Don’t get stuck in the GOOP

As I’ve mentioned, I’ve been going through the Self-Mastery course taught by Peter Sage.

Again, it is more designed for those with an entrepreneurial spirit, business-minded folks that are tired of living in the proverbial rat race and want to find more individual success. It is not a writing course or writing advice in any way, but I figured I would try it out during a time of career transition. Besides, in the end, writers are entrepreneurs, they are their own businesses—specifically if you choose the independent author route.

One particular phrase that keeps coming up through his lessons—which are essentially monetized versions of interviews he’s given throughout the years—is GOOP: the Good Opinions of Other People. Most people spend so much time either swimming in, drowning in, or seeking out the GOOP that they lose their authentic selves, he says.

I don’t know. I can understand his point, but I see the other side of it, too. Through a prolonged—and, let me tell you, I mean prolonged—job search, I am somewhat dependent on the GOOP, at least in the short term. As writers, we are somewhat, too. We need someone to have a good opinion of our work to pick it up, to publish it, to buy it. At the very least, we need more people to have a good opinion of our work than a negative one. The better it is, the more likely others are to share it, which will lead to more and more success—and more GOOP to keep you afloat when negative criticism comes your way.

I think the GOOP is something you should strive for, but not worry about. That criticism will come, no matter how polished your work is. It is impossible to be universally liked and if you strive for that, I think you will lose that important part of your work that only you can provide.

For example, at least half of my stories will be grounded in reality: they take place in a fictionalized version of the community where I bought my first house, where I lived, drank and worked as a reporter and editor of the small town of Wayne, MI. Many of the characters are based—loosely, of course, on real people. The stories have some relation to headlines I read or wrote. Usually, they’re just a starting point followed by: “What if.” There’s also a lot of interaction with the police department. Naturally, it’s not all flattering. I could strive to make everyone happy, but what good is a story filled with heroes?

You have to let that go. You have to learn it’s okay not to be liked. Until you get to that level, you won’t be that authentic and that is what we should all push for, no matter what our goals in life might be.

Set yourself up to win

2023 has been a difficult year for me and, in some ways, I have lost my sense of direction and identity. 

There’s no reason to get into the causes right now, other than to gloss over the specifics. It could have been many things, or a combination thereof: getting older, being busy, a new dog that requires a lot of walking–and I mean a LOT of walking–or something different entirely. I had many goals for the year, primarily writing-based and, staring down the final two months, I haven’t come close to doing what I want to do.

Three months ago, I decided my problem was procrastination. I needed to shift my thinking. I knew I was the cause of my own malaise; I had fallen into a rut that I couldn’t get out of. So I signed up for a series of classes from entrepreneur Peter Sage. I’m not exactly what caused them to show up in my newsfeed, but I think the hook was something about reinventing yourself. And I needed to reinvent myself. 

Or so I thought. 

Twelve weeks in, the series of courses has been hit or miss. There is some relevant content and I must admit, I admire the way he has monetized his various appearances, speeches and interviews. Should anyone click on the link and sign up, thinking it will help with their own writing, I’ll tell you right now: that’s not what it’s about. They are geared more toward business, toward entrepreneurship, but they are relevant in a way because what else is writing about, in the end? It’s a business. Like me, I assume you’re doing it to ultimately make money. 

I’ll be breaking down some of the lessons here on my blog, going forward–or at least what I think about them and how they relate to writing or life in general. There are a couple of reasons for this, and tops among them are: it’ll help me reinforce the concepts to myself and, as you might be able to tell, I need to get back into the practice of writing. Also, since I’ve been away, WordPress has upgraded most of the user-friendly aspects out of the platform and I need to re-learn how to use it again. 

Anyway, so far, my overriding takeaway is that I don’t need to reinvent myself. I need to remember who I am.

Maybe you fall under that category, too. There was a time when I wrote every day, even if I didn’t know what I was going to write about. I just banged away on an old electric typewriter–it wasn’t even mine–in a dorm room at Central Michigan University (the dorm room wasn’t technically mine, either; I only stayed there for a couple of semesters). It didn’t matter that I didn’t know what I was going to write. I, as I told myself and anyone who would listen, was a creative genius. I was a walking prompt. 

Somewhere along the way, I lost that. Honestly, that’s not accurate. I didn’t lose it. I let it go. I let the muscles get flabby. I didn’t commit to it. I set myself back and then looked for reasons to justify it, excuses that people would understand, when I explained why my name wasn’t on the shelves. Life got in the way. 

