantly changing. What is hot and fresh one day may be considered old and moldy the next.  Yet despite the survival of the fittest mantra we have pounded into our heads from an early age, I have rarely met a published writer who was unwilling to share a bit of insight with an aspiring writer. In my experience at least, it’s always been the exact opposite.

And that’s what I am thankful for today: the writers who have become my mentors. Some I have never met face to face, we’ve only worked together via electronic communication; others I’ve had the privilege to sit under for a spell. Each of them recognizes their time is a mere blink and wants to make sure there are other well-trained storytellers to take their place when they set their pen down for the final time. They don’t just lock themselves in their writer’s caves and turn out books — they dedicate a portion of their already busy lives to teaching.

These writers remind me of the ancient story keepers who took on apprentices and trained them until they could recite from memory the histories, fables, and tales of their culture. The main difference is my mentors taught me the rules of writing, how to avoid pitfalls they encountered, and they also encouraged me to find my own voice.

So to my mentors Norm Rohr, Douglas Hirt, John Perrodin, Suzanne Eller, Jim Bell, Jerry Jenkins, and all the others who have taken the time to pass on their valuable knowledge to the next generation: Thank you for working to make the pie a little bigger for all of us.

30 Days of Thankfulness in Writing – Day 1: Professors

During the past few years I’ve seen several of my friends embark on a 30-day Thankfulness challenge for the month of November. The idea is to post on their Facebook page one item each day for which they are thankful. I was so intrigued by this that I decided that this year I would attempt to update my blog every day with something or someone that has been a blessing in my writing life. I’d love to have you join me by visiting each day and perhaps posting something for which you are thankful for in the comments section below.

Today I am thankful for four college professors I had who saw a talent in me they decided to foster by pushing me harder than I at times thought fair.

I am thankful for Rick Thompson who saw in a ridiculous and very short story an ability to engage the imagination and create a world he thought children would love to explore. It is because of him I first started dreaming of becoming a real writer.

I am thankful for Luis Perotti, a World Lit professor who realized I just needed someone to sit down and explain a few simple mechanics in order to really excel in writing, and who opened a whole new world for me as a result. I only had one class with him, but he always stopped me in the hall when he saw me to catch up with me and see how my education (and writing) were progressing.

I am thankful for Mada Morgan who introduced me to the joys of writer’s manuals and gifted me with my first Moleskine notebook upon graduation. She also taught me the fundamentals of rhetoric and editing, and worked alongside some fellow students and me as an advisor while we created a departmental e-zine and two annual writing competitions for English & Writing majors.

And I am thankful for Craig Wright who never allowed his students to use five words where one would suffice. Who taught me the difference between having a well-rounded vocabulary and flipping through a thesaurus. I am thankful for all the times he forced me to cut a story in half, then in half, and then in half again until I finally discovered that in order to write one must first have a story to tell.

I am thankful for these four individuals because they are the beginning of my story. It is through their efforts, their patience, and their guidance that my eyes were opened to see the first archway in my three-act play, and it is because of their encouragement that I had the faith to step through it.

The Writer’s emotional bond

As a writer I have a ton of books I’ve collected over the years on becoming a better writer (I’ve often joked that if you want to make money writing, all you need to do is write a book about writing). One of the books I turn to the most, and often lend out to other writers, is Stein on Writing. He reminds me of my favorite writing professor in that he doesn’t pull any punches.

In the chapter, “The Writer’s Job May Be Different Than You Think,” Stein discusses the importance of considering the reader’s needs, the necessity of capturing emotion, and the importance of practicing, developing a thick skin, and becoming an observer of the unspoken.

“It is our job,” Stein writes, “in nonfiction as well as fiction, to juxtapose words that reveal what previously may have been blinked, and prove insights obscured by convention and shame.”

In other words, we have to be willing to say what is otherwise left unsaid. We not only need to answer the question “What?” but “What if?” as well.

Throughout the chapter, Stein compares and contrasts nonfiction with fiction, but boils the differences with the following: Nonfiction conveys information. Fiction evokes emotion.

One of my favorite writing quotes by Dave Lambert says essentially the same thing: Nonfiction communicates truth to the intellect, through logical thought. Fiction communicates truth to the heart, through emotion.

As a writer, my job is not to focus on saying what happened, but to allow my readers to feel what is in progress.

It’s the age-old “show don’t tell,” yet before I was introduced to Stein, this concept had never been expressed in this manner to me. Stein points out that when we curl up with a good book we forget about the words on the page. We love a book not because of the writer, but because of how the writer makes us feel. We thrill and despair without leaving our chair. Each word is carefully crafted and chosen to excite us and break our hearts.

I’m currently reading a series of books that does just that. I’m invested in the lives of the characters because the author forges strong emotional ties between the reader and the characters. There are the wicked people I long to see brought to justice because of the pain they’ve caused without remorse, there are the “innocents” trapped in situations far beyond their control who I want to see brought out safely, and even when I’m not reading I’m thinking about them, wondering what hand fate will deal them.

It is that essence I long to capture in my own writing.

Like in the real world, so much of what happens in a story happens underneath the surface. 

For example, my sister can read my emotions by looking at my eyes. She knows when I’m thinking about a particular person because the corner of my mouth will twitch. It doesn’t matter which words I use, she knows via subtle clues if I’m being honest or not. It’s determining how to take those clues and commit them convincingly to the page that often becomes the challenge for me.

I once heard someone say, “Everything is easy once you know how to do it.”

