This week we started the second half of the year! I am hoping that many of you have picked up some energy, and have begun to once again work towards your goals and dreams. Over the years I have given you countless “ra-ra” posts about going out there, and knocking down obstacles and achieving your dreams. So instead of rehashing much of those posts, I wanted to get a bit more personal. I wanted to chat about how I create, what makes me write, and some of the obstacles I have had to overcome along the way. My hope is not that you walk away thinking how great I am (I’m not) but rather that you would come away inspired. Ready to take on the world! If I can do it, so can you!
It sits there staring back at me. Blinking unceasingly, daring me to go forward. Below it sits nothing, a vast white emptiness in which anything can happen. But nothing does. Nothing is happening. I am staring at the screen trying to get started and there is nothing. Fear grips my heart. What if that was it? What if I never have another story to tell? What if I just can’t write anymore? What if I’m broken?
The summer that I wrote my first novel was one of frenetic, almost reckless, abandon. I would spend hours pounding away at the keyboard, night would turn to morning before I would lay down my head, exhausted and yet still full of ideas. I did almost nothing else for a month except work, write and sleep, desperately trying to keep pace with the story that flowed forth. It wasn’t a very good novel, it wasn’t even very long, something like 62,000 words or something like that. It seemed epic at the time though. More importantly, it was mine. I was elated when I typed the very last sentence. There on the computer screen before me was my dream, made real. I wanted to do it again.
That first book was set in a shared world I had built and I intended to write several more stories from it. I had the characters and ideas already set for a whole series of books. After a short break of about a month, I sat down ready to get to work. It did not go well. Even though I had pages upon pages of notes on characters, settings, history; nothing came to mind. I tried to force it, I tried to just write something, anything! In the end, nothing was worth keeping. Then the doubts set in. Maybe I really wasn’t a writer? Maybe I really wasn’t able to do this? Maybe all of those fears from before were actually true?
After several months of trying and trying I had nothing. Eventually, my writing time withered away. My hour long block shrank to thirty minutes. My everyday commitment turned to every other day. Then weekends. Then I simply stopped. I was frustrated. I was scared I would never write again.
Looking back at that time I can see the seeds of how I write today beginning to take root. Instead of trying to force my creativity to turn on at a specific time I carried around my notebook to take notes whenever the moment struck. I used apps on my phone when I didn’t have pen and paper. I would read something and take notes about what I liked. Constantly I was engaged in thinking about that shared world and expanding it. I filled my notebook with characters, sketches, maps, plots, and short stories. I may not have been sitting at my computer pounding out a manuscript, but I was still writing nonetheless. I was harvesting the best fruits that my imagination could offer, right as they began to blossom.
By the fall of 2010 I had moved twice, visited Japan, started a new job, and created the Dream Anvil. I was nervous as I sat down at the keyboard with the intention to write this book. It had been two years since my last novel had been finished, two years since the day I was defeated by an empty screen. Two years that I feared my writing days were over. Book number two would prove to be a bear. I had to work hard to get it tamed and onto the pages. The ideas that had flowed so easily before spilled out like sludge. The story was like quicksilver changing constantly as I tried to nail it down. At times I wondered if I could actually finish it. Maybe it was just beyond my skill level. I kept at it though. Weekends became every other day. Every other day became a daily routine. A half hour of writing time transformed into hours. It would take me almost 16 months to complete.
Our dreams will stretch us in ways that we can never imagine. They are untamed, wild things. Sometimes we can get by on just passion, but other times we will need to slog it out. We will need to dig in, work hard, and keep at it, moving ahead at what seems a snail’s pace. With persistence, one can overcome even their greatest fears. Even if it is just a tiny little bit, it’s still progress. Our dreams will not be built in a day, instead they are built bit by bit, one day at a time.