Excuses to Edit

One of the benefits (and disadvantages) to putting a draft aside is that, unless you've kept effective enough notes as you go (which is akin to writing the same thing twice over, so I don't often do), time away from it makes a preemptive edit a necessity.

I suppose some might have the willpower not to poke at the draft as they go (aside from glaring spelling and grammar mistakes, which must always be nipped when caught), but I am not such a person.

Today, I started to reread UnHeard's NaNo draft and I've barely cleared the first few scenes after a couple hours of reading because I've already begun to add and fidget with what I'm coming across. Nothing too lofty, a sentence here and there with any uncertainty being shoved onto the Notes section to be refined later. All the same, while the idea of editing was not thrilling, as usual I find that it is a very rewarding experience to have to refresh my memory once more.

Even though rereading any of my books evokes the same feeling, I can't help but feel what I am working on more truly reflects my aspirations for the story. Whether or not that's true, it's very much a feeling that drives me to keep writing, to keep looking for my truest voice, to keep believing my potential is never met, always growing, but not unattainable either.

I also feel as if I'm being more honest about my themes. Although the beginning of this current story starts with what seems to be a budding romance, I'm not handing this one to the reader so easily. Or myself, for that matter. Have you heard a long-married couple arguing in public and been intrigued to know what they were like as children or early in their marriage? Do you hear the odd mix of resentment mixed with adoration and wonder what combination of absence and being attached at the hip kept them from abandoning ship? Did everyone around them think they were destined to be together or was there no way in hell they seemed compatible, either in personality or station in life?

Even though romantic themes tend to be a 'sure thing' from the perspective of planning (not always the case since I sometimes find the story to take some pretty hard lefts), I spend a lot of time picturing them as both perfect for each other and absolutely hating each other's guts, building organically from a place where it truly seems it could go either way. Do I dive into dysfunction and being together for the 'wrong reasons' (being afraid to be alone, for one) or is theirs a 'healthy' relationship? How does outside perception interfere with those interpersonal feelings, if at all? 

Despite the depth I go to to tie in all themes, no matter how swallowed they are in their own conflicting or adoring feelings, how do I assure that it is secondary or even a distant third to a much bigger plot? Well, the same way we stumble through life, able to care about more than one thing at a time. Writing in scenes and short stories before I had the confidence to call them novels was a great stepping stone. Learning how to sew stories together, to create those transitions and plant those seeds of foreshadowing, was no small task. It often involves hiding things in plain sight, to draw some readers so far into an emotional subplot that they likely shove a detail aside, but... not so much that it can't be pulled up like an epiphany later.

The trick is to also distance myself as if the emotion is not effective. For some people, that will be the case. What makes one reader shocked or warm and tingly won't be the same for everyone, so this also means that emotion can not be relied on to carry the story indefinitely. It doesn't damage the raw heart of a story to invite other tactics into the mix. In fact, as a writer, I look forward to the very different perspectives evoked from my words. Having once been an avid user of social media, I've learned to take the aggravation of purposely twisted words as a useful strategy for purposely hiding meaning in my own stories.

What's more karmic justice than turning bitterness into something useful? Let your haters be the fertilizer for your growth, rather than salt the earth.

In any case, back to the enjoyment of refamiliarizing myself with the draft before proceeding. This story is somewhere between planning and free-writing, but with this series, I find that the best parts often arise from just playing around in its build before buckling down on the details.

Ooo, but I do have a couple of things to add before I get back to it.

It's not at all obvious, but I originally planned the relationship between UnNamed's mercenary and brat to be lovers. While they bantered early in the story, I realized that there was something to the way the child was bonding to him like a father since they never had one and he, the furthest thing from what you'd consider a good parent, had a soft spot for the kid. After a while, I definitely couldn't see the original plan of a romantic relationship, but instead found the strongest bond in a familial type bond instead. lol I wish I could be more exact about it, but I'm still new and unknown enough that I'd really hate to spoil it so easily in a blog. Nevertheless, it does align perfectly with the idea that even an original plan can evolve into a different concept altogether. In fact, it was this epiphany that gave me a great idea for one of the plots that spans all four books.

Until the book is published, it's more accurate to say that nothing is actually a 'sure thing'. Some plans just latch on more stubbornly, others are wrested free by the larger needs of the story.

The Art of Listmaking

Many years ago, I caught my best friend chuckling at me for making a list of video games I wanted to buy. Curious, I asked her why. With an affectionate eye-roll, she told me that it was one thing her husband and I had in common that she'll never understand.

While her husband and I very likely have different reasons for the habit, I can say for certain that it effectively does a lot of favors for me: it keeps me from impulsive spending when my broke-ass does have money and it helps me decide what is valuable and what is worth my time. 

(When it comes to shopping lists, I tend to have another rule when it comes to temporary and permanent decisions. If I still want a thing after six months, then I should buy it. For things like tattoos and piercings, it's actually a six YEAR rule. Loosely-- I don't ACTUALLY count the years, but if I've noticed the desire remains for years, I understand it's not passing. The 'six' part just sounds nicer.)

Small notepads are stashed everywhere in my room and they typically have a simple purpose-- daily and weekly lists. Monday, Wednesday and Friday tend to be my target active days so I plan for those the day before. I scribble down what I hope to get done and throw on some maybes. If I don't do it all that day, I push it to another-- Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays tend to be 'leftover' days because of this. No, I don't heavily plan this. It seems to just be the way I work best. It's really not as structured as it seems, but I'll get to that.

None of my planning necessitates anything as formal (or time-consuming) as a day planner. If I really need to keep track of an event, I just use an electronic calendar. This goes for repeating events especially (thank you, birthday reminders). What works best is disposable notepads for the variables of life. At the top are priorities of that day. In the middle is an ordered list of quick tasks and maybes. At the bottom are ongoing projects I can choose from. These are still priorities but of the 'Rome wasn't built in a day' sort.

Here's the thing-- once I write them, I rarely need the list but not writing them almost guarantees I'll forget something. On days where I'm really not motivated, checking things off is an odd incentive. Writing and marking things off is one of the easiest rewards systems for functioning according to plan. This is the same reason I actually prefer to hand-write ideas in notebooks despite apps and built-in notepad functions available. I rarely ever consult the notes I write again, but there is something about the act of writing each letter by hand that seals it in my head far more effectively than typing it does. I need to connect each thought to the letters they represent whereas typing is simply a convenience for speed and neatness. I love that I can throw out my thoughts quickly, distribute them even quicker, but if I really want to remember them, there's nothing like handwriting.

Either way, I consider all of the items on a list as a suggestion. Priorities even sometimes get pushed. If I just don't feel well or something comes up, anything can move. Things that get pushed too much often get upgraded to a priority. Why? Because there's only so much pushing until it's clearly procrastination or an excuse. Then I have to look at it differently.

My obsessive habit of alphabetizing my game collections into lists actually turned into a motivational tool in this too. (What I didn't share much then was the fact that my siblings liked to steal and sell my shit so it was a safeguard for keeping track of it. Now, I just put a lock on my bedroom door.) Organization only kind of helps since my best attempts to create order are often forgotten and result in digging around trying to find them anyway. However, to-do lists continue to be a great way to keep moving, to keep refining my workflow, to keep looking for a better way to create order in the constant chaos.

You can definitely add making lists to the list of ways to fake focus. List-Inception, at its finest. Mentally or in practice, life is often a list in a list in a list...

Let's flip to the other side of this practice for a moment. For some people, not completing lists comes with a demotivational sense of failure. It's a perception you have to actively learn to discard. Seriously, regrets are shit. You can only move forward. After making a mistake, my dad used to give me a lot of shit for it but there really wasn't anything to be done to change it and if there was a way to fix it, I'd already thought about and did it. I only ever ask for advice if I've truly exhausted my own resources. (And let's face it-- most people looking for 'advice' on anything other than an opinion are simply looking for peer approval/conflict. For facts alone, Google is gonna cover your ass.) Rather than compound the guilt, you have to similarly remind your critics (or the critic that made the list/did the failure- ahem, you) that it's something you will labor not to repeat.