What I liked about Sage’s introduction (and much of the content) is that he essentially says if you’re using that excuse, you’re full of shit. Life always gets in the way. What you need to do, no matter what you want to do, is set yourself up to win. That means remembering who you are: nobody was brought into the world to fail. It means you have to have a vision and you have to have confidence in yourself and you have to make the commitment. 

I recently watched an interview with Arnold Schwarzenegger on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. When he was starting out as a bodybuilder (Arnold, not Stephen), he didn’t even have a Plan B. That’s how confident he was, and look where it took him. 

The commitment to yourself and your goals, according to Sage, is setting yourself up to win. You have to do it every day and evaluate the steps you take along the way. 

“Commitment is doing the thing you said you’d do, long after the mood you set it in has left you,” he said. “Do things while you’re in the mood to set yourself up for when you’re not in the mood.”

In other words, don’t let life get in the way. Don’t forget who you are, or why you’re doing what you’re doing.

Right on? Write on. 

 

 

 

Make time work for you

“When you look through the years and see what you could have been
Oh, what you might have been, if you would have more time…”

I have always had a love/hate relationship with time, whether it’s time well spent, an impending deadline, a change in season, a new month—or time wasted.

Many of my favorite songs deal with the subject; my ‘Oddly Inspirational’ playlist is filled with music that reminds me how time is slipping away. I remember that every time I go to a bookstore and run my fingers across the smooth volumes on the shelves and see another title from an author whose debut I read or checked out years ago.

Could’ve been me, I think. Or, could be me.

Yet I’ve remained trapped, in my own personal writing at least, by procrastination. Days and weeks go by as I’ve searched for the right formula to make everything come together. Maybe you’re the same way: between the job, the chores, the inane necessities of life, or walking the dogs, staying somewhat social and fit, you wonder: how is finding time to write possible?

Well, I’ve got good news and I’ve got bad news. The bad news is there’s no perfect formula. Nobody can do it the same way. Most advice, including this, is unnecessary. But that’s also part of the good news, because the good news is there is a formula and it exists in your mind, within your grasp. The only thing holding you back is you.

I realize as I type this that I am, in part, talking to myself. But my goal is to help others with my own struggles because I don’t think they’re that uncommon.

I recently started watching a series of courses put together by entrepreneur Peter Sage about changing your mindset and overcoming procrastination. It’s been a hit-or-miss series so far: some lessons are good, some irrelevant. They are not in any way geared toward writing, but I look for ways to apply them to that lifestyle. His goal is to get people to succeed in business and, in the end, writing is a business.

The introduction to one lesson stuck out to me. In about 40 seconds, he essentially says the excuse about not having enough time (he meant for the course, but it’s easily applicable to writing) is bullshit.

“We all have the same amount of time every single day,” he said. “What you’re really saying is I’m not making transforming my life or getting rid of my negative patterns a priority. Or, I’m getting too much secondary gain from being a victim.”

Essentially, he’s saying that he—and all the advice columns you read or listen to—can only do so much. You have to make the commitment; you have to put your butt in the chair, as Anne LaMott would say (and, in fact, has).

I still scoff at some of the writing advice out there, authors who say they keep a notebook and jot stuff down in 15-minute intervals or while they’re waiting to flip a grilled cheese sandwich or something. That never sounded practical to me. Sage’s advice isn’t about that: his point is that his course only requires about an hour a week and, if you’re reluctant to give up that much, are you really committed?

If you’re in the same situation as I’m in (self-imposed, I know), you need to ask yourself the same question: how committed am I? Do I really want this? Between all you do, is there an hour a day you can take control of? I bet, between the phone, doom-scrolling on social media, the TV or something else, there is. Find it. Recognize it. Make it work for you.

From the embers, a new beginning

Fire Dog is a weird story, even for me.

The basic idea came to me while I was drinking by the fireside and noticed a log in the center of the fire (pictured, on cover) looked vaguely like the snout of a dog emerging from the embers. My mind wandered, collecting and sometimes discarding the ‘what ifs’ that formed the foundation of the story.

I liked the idea of a system of magic, or at least one niche of a larger system of magic, that would allow sorcerers to look out through different campfires across the world of Korin and send messengers or minions to strike secretly at their enemies.

Gradually, the idea of the Heatstone developed from the murk drugs and alcohol and, the theft, the tension between the main characters, Korson and Glory, and the connection to the world of Korin.

What makes it weird is that I didn’t know what it was about until three or four paragraphs from the end–and then I realized it wasn’t an end at all, but a beginning. Perhaps that’s true of all short stories, but this particular beginning means retrofitting some other stories to meet this new concept. Or maybe not. I’ll decide that when I continue this story (because it is, in fact, just a beginning.)

