friday motivation courtesy of alec baldwin

I was looking for an inspirational quote, something to really motivate today. Instead my mind kept returning to this scene from Glen Garry Glenross. It's harsh, obnoxious, and in your face, but for whatever reason, it fits my mood. This will either motivate you or piss you off.



Although Alec Baldwin is talking about selling real estate, it will work for anything. Take the sentiment and apply it to whatever you are working on today.

Enjoy and Happy Friday!

Lisa

collaging for the visually un-artistic

it's a new year which means...a new collage. i love collaging. it's taken me awhile to get a handle on the process, i'm not visually artistic but i'm working on it. honestly, my collages are never going to be masterpieces but as long as they inspire me, i'm happy.




if you haven't ever done a collage. they're fun. it's even more fun when done in a group. our critique group gets together with colored paper, magazines, fun sparkly do-dads, foam letters and shapes, glitter writing pens. sometimes i have a theme in place. other times, i let my subconscious guide my color and picture choices and theme emerges later.

this year's theme is 'love to write'

which i do. go forth, get some craft supplies and go crazy. :)

Lisa

rainy days

I love rain. I love the sound of the drops hitting the pavement, splashing against the window panes, the heady scent of ozone in the air, and how clean and shiny everything appears after the rain is over.



I love the gray sky. I love how green the leaves on my trees seem, glowing from the refraction of light on the rain drops. I love curling up under a blanket, laptop warming my lap and cup of tea steaming at my elbow. (must be tea, you cannot drink coffee on a rainy day, it's a law or something :) )





I love how when you're writing, rain inherently supports the mood and tone of a scene. From gray and ominous as a portent of the plot twists to come. From sad and cloudy or dark and angry mimicking the characters' emotions. And I love how the rain seems to spark my creativity.

I can just as easily snuggle up with my laptop as a good book on a rainy day. Blue skies are lovely, but gray rainy skies rock.



Happy Rainy Monday!



Lisa



ps. I wonder...I'm descended from the English-maybe liking rain is in my blood. :)

writing warriors

this business is crazy and dream crushing and dream making and not for the faint of heart. yesterday, during my critique group, we discussed two kernels of truth in learning your process of writing:

1. you can only control what you can control and write the best damn book/article/short story you've got inside of you at the moment and learn from each project you complete and revise.

2. writing is not for wimps. everyone loves to talk about that one person who wrote their first book, sold it, had to do zero revisions and it became an overnight instant bestseller. all that sounds great but the reality is writing is WORK.



writers work and submit and get rejected and write and submit some more and get rejected and so on and so on. this is the career path for most people. it is not for people with fragile egos whose feelings are crushed at the slightest bit of criticism or rejection.

writing is for warriors.

Lisa


ps. please don't fall down in shock--two posts in a week!

procrastination

aka cleaning your office, culling out unread books, sorting through borrowed books to give back, filing your reams of internet research on various topics, scheduling the next year's worth of www.pensfatales.com topics....

aka sprucing up your front yard, watering your apocalypse garden (i have zucchini! and the corn is sprouting or whatever you call what they do), spending quality time with your children (whether they want to or not), heading to the bookstore and buying books but not reading them because you can't until you write....

aka mulling over your plot, working through story lines, fretting over character motivation, pondering the potential settings of the next scene....

in other words...all of that aka stuff is productive, no question, but it isn't writing. Writing requires BICHOKTAM. Butt in chair, Hands on keyboard, Typing away madly.

No magic handshake, no muse on vacation, no excuse. Time to write.

one hundred days

So maybe you are familiar with 100 words for 100 days. This is a writing jump start tool that is supposed to motivate you to write every day...at least one hundred words (which truly is minimal) with the goal that you will begin a more steadfast and productive writing habit. A few years ago my critique group started this and I gamely went along with the idea. One rule: if you miss a day you have to start over.

So...I would enthusiastically jump right in and go gangbusters for...about five days. Then the kids would have a bunch of sports, or the dh and I would have a night out, or we'd have the kids' friends and parents over, or, or, or...and pretty much after the weekend, I'd have to start over. I probably attempted this for a month (maybe longer as I am stubborn) before I stopped writing altogether. The failure to keep at it past four or five days took an incredible toll on my psyche and that was it.

But of course because I am the type of person who REFUSES to give up, I would start the cycle all over again. And because I am also an occasional rule breaker, after failing again and again, I finally made up my own rules. I didn't have to start over. I just acknowledged the day off and kept my own tally of days.



I'm in my third year of going my own way and today I hit day one hundred for 2009.