It's Six O'Clock--Do You Know Where Your Writing Is?

I think I'm going to just make a habit of waking up early.

The whole house is sleeping, and the only noise invading drifting through the early morning is the chime of the grandfather clock every fifteen minutes. It's the most luscious sound, full of calm and promise. The perfect time for writing.

I thought today was packed, but items have mysteriously slipped off my to-do list. And I have hopes that homeschooling will soon get easier. Perhaps not this week, but soon.

So it's time to write. Right now. Write now.

I wish you the same leisure... at least an hour to write/paint/sing/listen to music/dance/or whatever suits your soul.

Finding One's Muse

While living in Kansas, I participated several times in a 24-Hour Play Festival, the equivalent of a short-term writing sprint. People signed up for various activities--tech, acting, directing (6), and writing (6). I did tech once, but the other times I wrote one of the plays.

The premise is simple: At 8 p.m., all of the participants come to the theatre with one costume and one prop. The participants get up one by one and present their items, and the actors also tell anything they can do--accents, sword fighting, double-jointedness, etc.

Once that is done, the actors, techies, and directors go home to bed, while the playwrights "draft" their actors for their play (usually they end up with 4-5 actors). Using their group of actors, along with the costumes and props brought in that night, the playwrights have from about midnight to 6 a.m. to write a ten-minute play. They have a few readers who stay up with them to read and offer feedback (so that the plays are at least a bit revised and polished before 6 a.m.), and then they head home to sleep all day.

Copies of the plays are made, and by 7 a.m. the directors come, read all the plays, and then fight over who gets to direct each one. At 8 the actors and techies show up, and from that point until an 8 p.m. performance, they rehearse the play, find costumes, learn lines, and prepare for a full production of each play.

Pretty fun stuff!! Exhausting, but fun. It's also a learning experience, and it helped me realize how much I depend on PEOPLE for my inspiration. I never had a clue what my play would be until after my actors were cast. Sometimes a prop gave me a little something, but it was usually the actors themselves. No, it was ALWAYS the actors.

And I have muses in real life, too. One woman in particular in Kansas ended up in several of my plays--she was the perfect protagonist--vulnerable, kind, intelligent, sensitive. She was also an actor, and a good one, so she often ended up in the very role designed for her. She was Othello's wife in my play Desdemona, and was absolutely perfect for it.

Now I have another muse here in Georgia, a 72-year-old teenager who has more energy in a single strand of hair than most people accumulate in a year. I've already written a play with her in mind, and I will likely write more. Then again, most characters in my plays and novels are melded images of a dozen different people, some from decades ago. And they all have just a touch of me, as well (even the villains).

So, who is your muse? What or who inspires you to do the work you do? Who shapes your world?

The Importance of Praise

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me."

Sure. Right. I can delude myself into thinking what people say doesn't matter, but it does. Thankfully, it doesn't matter much to me. I'm the Queen of Rejection, the Master of Being Passed Over. I even like the sound of that, so I think I'll keep that title.

I do like praise, though. I can push through insults, grit my teeth against a storm of criticism and just keep on going. I'm tough and thick-skinned. But when somebody says something nice, I get all mushy inside.

Consider this comment, from one of my fellow contributors to the up-coming Death by Chocolate anthology, who edited my story:

I’m not going to be much help to you, Cheryl –I adore the story as it is. I think your writing is gorgeous! I’m crazy about the character names and the village setting. (I have a thing for historical fiction.) It was actually difficult to critique because I got sucked into the story. I’m getting so excited about our anthology! Have you published any novels or plan to self-pub? I’d love to read your books and I’m not just saying that to be a nice author friend. I love your writing style!


Even better, this author's work was AWESOME--a great story!--so her praise means more to me. And asking about other stuff I've written was icing on the cake. Unfortunately, I haven't published any e-books. (Darn!)

Another writer, who has read my first novel (which I'm currently querying out to agents), has been e-mailing me about my fourth novel, set in the Caribbean, literally, since it's about a siren. Yesterday, she told me:

I am desperate to read your mermaid story.  Can I beta read or have you got that all done?


*sigh* She actually used the word "desperate"! Can you think of anything more invigorating? Of course, I haven't even revised the rough draft for this novel, and it's really terrible at this point, so she'll have to wait to read it... but isn't that an awesome comment?!? Even now I'm grinning.