In that same way, this attitude helped me be less anxious of things that haven't happened yet. It's unavoidable that I'm always thinking of best and worst case scenarios, but I don't get very anxious before interviews, mainly because I know they'll either like me or not and I'll answer the questions to the best of my ability. It ceases to matter how badly I want the job or what it could mean to my future if that just means I'll be a mess where it matters. If there's any anxiety, it's me telling my mouth not to run away with the honesty of my brain. (Don't overshare, Krista.)

Lists are just another planning guide in your behavioral toolbox. A good habit in a long line of tempting bad habits. However, they have the long-term ability to develop a good attitude if you don't beat yourself up over what isn't done. Grab a whiteboard or a corkboard, a planner or a tablet and work to remind yourself daily of what might matter. Having things specifically dedicated to this habit truly helps. Tablets can be distracting, if only for the ease at which you can get distracted from taking notes/lists to hop over to FB or check messages. Again, this is why I recommend just buying stacks of cheap spiral/composition notebooks. While you can get distracted in thought, handwriting still requires purposeful marking. Even if you switch over to mindless doodling (which I do) there's a greater tendency to get back on track when your real estate is limited to the physical page and there's no 'accidentally' opening Facebook.

When you don't regret how you spend your resources, it's a valuable tool. No, it doesn't have to be daily or weekly. Sometimes people just keep a calendar. My dad is a random list maker and only when he's super motivated. If you're forgetful rather than neglectful, even better. Sometimes we tell ourselves it's neglect but this often removes that possibility when those lists are consistently met. It's not always procrastination that makes us unproductive but some simple lack of a task that keeps us ordered on our task.

I've mentioned before but puzzles are a terrific way to create a mentality for focus. I tend to avoid brain scrambling moments after taking time to hyperfocus on a task. Diet can be a huge help too. Omega 3s, found in fish or supplements, is touted as a terrific way to get your brain function on point. In truth, there's rarely ever ONE thing we do that contributes to the best methods for productivity. I really just enjoy making lists and always have. If I sat and thought about it, I could think of a time all the way back to when I learned to write words where I was making some kind of list. Even before words, there was the temptation to draw as many fruits as I could think of-- shapes, animals, etc. I've always loved to satisfy how things might be grouped according to what I need from them.

Ha, and we do get a lot of shit for grouping things these days, don't we? As if noticing the difference between men and women or skin colors, etc. is some sort of cardinal sin. Ironically, people often end up ignorant out of a fear of seeming ignorant. Stop asking, stop talking, stop searching, stop making stupid lists... Nah, take some risks that you'll look stupid to avoid actually being 'stupid' for acceptance.

I'm jumping around just to feel out what might be some mental hurdles here. I know I favor handwriting, but some people have terrible handwriting. Finding a strategy is about personal preference and resources. If anything, I'd always say adaptability is going to be key with this one as it is with most. List-making is secondhand for a lot of people, but like a lot of things, people also fall out of certain habits and don't realize its value when it could be best used.

How do lists help you through layered tasks or everyday life? How much of a hot mess are you without the joy of lists? I'm kidding, but really, lists are a pretty terrific way to assist a busy brain.

Bestiaries are the Best!

Bestiary... let me copy-pasta this first...

bes·ti·ar·y

ˈbesCHēˌerē,ˈbēsCHēˌerē/

noun

noun: bestiary; plural noun: bestiaries

1. a descriptive or anecdotal treatise on various real or mythical kinds of animals, especially a medieval work with a moralizing tone.

I do this because a friend of mine almost immediately asked me what a bestiary was when I said I was doing one for my ever-growing list of magical abominations. Can't assume this is common knowledge if even my nerds/geeks aren't all on board here.

If you told me a decade ago that I would ever care to do one, I'd have cocked an eyebrow at you and told you you couldn't pay me to do one. I'm an artist, sure, but I had this odd niche in my twenties where almost everything I drew was a female and possibly a fairy. Still, animals were not my thing. I couldn't draw them from memory, but I'm pretty decent at drawing based off a picture. When I say this, I don't mean the exact picture even; I could discern how to draw it from other angles based off of the anatomy. I just didn't have the exact form locked in without seeing it.

The first time I had to cave in was for a college project in character design. The task? Create a mythological creature based on two or more actual creatures. Source pics, an anatomical skeleton and at least three natural habitats it might reside in. I... was not happy. Like most things I was not happy about drawing, I did it anyway. Mostly as some snide decision to prove I sucked at it, even though I was always wrong and it was always pretty damn good.

Not bad, right? I'm glad nature doesn't actually make these horror combinations of alligators and pelicans, but I realized I didn't hate working with animal anatomy. Certainly knew I always loved human anatomy and I even loved the hell out of AP Science classes in high school, but I'd never really wrapped my head around enjoying the two in combination.

I didn't exactly unlock Pandora's box just because of that though. In fact, until I was making my senior portfolio years later, I didn't think to do it again. This time, it was an axolotl/hummingbird.

Again, years passed before I thought about it again. I can at least be consistent in forgetting things. This time, it's for UnQuadrilogy. I didn't start off intending it to be like this either. I love using polytheistic mythologies as a theme, so I set out looking to write a single novel about a man once more shaking away the perfection of gods by revealing their mistakes. Somewhere along the way, I woke a dragon, in the multi-layered literal sense. I also woke a four-book plan to align with the mishaps of the Four Gods in question. It didn't stop with dragons (in fact it didn't actually start there. Heh. There was a giant snake before that one, to be technical). UnSung came along and the little bastards started cropping up everywhere. And like most plans run wild, I realized that a new stage of planning was inevitable.

So along came the bestiary. I could say my years as a gamer was actually where this became a thing I was aware of. It wasn't fantasy books. I still remember my mom introducing me to my first fantasy book while we were sitting at Pizza Hut and I was clutching the Dragon Warrior manual for the Nintendo and going on and on about the story of the Dragon Lord. She told me I should read The Hobbit. Although I enjoyed the riddles between Gollum and Bilbo, it wasn't an immediate favorite. In fact, I started delving into fantasies and developed a love for Russian fairy tales. Bartek the Doctor and Finn the Keen Falcon were favorite short stories of mine. When I started expanding, it was actually Anne Rice that came into my view first. Beyond the Vampire Chronicles, I fell in love with Garth Nix's Sabriel and Sara Douglass's everything-else. I always loved dark tales with improbable romance and deep lessons.

I just wasn't into the sort of fantasy books where bestiaries were used. Tolkien was just okay for me and I still have yet to pick up a book by names I see often-- Brent Weeks, Patrick Rothfuss, Brandon Sanderson. I won't go into the fact that somehow female writers are often pushed into romance subgenres (even though men have proven to be just as sensitive/romantic/sexual as writers). I've done it to death and have nothing new to add, but needless to say, I've just never been into fantasy purely for the world-building, creature roster and sword swinging. I'm told that Sanderson heavily plans magic systems in his tomes and, after trudging through the House filler of George R. R. Martin, it sounds about as exciting as a dentistry manual. 

Don't get me wrong; I love planning the logic as much as the next geek, but I've become conscious that it makes for tedious reading. Everything needs a solid base. Houses also have impressive foundations, but their beauty doesn't lie in seeing what went into it.

Bestiaries are my new fun project, but it's not something I think anyone will actually share in the enthusiasm with. Who knows; I might have those kinds of fans that do. In that case, I'd love to share my post-publishing notes and side projects here and there. For most people, even the most devoted, nope. When I love a book, I don't even assume I'll like anything else they've done. It might be worth looking for the next in a series, but I don't wade through half a dozen 'bad' books before I give up-- I'll give it about .2-2 entire books before I'm done. I can appreciate different fans and fandoms and I don't begrudge anyone their success, but I honestly just develop the books that I would want to read.I used to love the thrill of discovery, but my level of patience started wearing thin.