Although Fire Dog takes place in the same world as the Keegan stories, Unclaimed and Three Sacrifices, along with Keeper of the Dead, Two Cows Too Many and The Sigilist, and features one of the same characters (sort of), the story itself stands on its own. It’s another snapshot, another entry point, another look at the world as it takes shape through the eyes of the people that live in it.

I hope you’ll take a few minutes, spend a buck and check it out–and, as always, let me know what you think!

“You know, it don’t come easy…”

Someone once asked me if I thought it was possible to essentially flip a switch and change into the person you wanted to be.

My guess is that it was around the end of the year and we were talking about things we wanted to do in the upcoming year. I know neither one of us was happy — both of us worked in a restaurant at the time. She had aspirations of becoming a gourmet pastry chef. I wanted to write.

Perhaps feeling the weight of unwritten stories on me, I said I was optimistic. People can change. You just have to commit.

That was 1992.

Nearly 30 years later, I find myself in a similar situation. Okay, that’s not entirely true. Or, if I think hard on it, even remotely true. A lot has happened: I went to college, got out of the restaurant biz and, in many respects, became a writer — first in the newspaper industry, then healthcare and now in my position as communications manager. I have written three novels (first drafts, which have since languished) and published stories on Amazon through Kindle Direct Publishing.

What I haven’t done, I think, is make that commitment I hinted at so long ago. I still struggle to maintain a daily writing goal, to build up the mental muscles and writing technique necessary to improve my work. A quick look at this blog will provide some evidence, Amazon another — I haven’t posted anything new in more than a year, because I haven’t finished anything new in that long.

In 2021, I will again attempt to flip that switch. I have plans, big plans, but I’ve learned that if I don’t write them down — and tell someone else about them — then they won’t progress any further than that.

I will, at minimum, finish my current Work In Progress (WIP), both the first draft and whatever subsequent revisions are needed to make it suitable to publish. My initial goal, to have it finished by the end of this month, has already changed (which is also part of the reason why I’m writing this). My new deadline on it is the end of February (it’s another month, but at least it’s a short month).

I also have two short stories that are half-finished. They will be complete within the same timeframe.

After that, I will edit one of my previous novels, then go back to my current one with fresh eyes. By the end of the year, I will have two novels ready to send out, as well as any short stories that come up in the meantime. And regular blog posts, too.

Part of my confidence this year is tied into my physical fitness goals: I think to get my mind back in shape, I need to get my body in shape, too. I’ve set a goal of riding — between trail, road and exercise bike — 2,021 miles this year.

If you’re in the same boat as I am, frustrated at lack of progress try these simple steps. Write your goals down. Tell someone else and authorize them to hold you accountable. If writing is your goal, find someone who is willing to check in on you, maybe a weekly zoom meeting, where you can talk shop, talk progress or just decompress.

I still believe people can change. It’s just not as easy as flipping a switch.

Program your mind for writing success

When my job first transitioned into a remote work situation, I had high hopes.

I would finally be able to get into a regular writing routine. I would get back in shape. I’d reconnect with my dog. After all, without the daily commute, I was gaining at least two hours every day when you factored in the drive time and the time it took to prepare for and recover from sharing the road with far too many idiots. With that much extra time, I told myself, all things were possible.

Eight or so weeks later, that hope is dwindling but my level of determination is increasing. It turns out – and maybe you’ve heard this before – change ain’t easy, no matter how bad you want it. That’s because just wanting to change isn’t enough; you have to take action – and that action begins with your own thoughts.

To help keep everyone thinking sharp as we all exchanged our corporate casual outfits for pjs, robes and slippers, the manager of Organizational Development and Learning at my employer has been sending out optional training and inspirational videos. One in particular struck a chord: it was about programming your mind for success.

It’s not specifically about writing, but it certainly relates to it.

The presenter, Carrie Green, talks about all the subconscious factors that hinder us from achieving our full potential: fear, obstacles, lack of motivation. They are self-limiting thoughts that keep us from action.

“People miss out on amazing opportunities all the time because of what’s going on in their heads,” she said.

If you let these things get in your way, you tend to make bad decisions based on a bad frame of mind, she said. You talk yourself out of ideas – maybe telling yourself “there’s always tomorrow” – and your potential stays locked inside.

Anne Lamott, in her wonderful book ‘Bird by Bird,’ describes something similar as an internal radio station stuck in your head. She called it KFKD.

The key to breaking through is asking yourself a series of questions:

• What do you want to achieve?
• Why do I want to achieve it? Or, put another way: What does it mean to me?
• What kind of person do I have to be to make it happen?

When you can answer those questions, you can start to reprogram your mind for success. You begin to control your thoughts, rather than letting them control you.