More important, I'm writing. I'm taking the whole day to work on my Thomas novel (Novel #1), to get it ready for the ABNA contest (which I'll blog on soon). And now I have one more reason to get to work on my mermaid novel--and that means revising #3 first. Will I actually get three novels totally revised this year? Who knows? These little bits of praise, scattered here and there and reaching me at the best times, keep me hopeful. And they keep me writing (which is even more important).

Is there someone you can praise? Someone who needs a boost? You never know what magic your comments might work in the lives of someone else.

What's Your Motivation?

Sure, my title is an acting question--I remember the times in college, when even actors with no lines had to figure out their motivation as we worked on a play. The truth is, though, we are all motivated differently, and my students show varied kinds of motivations, some of which I share.

Now, I do have a few students who lack motivation. I'll admit that right off. I just don't see these students very often, since they aren't motivated enough to come to class (or even motivated enough to drop the class so that they don't fail it). All the rest of my students are inspired by some form of motivation:

1. Judgment

This particular motivator is people-centered. Either students go to class because they know their mom will wonder why they are at home when class is happening (and they don't want to upset her) or they want to get good grades so the parents (or girlfriend, etc.) are proud (instead of disappointed), or they may even fear what their teacher thinks of them. I was a member of the latter, although I do understand that what a stranger thinks shouldn't really matter. The point is that these people are working hard, not because they really think it's important, but because other people do, and they want to be judged favorably by those people.

2. Competition

I can't say this is a motivating factor for me--the Navajo blood in me is too strong--but it certainly is for my students. Some of them want to know what everybody else's grade is--tests, quizzes, papers, everything. Envy is the name of the game here. These students might not care that much about what grade they receive, as long as it's the best grade I dish out. However, since I dislike this particular tendency, I never tell them anything. (Other students' grades are none of their damn business.)

3. Grade

For these students, the grade is a sign of whether or not they will make it to heaven. An "A" is average for these people (although a "C" is supposed to be the average), and anything less means they failed. Call them overachievers--I know I do--or perfectionists--I call them that, too--but they are also very hard workers, for they aren't competing against other students in class but against the perfection they imagine themselves capable of. The only problem with this motivation is that it causes students unnecessary stress, and it's stress on the GRADE, not on the LEARNING. Which leads to the (next to) last motivation.

4. Desire to Learn

This is my favorite, but it's not that common. Most students are in my classes because they have to be. They need so many English credits to get an associates or earn their certificate in welding, so they enroll because they have to. But the rare student comes in, takes a course, and then returns for another one which he doesn't need, just because the course will teach him something. I knew a class once--taught by an adjunct instructor--that was told three weeks before the end of the class that, to give them a break, the teacher was canceling the last few weeks and dropping the final research project. They walked, en masse, straight out of her classroom and to the Dean's office to report her. They were furious that she had robbed them of three weeks of learning. Such an event is rare, yet I do see small signs of this nearly every day, when students express frustration that they get a good grade in some class yet feel like the course itself didn't cover anything important. One student recently commented on a religion course, saying, "You know, I took the class because I wanted to learn about different religions--because it interested me--and I haven't learned anything. It's a complete waste of time."

Now I'm looking over at my little NaNoWriMo calendar, and I am glad I posted in my sidebar. I was unable to write on the novel until late last night, but seeing a red mark on day three was highly motivating. Is it because that calendar is public, and all of you might see it? Nope. Is it because my mom might check out the page? Nope. Am I competing with another NoWri? Nope. Is there a grade involved? Nope.

My drive comes from another source, one I haven't discussed, but one that drives nearly all of us, except for those rare students who never show up for class. It isn't what others think of us, but what we think of ourselves that matters most. I don't want to see my calendar filled with red marks. I care about what I think. That is my ultimate motivation.

Speed Writing

Speed Dating is a relatively new phenomenon, consisting of a bunch of single(?) people getting together somewhere public and rapidly moving from prospective partner to prospective partner, talking to each other for somewhere between 30 seconds and 5 minutes (I have no knowledge of what time limit is ideal, as I've been married longer than many of you have lived on the earth).