Writing was largely about creating what I wanted to see. It wasn't some lofty decision that everything was crap. I was looking for an instant fix and I was getting a lot of great ideas. Like everything else, I labored to be good at it, but ultimately, I set out not just to enjoy something but to see if there's some overlooked aspect that I might enjoy more than I expected I might. Even if you think I'm really good at a lot of the things I do (and I'm not so falsely humble or lacking in self confidence as to disagree), my tastes are tricky to pin down. Nothing wrong with that-- Stephen King became more prolific over time. You can argue that success afforded that, but self-publishing has removed that as a luxury a writer has to earn. Now, we can publish what we want AND be poor... (yeah, it's not really an advantage, but I still love it.)

Maybe I should talk about what's involved in a bestiary. In short, whatever the hell you want. Does size matter? Eye color? Species names? Strengths and weaknesses? Essentially, it's just a character dossier for the creatures. In this case, there will also be humanoid creatures. Many of them can communicate intelligently with humans, so it would be a much shorter bestiary if I limited it only to the sentient, hostile, or purely animal sort. The ones that are main characters in those categories get their own profile considerations, but again-- this be on a needs basis, yo.

I might post a sample page once I have one complete. I've organized them loosely at the moment in the order they appear in the books. This might change. As a designer, flexible elements are part of the job, so I've made everything in convenient drag and drop pieces.

When it comes to my books, I'm a writer first and foremost. I don't actually have a set way of looking at my characters and creatures. Aside from the details actually pulled into the book, I have no actual 'canon' and those other details are flexible, sometimes changing. Very different from how I view floor plans in a previous post. I do floor plans to lock things in, but I do character sheets and bestiaries to play around with possibilities.

Up until NaNoWriMo, I'm throwing open my creative doors again and doing things on impulse and need. I'll put out a more detailed bestiary post later once I've fleshed that out. I'm spreading out the scheduled posts since they'll continue to be more scarce as I focus on other things. Even if they trickle to 1-3 a week, I'll still make an attempt to keep it up.

Onto the creative now!

Focusing When You Can't Pay Attention

As someone who has always dealt with central nervous system mishaps, it always makes me crack up laughing when someone says they couldn't possibly accomplish as much as I do for lack of focus, inability to pay attention, however they phrase it. I'm high-functioning at best-- whether you throw a name at it or not, the symptom of 'lack of focus' is still a daily reality. I've gone over both my health challenges and creativity 'unblocking' techniques, even how I focus, but perhaps too safely-- ultimately I've neglected to honestly depict the tug of war that occurs behind the scenes. Although I'm flattered that I look to be so hardworking and productive, the reality is that it's only because I work in solitude that I can manage some semblance of focus and also have the ability to have emotional meltdowns without risking embarrassment or causing a scene.

Some people use meds to handle a more public life. If it didn't have a choice, I probably would too. I'm going to go ahead and assume you're already taking care of those individual needs since I'm no doctor and I can't possibly address all of those here even if I researched it. If you're minding your diet, getting at least two and a half hours of quality exercise a week, taking meds for your conditions, then you're already further ahead than I was when I had to build up to my current superpowers. I suppose I can't just assume it's common knowledge, but your creative health is dependent on your physical and mental health. You can't have one without the others.

The rest? It's largely about creating more healthy habits, these pertaining specifically to your goals.

1) Eliminate distractions.

Some of the things you've sworn are inspiration are purely distraction. That music that fills you with the valor of a Valkyrie. That favorite show that's given you great ideas for what you're working on. I do often work with my TV on, but it's also not the latest episode of a show I'm actively watching or even something particularly interesting. Usually low volume creates a pleasant white noise, but I keep the remote in reach to Mute as soon as I realize my ears are pulling towards it too much.

'White noise' is actually better creative therapy for some-- I personally love the sound of my fish tank filter running, a fan blowing, and the clock ticking on the wall. For some, the clock is way too indicative of passing time, too marked, so this isn't one I'd say is universal. I'm aware that some people can study to heavy metal/thrash music as well, but I'm sound-sensitive. Even my own choice of music is something I can only enjoy at certain volume levels depending on mood.

It's perfectly fine to get distracted, but if you often find that it's not producing anything outside of procrastination and feelings, then you need to note the risk and either substitute it with something more meaningful to your goals or just get rid of it. I like to work in relative silence most of the time. I do keep playlists of music without English words or any language at all but those are mostly something I enjoy on breaks rather than ever use while writing.

2) If you can't eliminate, turn it into inspiration.

Many of the sounds and sights in life are unavoidable but they don't have to terminate creative processes. I've raised my nephews so I know kids can be a big weight on how efficient you can work. It's VERY difficult to get into a flow state when kids seem to both have the worst timing and a need for attention, no matter how independent they are. There were definitely stages where creativity had to come in stolen moments until they were older. It was an odd mix of depressing and educating. I learned to become both patient and opportunistic.

Get your 'distractions' involved, however you can. Even if you're not writing kids' books, there are universal ideas and even fresh quirks that kids can offer your stories. If your neighbors are assholes, then maybe loud music is something you adapt to in order to drown out that annoyance. No matter what distractions must be dealt with, part of the creative process often extends beyond the work itself and is tested in how you handle life. You don't have to be 'normal' to work around what challenges you. Facing fears and doubts is how we drown them out. I'm never going to be comfortable in crowds but I do it anyway because, seriously, fuck all the things that stop you from what you really want in life. My ability to take risks is directly related to the very specific goal of why I'm doing it.

3) Admiration can be your key to turning passive planning into action.

When you tell friends, like me, that you admire me and wish you could do it, I'll almost instantly reply with 'you can.' Okay, maybe you can't have my exact level of talent nor reap the rewards of that hard work, but you already have something you can build from but you probably haven't actually tested it. I can 'do it' so it's not something only the neurotypical get to enjoy. Given, I could easily do so much more without it that I'd give it up in a heartbeat. It's not supreme focus that got me here. It's not pure passion that keeps me going. It's not even goals. I trained myself over time to change damaging impulses into productivity.

In the same way you can instantly turn the urge to party into calling up your friends to see who wants to go, you can start phoning up your mental desires. By all means, admire away, but don't just stay wistful over what you wish for. Seriously ask what it would take to do it. If it's not a hobby, start there. If it is, what would it take to take the next step? Pull out a notebook and crack open the web browser on your computer and start taking those advice lists and cherry picking what appeals. When your approach fails, there are tons more to pick next. As it turns out, some of those undesirable options from previous searches might turn into the one you love. I hated vector drawing when I first tried it. Now, it's one of my favorite ways to draw when my wrists act up.

A lot of people are overwhelmed by the idea of mastery. Mastery isn't about focus, at least not entirely. It's more often about flexibility. When the best tools aren't available, do you know how to work another way? What people most often admire is results. To get results, you often have to trudge through a lot of unconventional fixes to power through. The most flawless results are the product of great effort. People often admire what they aren't doing, but they'll develop an even greater admiration and appreciation when they actually try it for themselves. Being a mentor or involved in someone else's process is magical, but don't put your own efforts on the back burner too often.

4) Don't fixate on schedules.

You know I'm not fond of 'don't's but this is a big one, especially when you're first starting out. If you're not gifted with laser focus the minute you sit down, you might find it immediately frustrating when your mind goes blank. Go ahead and unfocus your eyes. If your brain just hums, well, I count that as blessing. At one time, I might have panicked when my brain did that, but it's also an intuitive form of meditation. Don't force thoughts into the space just because you decide it's time. Inaction is not an immediate sign of failure. If that's the part that doesn't sit right, remember Jack Torrence's carelessly typed 'all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy' in The Shining. If you need to get your fingers going, do it that way. Another idea-- don't have a clock in view or even in reach (my own ticking clock is not in immediate view). If you like to use alarms to time breaks or other priorities, keep it out of reach. Getting up to get it is a marker of putting your work down. Most computers have a customization option for turning off the onboard clock too. Even if you want to try a schedule method, there's no reason you should let time bully you into thinking you're taking up precious chunks of it. Trust me; once you get going, those brain fogs are going to be easily forgotten.

5) Stop when you want to keep writing.