Let’s talk about writing for a minute. We’re all familiar with the who, what, when, where and why, which is the foundation of any story. If you are having a hard time motivating yourself, stop thinking about the story and just ask yourself the three Ws:

• What do I want?
• Why do I want it?
• Who do I have to be?

Again, it won’t be easy. Chances are, the answer to the third question will not be someone who sleeps in, watches reruns or waits for inspiration to strike. You have to commit to it and take it on like it’s the toughest job you’ll ever have. Keep the ‘why’ in mind and hold yourself accountable. Success, in writing or in any other endeavor in life, is no accident. You have to do it on purpose.

Bet on your Beta readers

Recently a friend of mine had a little extra time on her hands and was looking for new things to read.

I, sheepishly at first, suggested one of my stories on Amazon. Specifically, I picked A Better Way, because it had always been a favorite of mine, it was difficult to classify and I wanted an honest take on it. It had been up and published for a while with no reviews. (That, sadly, is still the case).

It had been a while since I wrote it, too, and that gave me the chance to experience it again through fresh eyes — hers.

“You’ll have to let me know what you think,” I told her via text. “Even if it’s stupid. You won’t offend me, but I’ll ask you why.”

Because A Better Way, while being a favorite, is a bit of an odd story. Conceived and written post 9/11, it is about government overreach and how we are all, at the end of the day, beholden to the corporations that employ us and under the suspicion of the government that oversees us. The main character, Darryl Johnson, is based in name on one of my cousins, may he rest his soul. His name is the only similarity. In the story, Darryl has a rather convoluted thought process; he’s a bit of a wool-gatherer, with thoughts the circle and meander like Billy walking around his neighborhood in those old Family Circus cartoons. Good for character (I hoped) but not necessarily good for advancing the plot–and, of course, you are not supposed to waste a word in a short story.

Darryl becomes under suspicion from a shadowy branch of the government because he’s a bit of a clueless yoke and he placed one too many American flag stamps on his envelopes upside down. It gets a bit more bizarre from there. It probably doesn’t help that it was initially based on a fart joke and a ‘word of the day’ that came across one of my social media apps.

Anyway, a tough story to market.

My beta reader, in many ways, validated what I tried to do.

“We’ve all been Darryl a time or two, haven’t we?”

“I love his thought process. Funny how we’ve all thought things like that; some so off the wall you kinda catch yourself like: ‘that’ll be five seconds I never get a back.'”

And, most importantly, “OK, I wanted more. You need to add to it!”

I forget who said it, but someone once described a short story as a prelude to a novel. That’s what Darryl’s story is to me. He was so much fun to write, with an occasional universal truth sneaking out of his macaroni and cheese mind.

Beta readers can be a hit or miss proposition. Many of them, your friends in particular, are afraid of offering honest feedback because they don’t want to hurt your feelings. I say: tell them not to worry about it and then do your best to keep up your side of the bargain. If you don’t agree with the criticism, you don’t have to apply it to your work. If they tell you they think it sucks, put aside your ego and ask what doesn’t work.

You can always learn something from a fresh pair of eyes (even if it’s not to use that particular fresh set of eyes again…) and you may inadvertently validate the hard work you’ve put into your story.

Write on!

 

 

Creating habits

Through no real fault of my own, I recently had to take a job as a salesman in a Kia dealership. It wasn’t anything I was expecting to do–or trying to do–for a living, but after searching for seven months in vain for some type of communication or writing gig to replace the one I had been kicked out of, I had to take something to keep the lights on, the bills paid and, of course, provide health benefits.

No problem, I told myself. I could use the people I talked to on the job as the basis for characters. I could study dialogue or arrange story ideas and plot points in my head during the slower times. (And I assumed, in the Big Three-friendly confines of Metro Detroit, there would be plenty of slow times at a Korean car dealership). Everything is a learning experience, I reassured myself.

And I was right. Two weeks in, I have learned a lot. I have learned, for example, that I am not a car salesman. At least not a good one. I will never win a footrace to the door to greet a new customer or a potential sale. I can’t beat anyone to the phone, either. When someone tells me they don’t want to buy or lease a particular type of car, I don’t try to get them to get them to buy or lease it, anyway. There’s nothing wrong with people who can and like doing that every day. It’s a different skill set, that’s all, a different frame of mind and I just won’t get there.

Some skills translate to writing, though. The first training video I watched centered on Creating Habits or doing the things you need to do to be successful. The narrator called it “investing in your next opportunity.”

