Monday, June 30, 2014

Good Blog Post From Dean Wesley Smith

In the latest blog post in his series, The New World Of Publishing, Dean Wesley Smith talks about what he called the "Great Time Of Forgetting." It comes down to setting resolutions and coming to a point during the year when you realize that you've missed them or have fallen away.

He talks about the tendency for writers, especially new writers, to let things distract them particularly in the warmer months of the year. I've been caught up in that, I think. It's more than that but certainly the needs of my family for my time, the beautiful weather, and other real world issues have contributed to me dropping off on my writing.

A Break

In fact, I've unofficially gone on hiatus as a fiction writer. I'm saying it's to recharge my creative batteries and get a grip on what exactly it is I'm trying to do with my writing career. I'm struggling with this. Such factors make it easy to just let it all slide and make excuses for not getting to the storytelling.

Smith presents a number of options to get back on the writing horse and carry on with the learning and writing. He mentions that we're coming up to the halfway point of the year, July 1st. I kind of did a double-take when he said that because I honestly didn't realize that we were already halfway through 2014. It's hard to believe. And I'm feeling disappointed that I've not made as much progress or completed as many stories as I thought I would going in to the new year back in January.

In that way, I've forgotten my resolutions for the year. I've succumbed to the "great forgetting." I know I'm not alone in this, but it still feels lousy. Of the solutions he lists, I like his third option the best, but would consider including some of numbers four and five as well.

Option Three

"Reset completely. " Yes, I could forget any ideas or resolutions I had in place and just start over from scratch. Decide what sort of work I'm going to do and just get busy doing it. He also included taking classes and studying the books of other writers and craft books too because these are successes too since it is very important to keep learning as a fiction writer.

I keep waffling back and forth between writing short stories and novels. I'm not sure why I keep doing this little dance. Doing both really is okay and I should be okay with it. It may even be the smarter option since the more diversity I cultivate for outlets for my work, the more success might be possible for me.

With July 1st around the corner, I have the perfect chance to make the second half of 2014 and full and prosperous writing time. If only I take the first step and commit to writing again. That sounds great; it really does.




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