You're going to need to take breaks or address unavoidable distractions at times. Keep a notepad or a note app handy at all times so you can jot down what you want to tackle when moving ahead, but keep in mind that lack of focus can happen even when the getting is good; more so when you've neatly wrapped up a big idea. Engaging focus can be largely solved by just wanting to continue badly enough. Do as many of the things you've discovered to be helpful in the past as often as you can.

But you can't put it down when it gets good! Yes, that's a discipline too. No one actually wants to, but I've found that even the most vivid ideas only get better when you can't get to them right away. However, don't let desire come in the way of taking care of yourself. If you keep putting that creative place first, your mental and physical well-being will degrade. Yes, mentally too. Because physical stress and mental health are directly related, not taking those breaks, not minding your body's need will bite you on the ass. Your metabolism can take blows that are difficult if not impossible to fix easily. I once crocheted so often that I developed a condition called trigger thumb. Because I thought I could handle marathon creative sessions, I ended up unable to use that hand for six weeks.

Carpal tunnel syndrome used to be a painful re-occurrence, but after wrist braces, corrective habits and mindful use to avoid agitating it, I can mostly forget it's there (on occasion, I agitate it by playing on a tablet too long, but if you've ever been hit by a carpal tunnel flare-up, there's no mistaking it and you immediately quit what caused it).

Don't wait until you have to stop. Don't always think that pushing it makes it better. I've read that there are actually only about 3-5 hours a day in which we are optimally productive (less prone to mistakes and on point). There's not a 'go' light on when it starts and being high-energy isn't an indication. High-energy can be restless energy so it's more likely to be a zen state you're looking for. Even then, if you can quit prior to a climactic point, the chances are higher you'll hit the ground running when you come back. Even if you've only written or worked an hour before you reach it. It's worth the risk to feel this one out.

6) Don't focus.

(Again, with the 'don't'...) Counterproductive? Maybe. What's the point? Getting to it. If in the middle of creative flow, you would rather jump ship to draw the cool animal you just thought of or you've thought of what would be amazing in some other story you're not working on, embrace it. I've come to firmly believe that discipline is not restricted to the one thing you tell yourself you should be doing (something I bring up over and over, I know). Restless moments sometimes require restless solutions. I have a yoga ball that I enjoy using as a desk chair on occasion. Useless for drawing, but I type rather well while bouncing. As far as drawing goes, I never see mistakes until I walk away from it several thousand times. Sometimes I see the big picture, sometimes I'm overly fixated on the weirdest details. The creative brain is meant to benefit from that volatility. Remember that you will have an editing phase. Editing has become my holy city. However, if you don't feel that way...

7) Do puzzles.

One of the way I've learned to organize my brain is to take advantage of visual puzzles. Jigsaw, brain teasers, word games, stacking-- doesn't matter which one, but these are all repetitive disciplines that you never solve the same way twice. Wasting a good half hour on puzzles is a phenomenal way to fake focus. This does tend to work better for women, but my grandfather is a huge fan of crosswords and my dad likes quiz shows. In order to trigger intellectual structure, the visual engagement is damn near a failsafe. Some writers do image searches to create inspirational collages, but even the most abstract sorting can stimulate a solid bout of focus.

I once had a college prep course that focused on what kind of 'learner' you are. While it's been flagged as a pseudo-science since (much like the Jungian based Myers-Briggs typing), some people often insist they are more auditory, visual, haptic, etc. I'm not big on listening so I can tell you that's not a strong suit, but most people respond splendidly to a mix of hands-on and visual, which is why puzzles are so useful. Even if your hand-eye coordination is abysmal, puzzle games tend to sharpen it due to muscle memory being linked to specific tasks.

Puzzles don't immediately demand a skill level and also ease you into a sense of accomplishment. Even when you absolutely can't solve it, you tend to mull over that problem. Learning the answer is something you rarely forget either. I can tell you the words I lost with in grade-school spelling bees-- if only because I was determined never to misspell them again. (Ulcer and whetstone, for the record-- not really common use words prior to middle school, but aggravatingly simple in retrospect.)

8) Be a tourist.

You could travel in earnest here, but this is more a nod to touching base with something more important than focus: being unsure in an unfamiliar place. It's a very stressful experience but one infused with excitement and possibility. When you think of the things you'd rather do but are repeatedly not doing them until you remember it randomly at three AM... It's time to travel. Think of those excited tourists not paying attention while snapping tons of pictures with the attention span of a squirrel. Let it be an exciting state of being. I realize this very much lines up with turning distractions into inspiration, but think of this as the next half step. Don't make this sentiment about focusing on work at all, simply gathering the experiences that make it irresistible to talk about it later.

I come across this time and again, but can't stress it enough. Productivity includes wandering. If you haven't heard Tolkien's famous quote 'Not all who wander are lost.' Even if you are technically lost, perception is more important. I wandered away from home when I was 3 years old. To panicked adults, I was lost, but I remember it differently.

I felt transient twinges of fear, wonder, curiosity, a sense of independence quite striking for a 3 year old. I still remember clutching the book (titled Snow) and my favorite My Little Pony in a patchwork sundress and puffing up as I passed Scary Tree. When I walked past it with Mommy before, I cringed and hid behind her leg, but this time all I had was my word-shield and trusty steed. Somehow, it made all the difference that day.

Find some moment of childhood curiosity. Use it to help you unlearn what productivity is. At some point, the things that formed you, that fed your imagination, were idle things. As a creative, you sometimes have to tour idly through your spaces, feel around in the dark before you turn it into a moment you can share. Creatives don't really have vacations. What might appear inactive is something we have to let people criticize for lack of understanding. Enjoy your secret smiles, sudden laughter and resting bitch face while you slip in and out of those thought processes you'll use later.

9) Do everything else.

You knew we were heading here; admit it. There is nothing more irresistible than doing something else intentionally when you actually can focus. Krista, seriously; I'm focusing and NOW you're telling me to play hard to get? Yup. Sometimes you know when you can take this risk, so go for it. On occasion, this perfectly envisioned scene only goes to nth levels beyond that when you dangle the carrot. I saved this one for last because this is something I'd save for master levels of discipline. It might take a really great day, a higher than usual energy level (again, energy isn't a sole indicator), but even a half hour of circling the prey can lead to a spectacular kill in your ability to focus. Deprivation is along the lines of absence making the heart grow fonder. Just don't push that muse too far. Another risk you must be aware of is that absence also creates the opportunity the other pieces may abandon you.

It's a process needing great care. How long can you fast before you trigger starvation? You don't truly know you've gone too far sometimes until the penalty hits. Whether you neglect focus or demand it too much, creating the balance is NOT about creating the ideals. People are groomed in modern times to fear things outside of their control and for people like me, it makes you very sick to try.

Control is an illusion. If you haven't seen the movie Instinct with Sir Anthony Hopkins and Cuba Gooding Jr., do this now. There are situations where control isn't possible and ramming your head into the wall doesn't make the wall crumble. You do have SOME control and it is over how you handle and respond to things, how you react to stimuli. Before I learned to balance diet, exercise, negativity, I was hypersensitive in none of the good ways. It's not control that made me better, but flexibility. I didn't restrict my diet, enforce exercise and sleep, etc. I based even that on its availability and probability.

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As a good friend of mine said, self-publishing is the way of the future. It's one way creatives are deciding for themselves how their work is most beneficial. Traditional may be experienced for a market, but self-publishing inspires those who work differently, shows that their methods might actually be more beneficial to the work itself. We learn to become entrepreneurs and can prioritize which aspects to handle ourselves or who to give jobs to. Like any option, it can and will be abused, but we are also giving readers more freedom to choose the content they want to see, free from the bullying of literary selection. Our focus is limited only by our choices.

That's scary too, for many people. That because these are our choices, we have only ourselves to blame. Personally, that's a huge breath of fresh air for me. In almost every instance where I was quick to blame someone else, I denied myself a valuable lesson in how I could have handled it differently. When some aspect of my work is not its best, people address me directly and it is something I can improve on. I don't just guiltily sit on my hands and say I have no clue/power to fix it or learn from it.