He talked about doing whatever was necessary to turn yourself into a winner, because car sales–like writing–involves a lot of rejection. You need to pick the smallest thing you can do each day that you can win at. Maybe it’s just getting in on time. Maybe it’s making a dozen phone calls.

Ray Bradbury put it this way: “We must take arms each and every day, perhaps knowing that the battle cannot be entirely won, but fight we must, if only a gentle bout. The smallest effort to win means, at the end of each day, a sort of victory.”

They only difference is that you’re not preparing yourself to be a more successful salesman, or preparing yourself for a promotion or for your next job. You’re preparing yourself to be a writer. Get the habits down. Set up time to write, and stick with it–even if you’re out of ideas and energy. If you can’t create something new, go over old work. Re-edit it. Tinker with half-developed plots. Make some character sketches–anything you can to work out your creative muscles. If you’re stuck, really stuck, try to do the smallest thing you can to make you feel like a writer again–and then build on it.

It’s so important to exercise your creativity in some way so, when inspiration hits, you’ll be ready and in shape and able to handle the load. All that preparation, the habits you are creating by sitting down and getting into the mindset will pay dividends. Your mind will already be nimble and ready to go down any plot path your characters take you!

Who we are vs. what we do

So much of our culture revolves around what we do for a living.

“What do you do?” Is usually one of the first questions we’re asked (or we ask) whenever we meet someone, whether it’s just to make polite small talk or a genuine attempt to get to know that other person.

I’m not sure if it’s specifically a human trait, but it certainly is an American one. There are cultures throughout the world where a person’s worth is not dependent on how much value they bring to society, where the sense of identity is not necessarily tied to what someone does to pay the bills.

For writers, particularly independent writers, it’s a difficult question to answer. Most of us aren’t actively making a living by writing–at least not the form of writing that first tickled our dream nodules. Does that mean that’s not what we are? Absolutely not. It’s who we are at the core; we just need to be reminded sometimes (or at least I do. Maybe you’re more fortunate.)

When I was a senior communications specialist, it always bothered me to provide that title whenever I was asked the ‘what do you do?’ question. Eyes glazed, for one thing, and people misunderstood it, for another.

One common response was: “Oh, like telephone lines?” Or, picture Clint Eastwood reloading his Spencer rifle in “Unforgiven:” “Communication specialist? Like cables and such?” I would then explain what I did: writing for executives, contributing feature stories, lots of letters. It always sounded like a long-winded explanation or justification of why I hadn’t published more. I enjoyed parts of it, but it certainly didn’t spark a fire.

It’s also important to note that if, for one reason or another, you lose that job, you can feel stripped of your identity. That, I can tell you, is not an easy journey to reverse.

Instead, just say: I’m a writer. Every time you say it, you’ll make it a little more true. Your eyes will light up, you’ll feel engaged. You’ll remember what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. You will keep that goal alive in the midst of the rejection slips, the disappointments, the rough critiques and the monotony of working in a cubicle or delivering packages or slinging hashbrowns. Maybe you’ll even get some ideas.

Writing is a difficult calling. It can be a lonely calling. It is, almost by definition, a solitary one. We need all the encouragement we can get and it’s perfectly okay to supply it ourselves. Perhaps that response will generate some skeptical looks, rolled eyes or smirks. Who cares what they think? You’re not saying it for them. You’re saying it for yourself.

 

 

 

 

 

The explanatory lede

The explanatory lede has been a pet peeve of mine ever since I learned what it was.

In my newspaper days, they came up frequently and I could usually see them develop. I would glance across the newsroom and see one of my staff start a story, write six or seven words, delete them and then start again. Explanatory ledes usually happen when people are stuck, not sure of their topic or trying to take up space–like a middle-schooler who has to write a thousand words on Dickens’ Great Expectations. 

Probably for the same reason, explanatory ledes are just as common, if not more so, in the  corporate world. Each time I see them, I strike them out as my inner J. Jonah Jameson growls: “Don’t tell me why you’re telling the story. Just tell the story.”

It’s funny, though. I was about to do one, myself. As I start blogging again, start getting into a regular writing rhythm again, I felt compelled to announce it and perhaps offer an apology for things I haven’t done. The year is almost over and I have accomplished very little: a new Keegan story closer to the tone I had anticipated for him; a second Charlie Morton short story that introduced one of my favorite characters. I wanted to speed up and I slowed down, instead.

Maybe you’re walking the same dog. Starting over is all well and good. It is important, if you want to be successful (in writing or any endeavor, really), to get serious and stay serious. Go ahead. Start over. Just don’t feel compelled to tell anyone what you’re doing or why. Tell your stories; write your blogs; voice your opinions. Save the explanations. The only one you need is this: it’s who you are.