So this evening after work I’m going home to practice conveying emotion through the written word a little more.

The Broken Branch

One of my mentors once told me the true essence of a story isn’t about the character — it’s about the conflict. When we pick up a book the last thing we really want to read about is what he called “Happy People in Happy Land” because as much as we complain about the hardship in our own lives we think that a character who faces no challenges is absolutely boring.

My mentor went on to tell me that when writing my goal is to run my protagonist up a tree in the middle of a forest fire and strand him on a branch that is about to break, plummeting him into a pack of ravenous wolves below. At the time I chuckled to myself. I didn’t realize yet that I was as hesitant to throw my character into that type of danger as I was to step into the fire myself. After all, life isn’t really like that…right?

Lately my life has resembled the above scenario far more than I care to admit. It seems that every time I come close to breaking free from one potential catastrophe I land right smack dab into the middle of another. That there tends to be only the briefest glimpse of peace and safety in between makes the new challenge even harder to face. I’ve found myself asking the oldest cliché in the book: Why?

It’s the question every character finds themselves asking at the end of the first act of a story. Why me? Why here? Why now? It’s also the point in which they make the first in the series of critical choices: Stay and ignore the problem hoping it disappears, thus ending the story before it begins. Or tackle the issue head-on and accept whatever changes and challenges come with it. It’s those who chose the latter we remember.

One of my all-time favorite characters is Frodo Baggins’ best friend Samwise Gamgee. Of all the characters in the Fellowship he was the only one who never wanted an adventure. He would have been content to live out his days tending his garden in the Shire. Instead he chose the path of adversity and it was his choice to stick by Frodo’s side no matter what the cost that resulted in the final destruction of the Ring of Power and the ultimate fall of Sauron.

What I love the most about Sam is that despite everything that happened to him he never lost sight of his goal: To return to the Shire at Frodo’s side. Whether it’s in my personal life or as a writer, I’ve discovered I face the same decision. And as much as it shocks me to type this, I couldn’t live as a Happy Person in Happy Land. Without these struggles I’d see no growth. Without these challenges I’d have no way of knowing how far I can really go. And without these burdens I’d never know just how wonderful it is to discover I don’t have to carry them alone.

There’s one other thing my mentor joined in with others to drill into me: Write what you know. Thanks to the broken branch above the wolves in the middle of a forest fire, that list just got a little longer.

—Jen

Writers! To your marks!

Do you not know that in a race all runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. 1 Cor. 9:24

I know. The Apostle Paul was speaking to the early church about their spiritual lives when he wrote this letter, but this verse has spoken to me in multiple ways lately. Especially this morning as I dragged myself out of my amazing, warm, and comfortable bed to meet my brother at a local park. We’ve been less active of late and decided it was time to change that.

Since graduating from college I’ve been more of a yoga/Pilates girl, though I used to run when I was younger. I’m not entirely sure what got me interested in running again. Maybe it was all the posts from friends on Facebook about preparing for various races. Perhaps the seed was planted when I was reading through Paul’s epistle the last time. Whatever the case, I decided I want to compete in a race myself, and the time to start training is now.

Like starting any new exercise regimen, the first day is always the most exciting. You have lofty goals. You’re starting a new adventure and you can almost taste your eventual victory. Then you hit the trail and realize just how out of shape you really are. You also realize just how physically and mentally demanding running really is.

For me, the greatest obstacle I face is in my mind. I visualize the distant finish line and am determined to reach it whatever the cost, but once my heart starts pounding and my breathing accelerates, if that finish line is still out of sight, all I can think about is “I’m getting tired,” “I’ll never make it,” and I come to a halt. This morning when I started feeling the strain, however, I remembered the advice from one of my running friends: Make short-term goals. Pick a point you can see and run to it, just before you reach it pick a point just a little further ahead and focus on that. When the goal is in sight and is your sole focus, you find you can run longer distances. The more often you stop, the harder it is to get going again.

I’ve found the same is true in my writing. When I first picked up my pen in college I was going to have my debut novel published by the time I was 23. It would be a series that would rival the most popular Young Adult fantasies. But as time progressed without a single acceptance letter showing up in my mailbox, I despaired and considered giving up.

I’ve since realized that while my dream is one I should continue striving for, I was trying to run a marathon when I was barely ready for the hundred-yard dash. I needed to be training, which I’ve done by reading books on writing and through my time working my way through my Apprenticeship, Journeyman, and Craftsman courses in the Christian Writers Guild. I also set about making smaller more manageable goals.

In the past year I’ve had the privilege of seeing several articles and short stories published. The encouragement from that mixed with the feedback I’ve received from readers has inspired me to run a little further. I make a goal for myself each week now; sometimes I reach it, sometimes I don’t. But I’m focusing. I’m training. And I’m becoming a stronger writer as a result.

I didn’t make it as far along the trail this morning as I would have liked, but I did go further than I thought I could. In that, today served as a perfect reminder that the key to succeeding isn’t so much my physical ability; it’s overcoming the battle in my mind. I have to force myself to focus in the beginning, but once I find my pace I find the drive to continue.

I want to encourage you to do the same. Make short-term goals to go along with your long-term dream. Post a blog piece on a friend’s site if you don’t have one of your own. Write a human-interest piece for your local paper. Stretch those muscles. Push yourself to go a little longer, a little further between writing breaks than you did the day before. And never lose sight of the finish line.

Writers! To your marks!

–Jen