My blog posts can often be unfocused, but natural thought is hardly a neat and pretty process. Lists are about as close as you can get to reining yourself into the subjects at hand. Nothing wrong with not having some profound point. In most stories, we all latch onto very different aspects. I've read things that have rocked my foundation apart while others reading the same thing were unmoved. That's also a point on the subject of focus. Finding the focus of your story is not a linear path. You're not playing by the same rules of any other job and you don't need to satisfy the requirements of anyone observing you. Sometimes your ally in your fight for focus is embracing your inner squirrel.

It's stolen moments. And a lot of forgotten acorns that spawn many a forest.

Floor Plans: Movies to Books to Movies

Graphic design school, for all of its ups and downs, is worth it. There are three disciplines that I fell in love with that, oddly enough, have nothing to do with writing and only kind of use drawing-- package design, environmental design and... Well, I'm dropping the formality and just being blunt with 'floor plans.'

While I wouldn't say 3D spaces necessarily prove difficult in memory, it's more like they become 4D spaces akin to Portal where blue doors teleport you to orange doors and provide factually impossible movement. Even in my case, this is in a world where teleporting exists, just not everywhere it's convenient for me to pretend like I meant to do it.

It works both ways-- sometimes I'm seeing it unfold like a movie and my eyes are twitching unfocused as all the visuals are happening in my brain; sometimes the space is immediately a problem and I need a floor plan before my characters start trashing the place. Planning and pantsing, as you may know, can come in any order. Some writers can lean heavily either way, but being able to discern what your stories need is more important than deciding which 'type' you are. I'd save those distinctions for internet quizzes you take while shamelessly procrastinating on actually writing.

Why choose when you can be both?

Floor planning was hardly just a college discovery though. I vaguely recall my mom going to school for computer aided design and drafting just before I was old enough to start school myself. When I say 'computer aided', think more along the lines of a glorified calculator. Black screens, glo-green pixellated words. They were more like graphing calculators where you coded coordinates and watched as hitting Return drew out those lines on the screen for you (because it wasn't instantaneous). In fact, they were still using computers like that when I took a typing class in the early 90s. My mom had to buy these design stencil sheets to use-- triangle and square rulers and... Furniture. That was the one my little brain loved most. Little odd shaped stencil punchouts clearly labeled 'couch' and 'vanity' etc. I didn't really set out designing floor plans right then, but those stencils sparked an interest in shapes beyond the strictly geometric variety.

You should always have a lot of toilet shapes to choose from.

Fast forward back to years later when I'm actually writing AND finishing books. The first time I was tempted to make a visual aid for an interior space was at the end of my third book. There's a cottage that the new owner is settling into, awkwardly, and they were milling around in it, restlessly. I didn't want to go into every detail (which is an exercise I abandoned long ago-- great for creative writing or truly fantastical environments on occasion, yet naught but long-winded ego trips-- I'll elaborate on why as I go here).

At first, planning was just about the space, cardinal directions... How could I maneuver people through a building of many floors without sounding like a GPS? 'they turned north at .035 miles...' Even if you're writing a first-person story, the usual narrative blend of what they see and what they think could become tedious if you're just typing it out unplanned. Moving through an interior space gives you two starting points to expand the visualization: simple and complex. In a simple arrangement (think: single floor, efficiency apartment), you can start from the room or rooms you're working with. It's usually not architecturally impressive, but could have considerations concerning windows, doors, whether it's on the corner of the structure and what's below or above it that could be used. Simple starts with immediate needs and may not need to expand beyond them.

This is a simple room in a hotel suite. I didn't need too many details, just a basic idea.

Now, I know I've gone into floor plans before, but the complexities can get more complicated from there. Let's say you need a whole castle or some Byzantine wonder of architecture. That would be the complex. Not just on scale but also in deciding what is useful. Even just plotting a particular wing. I've known many a D&D DM that enjoys either using or making their own maps for campaigns and it is usually something that, unprepared, requires a couple-hour break even done roughly.

This would be a larger chunk of the same hotel. 

Now, in my 'complex' example, this hotel floor is considered ground level in the back where it goes out to the garden but the ground around it actually drops at points from back to front to make it seem like the entrance is one floor up from the front, a grand ballroom kind of entrance. Where you see the stage extend to the outside, it's actually built for the stage to be accessible with an outside facade and that terrace is also level. The side garden may be something I plot sooner or later, since the drops will include stairs and need to consider the landscape around it. It's a private luxury hotel so access to the gardens is restricted by a wall/fence boundary either way. Where the 'office' is you see an arch, which is actually a patio that goes down into the dropped front level. The office, while shaped by the main hallway, isn't accessible from it (there's an unmarked area to its left that is actually the lobby entrance; the office belongs to the hotel owner. I will add these details later). The ballroom is the main stage of the story but the kitchen is mentioned in passing. What I had to plan for was the secret hallway between the office and the ballroom as well as the layout of the ballroom itself.

What I definitely didn't want to do was work out such details within the story. It's not first-person and even in that case, the event itself would not allow for leisurely inspection.

You start with blocking in rooms as you need them (keeping in mind the shape of the building if needed). I usually do the floor plan on its own layer and lock it once set up. That way I can draw directly on it without disturbing those elements.

The next step is to take the floor plan at large and start making furniture assets. Doing this digitally, I start a new layer, (lock the floor plan layer!) and label the new one 'assets'. I sometimes reuse simple shapes and my 'key' often distinguishes those objects by color, as you've seen from the pictures. I'm using a bird's eye view so most objects are fine with generic geometric shapes. Occasionally, I'll resort to vector drawing to do curved benches, marvelous fountains, door indicators. These are the things that will help you integrate the environment without having to explain every detail. When the character enters through the southernmost door, they might notice the sudden vault of ceilings, but due to the layout of plants arranged around a massive center element (maybe a statue or fountain) there is more around it that they won't see but you need to mentally stage anyway.

If you're pantsing, this is where ego and excitement can make the draft come off as a creative writing exercise. Oh, there's a bookshelf over there with the tiniest of knick-knacks, how cute, and a grandfather clock! Oh, but the pendulum isn't working and-- what was I talking about again? You can be as fascinating with detail as you want but at some point, it may become difficult to distinguish what is building the mood and what is just prose that you're overly fond of.  And yes, I DO want to discover rooms like I'm just walking into them. However, the floor plan provides the basis of where my eyes are jumping around to, glazing over to sink into the scene, but pulling back to ask-- wait, didn't I just put a bookcase where there is already a couch? No matter how cinematic your brain is, it is also malleable with some details when 'something better' comes along. I like to eliminate the need for contradictions and story-damaging prose this way.

A few hours of planning can save you many more hours of outlining, style sheets and critical edits to catch those mistakes.

What I love most about my floor plans is that they often start out architecturally clean then can become a clutter of 'more assets' as I add more colored symbols that represent where someone might have left a sword or put down their poisoned drink. I can move these mobile assets and turn my imagination into a gameboard for strategy. I can choreograph fights that use the space and plan secret rooms and escape routes. I could do it before well enough but there's a solid confidence that I can better translate the space if I'm seeing how everything fits in it.

I wouldn't go so far as to say I consider scale very carefully. If I were a set designer, I certainly would but as a writer, shape and location are primary concerns. On occasion, I do make some adjustments for a sort of scale, but in most cases, the exact distance can be left to the imagination. Even the height of characters is mostly figurative. If I establish a female character as average height then a 'tall' female might come in as a head taller and a towering male two heads or more. The exacts might make it into a character dossier, but I'll use those in the same way as I do the floor plans-- to create figurative comparisons that minimize an info-dump.

Some writers might excuse it as their style or preference but it often becomes transparent that planning and editing was second to showing off their ability to describe all the things. As I've said, sometimes there's mystique in describing clutter and architecture but more often, I just see it as an attempt at depth that pads the ego but does little to nothing for the story. Some readers may like that kind of prose but since I am not one to soldier through that kind of padding, I try to minimize it or at least do a bit of pre-planning to minimize it. My audience will have plenty to do as I cut a path through these worlds-- belaboring it wouldn't do it much credit.