At the end of the Speed Dating "session," participants get to request numbers of those people who made an impression on them. If both participants request each other, then a connection is made. If both don't, there's no really uncomfortable moment when anyone has to reject the other, for no commitment has been made. Supposedly, it's a great way to meet lots of people and reject most of them in a very short amount of time.

As most of you know, I've been in writing limbo, drifting around without attaching myself to any of my writing projects. Do I want to write another veggie book for children? Revise one of my three novels? Work on my Oxford play? Write a ten-minute comedy? You see, it isn't that I don't have any ideas... it's like a filthy house: where does one start cleaning?

I've decided to play my own sort of game: Speed Writing. I'll set up six different writing projects on my computer--the three novels, the Oxford play, a blank screen for the ten-minute, and another document with several veggies listed (cabbage is next, I think)--and I'll spend ten minutes with each of them.

At the end of ten minutes, whether I enjoyed working on the project or not, I'll switch to the next. At the end of an hour, I'll have tried them all, and I might have discovered the one I want most to work on. More than likely I'll be down to two, and I'll spend a longer date--30 minutes--on each one to figure out which will be my "steady date" for a while.

I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow. I've never tried anything like this before. Have you? Do you have six (or more) projects that could use some doing? Might this work in other activities, like painting, sewing, etc.? What do you think?

Floundering

Oh, I hate it when people ask me how my writing is going lately. Frankly, it isn't, and though I'd planned to do nothing today except laundry and writing, I am now sick with a cold, tired out to the extreme, and I know I am unlikely to write today (except for this blog, and I am forcing myself to write it at this point). 

My online training is fascinating, but it still isn't writing, and now I'm using it as an excuse not to write (in lieu of housework)... I suppose my question is, why on earth am I putting off writing? I have always loved writing. It's always been something that motivated me to bounce out of my bed in the morning (even at three in the morning, sometimes), something that I couldn't wait to do, something that urged me to hurry through the clothes folding, the dishes, and even do so with a smile on my face, knowing once the chores are done I get to work on what I really love.

So, why don't I love it right now? What's wrong? Why do I put it off?

What do all of you think? Today would be a great day to write, since I just want to snuggle up in a blanket and work on the computer... what might I do to motivate myself to get going? I've put off writing long enough.

What's My Motivation?

I could make this about writing (most of my posts end up this way), since I could use the idea of motivation to discuss why characters act as they do. I could show that characters who act only to further plot, but have no reasons behind their actions other than this, usually make for a pretty stale novel (and lame characters)... 

However, the reason this is my topic today is because of my son. He is nearly five (only a few weeks away), and I have been working with him to teach him to read. With the help of an interesting book--100 Easy Lessons to Teach Your Child to Read--I have been slowly developing his letter recognition, phonics knowledge, etc. 

But such a task has been the bane of my existence these many months. The lessons are supposed to be quick, though the later ones, I'm certain, should take at least 1/2 an hour to complete. However, my son manages to drag them out TWO HOURS a DAY!!!! His eyes wander, he huffs, he whines, he claims he can't read "the" (one of the first words he learned, and one he'd already read at least 20 times immediately prior), claims he has to go potty, wants water, feels tired, won't take a nap... and so on, until my eyes are bleeding (I'm sure they are, though I'm afraid to look) and the closest thing to heaven I can imagine is all the books in the world burned to a crisp (and if you know how I feel about books, that's about as extreme as it gets). 

But today, we had a breakthrough. I found his motivation. For the word lists at the beginning of today's lesson, I offered him a peanut half for each word he read. He read them as fast as he ever has. For the story, I offered him half a peanut each time he finished a sentence. 

Yes, he ate quite a few peanuts. But he's nearly five, and he's still the size of a 3-year-old (he barely weighs 40 lbs.), so a bit more food in him won't hurt, at least right now. And they are the "low salt" peanuts, too (still salty, but what am I supposed to do?). 

So, I'm bribing my kid with food. I've found a motivation for him to do what I want, but I'm still offering him food if only he'll do something. And I know that's bad. Is there some other way to motivate him? I've tried about a hundred things so far. This is the first one that worked, so I'm sticking with it.

Knowing my son, though, tomorrow he'll probably decide he hates peanuts. (Drat!)