There's only so much I can do to show you why a visual aid like this can be valuable to a writer so I may do a video (just screen capping while I talk over it) and link it in later. I'm angling for a day when I don't have to run a noisy air conditioner so I can at least plan a video in the next two weeks. I hate doing videos where I'm talking to a camera but I can most likely at least be audible enough to pull off a screen-cap video. I've always wanted to do some tutorials that way so I'll see what I can come up with.

I have a few sketches in notebooks of floor plans and I did a library design for a class in school-- I'll add those below in an edit if I can dig those out. You don't really need ridiculous technical skill to pull this off. Hell, I've even used D&D maps for visualizations. These are more for your reference, but if you ever do want to put a professional on designs you can publish, then even a chicken scratch version with relevant text from the story is sufficient.

Writing a book is seldom about one aspect of imagination, no matter how focused you are. It's more often a combination of lofty goals. There's nothing wrong with picturing it as a video game or a movie, but if you are writing it as a book, make sure that you are using methods that work best for that medium. If you have some great idea for the movie/game version, keep it in a separate notebook. While some authors sign off on creative control, you may find you have the opportunity to be involved and your notes become canon to the new medium. Or you can keep these elements for a blog or website or an AMA/Q&A type fun-fact. Just as you might spark curiosity for sequels, there might be elements that are best withheld for baiting or teasing. Personally, I love when there's more to discover outside of the book world. I can appreciate when authors continue world-building and dreaming of their worlds. My love affair with my own worlds and characters doesn't stop when I hit Publish. All the little extra bits still wiggle and move beyond it.

Planning Extravagance

Da Vinci is credited to have said that art is never finished, only abandoned. In truth, who said it doesn't matter so much as the sentiment. Because there is ALWAYS something more to be done, it's just as true that there is a time to move to another phase, let it go, share it. 

Control is another point of dispute. There's no cushy line between the claim that 'the author is too controlling and I wanted to imagine it for myself' and ''his might as well be Mad Libs for all the holes in this story!'. 

What if you're using the wrong medium? I covered an answer on Quora that took on video game dreamers for misguidedly translating that idea into a novel.

It could drive you mad, scraping through a story too much. I suppose. I've read my own work more times than I've read any favorite author, so I court madness with open arms. Not just to edit but I've gotten sucked into my words and worlds time and again when I was supposed to be editing. Planning itself can be a siren call into restructuring what might have been nearing completion.

It happens. Embrace it. I'm still on the task of typing out perfectly legible notes. And not word for word. I'm catching inconsistencies in the plans and is it EVER easier to correct a typed document than the battlefield my handwritten copies would become.

It's a beautiful thing, really. To visit a world, even knowing what comes next and feeling differently about it. Sometimes you cringe at a little mistake or you think of something better or you want to change it. That's where publishing seems scary to some of the never-ending creatives out there. If you really feel ten years is what your series needs, ten years it is. If you're ready to set it loose after a few months, do it.

I'm really enjoying this planning though. It's all for UnHeard when UnSung is still in progress. Yet UnHeard is my NaNo baby, so I'm setting it up to fly. Planning can benefit from extra sometimes. As a teen, it was all about different color pens. Even now, switching to a designated tool for a designated task can be motivational to the process. 

Visit your worlds as many times as it takes. It is never finished and it never needs to be.  The art is about flexibility and the need to return. For writers and readers alike. No matter how airtight and done to death it is, a fan can tirelessly both spot flaws and create reimaginings. Even 'ship' characters, which is a term I won't use often because, while the origin story is cute, the concept itself is applied so thick that it's about as unoriginal as another overused word 'love'.

Heyyyy, let's shoot the shit with that one since I'm here... I almost obsessively avoid using 'love' directly when lovers are confessing their feelings. One of my favorites comes from two characters in the third trilogy of my first series. It tickles me because it's an obvious avoidance and a simple truth, but you know it means 'I love you.' In fact, it becomes an endearment, an emotional running joke between them. Lol if it were anyone else's work, I'd tell you their names and what they said, but at this point, I'm a newly published author and I hesitate to run the risk of my blog being the equivalent of a movie trailer that spoils the best parts.

I love writing romances where there is light teasing and quick jabs of tension. Some fantasies keep romance on the side of solemn and intense. The Arwen-Aragorn romance was a big one there. I've never liked seeing love from the 'til-death-do-us-part angle. I won't just brush it off as being done to death, but there are so many books I've read where confessing love or marrying was the height of the story. Or having a child. I won't deny that those are exciting moments for many people, but ultimately it came off as depressing that these very isolated events were given more weight than than the ACT of falling in love through a rich plot, what it takes to make a marriage work or even the beauty of raising a human being into a good person (or the horror of them becoming an inherently bad one). I have never seen love as a quick prize.

Even some romance novels that attempt to make a rich plot, the MAIN plot often still makes the confession the central point of the story. Maybe this is what most romance readers DO want, but when I started reading books where romance was a subplot, it was noticeably richer to me than poetic descriptions of eyelashes and dimpled smirks in books solely focused on it. I might be an odd one here, but romance isn't my favorite genre for romance. I like a lot of cat and mouse, but the juicy kind where the cat catches the mouse but toys with it to give chase again. Some erotica is annoyingly framed as romance so when I realize the plot is lame, it becomes a hunt for the sexy parts, where all the effort was placed. Yes, erotica can have a great plot, but that makes erotica the SUBplot. If you frame a book as romance primarily, I don't even have high expectations for plot. Still, it can't be boring. Even when I want light and trashy, I want to care about it. More often, I say I want romance to be a subgenre, even fifth on the subgenre list because I don't want solid expectations of it being there. I like when it's present. I enjoy the building intimacy and the private insights. At the same time,  I want to see its fragility, know that it can be cut short, know that it might not be returned, or even be passing or not strong enough with other temptation. I plan my own story's romances as carefully as my world building. If it's going to be there, I need to care.

And hey, some people want romance to be insinuated or absent. That doesn't make me hesitate to tackle it if I'm feeling the vibe as part of the story. I can't really help you. Despite or maybe because of its absence in my life, romance will always have a place in the story. Because I'm not fading to black when there's a veritable gold mine of character development (or fun) to be had.

One of the oddest kinds of comments I see in reading groups is along the lines of how much of a thing is generally accepted as okay. Can you poll that? Lol it doesn't stop people from trying. How much _____ do you like in a story? If you like all or nothing, every time, then you're an easy one. When I see these, I input 84% just to throw a wrench in the logic. There isn't a magic number when something is liked. In fact, someone's claim that they've NEVER seen _____ written in a way they like so they avoid it... Often makes me want to try. Not FOR them, but because I embrace the challenge of truly enjoying reading and writing on prompt. I wouldn't say that I aim to be the one who does it right. Most people who think in black and white will never ever try that disliked topic again. I don't doubt they'll still find plenty to read so that they can easily avoid every attempt to expand their thinking on it. They can have that. However, it's still backwards thinking to have not read anything in that category in decades and still make the claim there can't possibly be anything worthwhile. When they can't even frame an opinion as such, that opinion is usually as shallow as their ability to communicate it.

A guarded opinion is often external (this work is awful) as opposed to a more honest opinion actually focusing on their impression (this wasn't to my taste). I've always found that technical critiques can be external, focusing on grammar, punctuation, style, whereas using that same tact on opinion is always where it comes off as dishonest. I believe that some reviewers probably think it sounds stronger or more professional to leave out personal pronouns and impressions. To change 'I think' or 'I believe' into more definite points (this IS or ISN'T). In fact, it's often used in advertising because it's supposed to sound more confident. ('this product changed my life' as opposed to 'I really feel like this product improved this specific task'.) I'm going to disagree though. To me, bold assertions always sparked my skepticism, had me running to research it myself. Does it work? In advertising, the numbers would say yes. However, most people have neither the actual skill to reframe an opinion (to use actors as a scapegoat for something they never directly said) nor the ability to defend it fully. It is often parroted the same way every time, with no new additions, or extremely cherry picked examples (even to the point of purposely omitting knowledge of an exception).

I think I've found a few things to babble on about well enough so I'll return to planning. Got my notes typed out and printed today. Condensed and refined to nine pages. I have the series-arching plot arching over the subs, the book main plot (each one has a pivotal main character or two and a focus on one God and region), character planning, regional development (some idea of the map), and several of the micro systems planned. I also have a sort of running bestiary, but I need to play with a map. The scope is somewhat 3D like one of my locations in UnSung so it will need a top-down plan. These are just aids for me, nothing I'd ever publish (unless by some weird turn of fate there's ever a demand). Mostly done though. I'm excited to start it, even while finishing UnSung.

For some people who fancy themselves novelists, I wouldn't be surprised if some are actually most in love with planning. Those are the sorts of jobs that are harder to land and do start with a solid display of completed writing. I sit in the middle, the pantser that digs big holes and then plans. I'm not afraid of the holes though. I find a lot of comfort in them. They're puzzles I'm happy to solve. Even in a dark story, I find it cheering to get down to the critical fixes.

UnSung can be pretty dark. I wouldn't say grimdark or dystopian but still goes place light doesn't. Grimdark is really about the focus of narration. In fact, I'd love to try a cheerful narration of a dystopia. It's even been done! Twilight Zone had the infamous episode where a guy with a nagging wife and a joyless job finds joy in hiding in the vault of the bank where he works to read. Cut to nuclear destruction and he's the last man alive. It breaks cheerfully into him carefully gathering and sorting every book he can find, his face distorting with a happiness he'd never known before as he plans what to read next. Of course, he's severely nearsighted so it's a cruel turn of fate when his glasses fall off his face and break. For a loner, a solitary world seems ideal until you meet the grim realization that at some point, you depend on society to support the simplest of luxuries. What is a world without the passions most dear to you?

Of course, I'm not even going for the grim reality with my view though. What if survival isn't quite as bad as you think? What if you are actually good at it and the survivors aren't all morally bankrupt or zombies? I wanted to like you, Walking Dead... I really did. Can someone let me know if they ever actually decide to go to Washington DC to see if the virus center is even a thing? Because really, that was what kept me sticking around a few seasons longer than I should have. I assumed they'd wouldn't just keep escalating with a group sicker than the last and actually have an aim again. At some point, I didn't even care who died anymore because they all sucked.

Planning= Laziness

The header is not a personal rule or even an exception. It's Switzerland (neutral, for the younger ones). I have actually been less goal-oriented over the past few weeks while calling it planning. It has none of the structure of an actual workflow. It's far from being reliable but it's had some unforeseen boons nonetheless.

In fact, even my usually unusable dreams have actually been game for inspiration. One particularly weird one has become the outline for a chapter or two of the YA Steampunk Fantasy novel I've been poking at for the past few years. I've always pictured this series as something straddling real-life places (the kind of places that are damn near magical in reality) and sinking into the completely surreal. Glassy metropolitan streets, quaint cafes, and suburban sprawls to remind the reader that extraordinary people come through humble places too. A bonus to me because it will involve some couch tourism, finding some hidden gems of human invention, research and mind expansion on a budget.

Which is part of the problem. I'm used to creative bursts having a sedentary quality. It's also why I've made walking at least 8 hours a week a mandatory part of my routine. However, 'planning' is something I usually pair with something more active because of its tendency to create complacency in productivity. I don't stare at a blank page and force the muse to get busy so it mostly relies on inspirational spurts rather than an active effort. It's nothing like just throwing words into the big project or even taking notes of what might work later if I make a note to try to aim for that development now. I wander away from the writing and start doodling.

It's not wholly unproductive but it can feel that way. There's a sense of ennui in looking for inspiration, oddly enough. It's a background contribution so it's less visible but it's still a backbone in the machine so I've given it credit there. However, a YouTube search for a general idea can easily lead to hours of watching videos that have nothing to do with my story goals. Hey, some off-the-road wandering can lead to inspiration but some, I have to admit, do not in the slightest.

Focus does not come easy for me. When I do find the magical all-in activity, I am single-minded to the task. Planning is a bit of a nemesis there because it actually plays the devil's advocate against my intentions, encouraging unfocused, capricious wandering. Again, I can get lucky and stumble on a focused and usable train of thought, but more often, I get the retrospective feeling of derailment.

Regret? No. Trying something new comes with rough edges and delayed productivity. However, it's a shiny new object that may become a valuable tool. Even if I never get comfortable with it, those are the lessons that stick. Things that work almost become too comfortable so we more keenly remember the things that threw wrenches in the works. Avoiding the same pitfalls is a skill too. 

I wouldn't say this planning phase was a lost cause. Not just because of the usable dream. Not even because it did give me the ability to learn to relax my rigorous workflow. It had its pitfalls, but it was more akin to a good memory of my childhood. I kind of reverted back to my teenage years with the grabbing for notebooks, doodling and bursts of zaniness. It takes on a different flavor at this stage in my life, but I felt more connected to my long-term writing goals. This was always about creating the best stories possible. Ideas like improving my craft, studying structure and grammar, looking at the market-- those can murder and discourage the natural flow if I become too obsessed with it. They aren't unimportant, but they can't be allowed to supersede the main goal. Do I want a trendy conscientious choice or do I want to dig deeper and embrace the flaws and limitations unique to my experiences? 

The answer is clear to me. Edgy isn't taboo these days and I'm cheating myself to be too safe, to be too rigidly influenced. I don't want to be the next Tolkien or, pulling from a personal favorite, the next Garth Nix. Emulating success and the connection with the story is hugely tempting, but it tells me nothing about myself to go through the motions. It doesn't validate what I really find worthwhile. It doesn't truly dig out what else might influence me.

It's in the planning where I found this more strongly. I remembered more keenly the high of webbing a story, of staging characters and plots. I found a valuable place where blurbs were easy to pluck. If you must know what I consider a great weakness, it's blurbs. Simplifying the complex is something I already do as a writer, but blurbs are an insane condensing of all of it. One to three paragraphs to try to draw someone in. Yet it's in the planning where I just scribbled down "NAME: this wayward soldier sinks into life as a gambler only to run afoul of NAME when cheating in a high stakes game." When I read back all of these short character summaries, suddenly I was finding all of these effortless ways I had already described my characters that were both distinct and containing no actual spoilers. With such simplicity, I suddenly saw a value I had forgotten, a way to sift through my intimate knowledge of the story and pluck out the juicy bits.

Suddenly, it doesn't feel so wasteful or lazy.

See, sometimes in our road to 'expertise', we try to minimize waste, become more efficient, and streamline our time. However, even if you have to look at it like a vacation from your structure and schedules and word counts, find time for it.  The more complex your story, the more time you should 'waste' on playing with it. Some people find little snippets of time to do this while they're working even. Using a notepad app on your phone to jot down ideas, for one. All the same, at some point you will have to take that jumble and comb it into a story, which will appear to be passive and simple (when we all know it's not).

I've said before that modern times really put the screws on the competition to overwork yourself harder than the next person. Creativity isn't an assembly line, it's not a neat to-do list (although it can be, depending on the medium/genre), and it's not an area that profits from a hamster wheel mentality. It's a mental exercise in flexibility and it can run dry or come gushing. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to take advantage of how it presents. It's no wonder that so many creatives juggle projects. We've gathered a sense of what state each project benefits from.

All in all, there's a real need to get defensive when someone actually sees planning as procrastinating or laziness. Even if we're not actually guilty of that, it can get under your skin. If you find it empowering to defend yourself, then look at it objectively and calmly explain the way it benefits your work. Don't be caught unaware and have to scramble for the answer. They don't have to understand, no matter how well you've thought it out. Some people are ONLY trying to get under your skin. It's perfectly fine to tell someone to fuck off when you can tell they're being bitter or condescending.

Remember, most people attribute creativity to their younger years, bailing before harsh criticism was something they truly understood. They remember every picture going on the fridge, every story being saved in a memory book. At some point, they started comparing themselves to others and never really faced the abyss of taking the blows and the determination to improve despite that.

In truth, over the past five years, I haven't really dealt with the people around me throwing that kind of negativity at me. I did wade through family and friends ridiculing what they thought of as a hobby and I also stuck it out and changed minds (and tossed out the toxic ones). My own determination had to carry me through adversity, through education, through frustration and hard realities, but at no point was any defeat fatal to my goals. At first, they too saw it as laziness so I remember how raw that guilt could be. However, my portfolio and photo albums kept growing, my plans started to come to completion, and there was no denying that I was seeing many sleepless nights and long days to meet my goals.

Plan away, at risk of being seen as lazy. Your peers know it's bullshit. Even if you can't really escape a toxic environment, keep plugging away according to what methods work. We all do self-checks to weigh whether we're procrastinating or stalling and sometimes we're guilty. Sometimes, we. Are. Planning.

NaNoWriMo Prep!

Whether you're a pantser or a planner (or both, like myself), NaNoWriMo is worth some planning. Since my laptop charger went kaput, planning is the more palatable part of writing for me right now, but I'm not going to assume everyone is going into this already knowing what they're doing.

First of all, if you're doing it, add me now. AbsentGoddess. I'll be a cheerleader and an ear throughout the event, no exceptions! I love interacting and helping out fellow writers.

As for the topic (yup, still here!), this isn't just a good time to plan the book itself, but a good time to set up your page (sometimes they have a queue for new accounts so at least knock that out ASAP). Pick your user name and password and click through the links to see how badge work. Some you can 'award' yourself, some are milestones that go through when you claim your word count. It's an honesty based system so you can lie... But there's actually gratification in doing the work, so at least try.

(In the name of nabbing the winner's discounts, I do suggest fudging your winner count if you want the discounted programs at the end. I have no doubt you'll reach the word count eventually, so you're at least a runner-up in my book.)

What else? Go to the My Novel section. If you haven't planned this, it might be a good time to play here. Pick a title, a genre, and a 'cover image'. Write a synopsis, plug in an excerpt if you have one. Most people who reach the word count did so because they plugged in these details that made the whole thing feel more tangible and attainable. All of these details can be changed at any time. Change your mind. Continue a partial draft of something else. Write five short stories. NaNoWriMo isn't about quality. The focus is on quantity because the point is developing habits, methods and creative flow cognition. There are after-camps for refinement so let this be your opportunity to challenge yourself not to self-edit.

**Prepping is mostly about seeing what is available on-site, getting familiar with any changes, building your buddy list and checking out guest writers. You'll get personal messages and site-wide messages of encouragement during the event. Make the most of it so you can decide your plan of action and focus.**

I won't lie. I self-edit. But I also attempt to stick it out for the word count goal. It's actually simpler than you think if you do it in the spirit intended. Ideally, you're going to just aim for the best output. 

If you're a 1K word per hour writer at best, this should be where you aim to race for that goal. I believe the average word count per day sets your minimum daily count at 1,666 words (1,667, if you have some superstition about three sixes in a row). Assuming you having a full-time job then an hour and a half of free flow writing is probably a pipe dream during the work week. Set up your deficits for weekends. If you only nail half of the minimum each day, then you're looking at some modest chunks of hours to catch up on weekends. 

Too much? Give yourself an early bump. Again, it's an accountability system that doesn't get suspicious if you claim 50K words on the first day. If 50K words in one month isn't possible, consider starting a couple weeks/month early and maybe claiming the 10K-20K you prepped with.

I've never seen this community look down on anyone for 'cheating' or 'lying'. Some people adhere to the strictness for their own goals but ultimately, this is only about writers writing. It's about encouraging everyone to start that one book they swear they have inside them. Poets, fanfic afficionados, short story writers all participate (so even the Novel-Writing part is not a rule). This is more like a writing camp where the content, the criticism, the confidence-- none of it matters. We're in it for the camaraderie, the challenge and the courage to begin! (Alliteration... Imagine that...)

Pass my name along to your circle of writers! I want to see new and old faces and keep up the tradition of passion for the craft. Also, feel free to subscribe to all of my social outlets and toss me yours. I've met some amazing people through these sorts of events and I'd love to keep that up.

For your convenience, you'll find all my links on the footer of my website HERE.

Ahhhh, I'm All Outta Posts!

I may or may not be able to catch up on post frequency this week. Phew, days oddly enough seem to pass more quickly in planning than pounding out on the story word count even.

Planning is fun though. Just planning relationships, intertwining plots, back stories... 

It's like being a hobby writer again and I missed it. I had fallen into a trap of thinking of it as a future career. I can't not think about the current impossibility of ever retiring (okay, slowing down). It's just as likely I'll never see old age (doesn't really bother me though). Writing has always been a pipe dream. I get to entertain the maybe of a career under special circumstances. The creative thing is just a part of me, regardless of whether it ever affords me any other comfort in life. I have this life of strange circumstances and responsibilities and this window where I can entertain the what-ifs, so I adapt.

There's a freedom in creativity and I messed up many times in the past by treating it like any other job. Just like I messed up thinking any job would do. I don't believe that anything was a waste. I might play what-ifs with my future but it's a dangerous practice to apply to the past. That often requires a visit through red alert places that are fuzzy for a reason. I have 'now' so I can't treat it like some serious investment. True, I create hoping to see it finished, but it has to matter 'now' more. It's not a job, not a hobby, not really a lifestyle either. It's so much 'other' that it needs its own path.

My mom once blurted out that she was happy doing nothing with her life. I might have tried to agree with her in the past but I was writing my first book series then and I shook my head and felt a smile tug at my lips. 

"Not me. Not anymore. Jobs can go to hell, but I need to have a purpose. Even if it's just to draw or write or daydream." 

"Or drink vodka!" 

"Yup, yup... That too. Because if I can't celebrate my purpose, what's the point?"

Mom was proud of me still, for shedding the modern shackles of other people's expectations, of developing talents that helped me grow into the self. Maybe those are the luxuries I needed. Not vacation time from work or raises or the things people think we're supposed to want. Sometimes, we simply labor to avoid our parents' mistakes. And end up landing on the same squares on the gameboard sometimes. After a while, it's less about doing 'better' and more about doing what's right for me.

It's not in me to live an idle life like my mom did. It's hard for people to get how active I am because I'm a house elf. I actually speed walk about 8-12 hours a week and I don't clean or cook unless everyone is asleep or I'm alone. I do it whether I'm in pain or not but I'd rather not have anyone see when I'm hurting when I push myself. I do HIIT workouts on the spur of the moment and bust out in kitchen yoga. Even people I live with are surprised by my results and output. I don't do a lot of 'progress shots' on social media either. Namely because the process is for me. Ha, until those results come, talking about it seems like lip service.

People can assume what they like-- about how 'smart' or hard I work, my work ethic, my activity level and my social prowess. As long as I love life, it's enough. Heh, and it's not easy. I was no less groomed into the benefits of a 9-5 contribution and sometimes I even pine for the security and simplicity. Until I remember what that was for me. I have different miseries and perks to this life and I swapped them for good reason.

Said it before but we don't owe people some show of misery to emphasize how hard we work. We're allowed to enjoy our jobs (although showing that REALLY gets managers on your case-- if you enjoy your job, you're definitely not working hard, right?). I'm going to keep taking a page from the jobs that I loved, the jobs that lasted, and I'll enjoy it. I'll wake up eager to do it. I'll take days off and still think about it fondly. I'll get pissed and frustrated sometimes but that's just how I work through problems.

I don't really have anything concrete to talk about. Just that I might not have content. Might get suddenly inspired, who knows? Story planning-- if that's where my days land for a while longer, I can't complain. I do have a lot of maybes and no shortage of things to play with.

As always, there's little I can say about my work. I protect it until it's released. So much changes anyway that I can't really commit to the bursts of content from the in-between. Lol really, it would probably be more confusing than helpful.

In any case, it's no biggie. I don't get a lot of traffic at this point and more often than not, it does take time out of the long list of more productive projects. I'm sure I'll be back to blogging when the whim strikes. Preferrably when I have something to talk about, not just idle reflections.

More isn't necessarily better. It's fine if you're fast, okay if you're slow-- no reason to force it as long as you're rolling along.