The economy is languishing.
Concern and doubt fill our emotions if not swarm around us.
For writers this can be either a perilous time or one for heightened creativity.
Those of us who write for money and recognition are asking many questions.
Will I get that agent?
And if so, how?
Will the publishers like my work?
Those whose hopes for the future rest on crafting a book that will make giant sales wonder about the state of publishing.
Where is it going?
And then there are the daily concerns of paying the bills, never mind if one has chosen the road to self-publication as the way to make our work public. To be sure, this route comes with costs also.
But what about just writing?
Sitting down to the computer, that legal pad, or notebook, scrap of paper of whatever–and just pouring out your heart?
Does it bring music, your words, the ones you scribble or type onto the page?
Does your heart flutter and/or speed up as the words mount into sentences producing paragraphs and then pages and scenes that make chapters?
I’m getting excited even now as I type. I am thinking of a novel on which I have been working this last year while bringing my novel, The House, through these final stages of publication.
I wrote this novel on which I have worked the last year, in 2001.
Only now nearly 9 years later am I gaining clarity in the finer points of the plot–essentially the middle part of the book.
Going back and forth between re-drafting it and reading final edits and then proofing The House, has been a slow moving and tedious process. Never mind keeping my responsibilities as a wife and mother. I have moved at a snail’s pace.
But then you know what they said about The Tortoise and The Hare.
Sometimes the best way to finish the race, keep our eyes on the prize and win it is to move slowly.
Presently I am re-reading proofs of The House, making sure everything is as I want it before I submit the final file from which copies for sale will be printed.
My last change consisted of a few lines in my acknowledgments.
No technical or spelling errors existed. I simply needed to write what my heart felt.
It comes like that, or perhaps goes this way with writing.
We write and write, revise and revise, re-write and revise, edit, etc.
And then when we think we have it all correct, and perhaps all is technically in the right place, we notice that something requires more, a bit of reshaping, we haven’t said all that we need or desire.
The wonderful thing about this age is how computer and Internet technology allows us to make changes throughout the process of creating–and even afterwards if we are willing to spend a little bit of money.
We can insert even more alterations if we permit ourselves the time.
The more we are able to accomplish, the faster we are able to move, the more time we can permit ourselves to achieve what is in our hearts.
If we can but listen.
But that takes slowing down.
Like keeping our eyes on the prize.
I’m still working on that novel, the rough draft of which I wrote in 2001. For the moment it is resting while I complete the process of seeing The House into publication.
Revising, editing, marketing and/or promoting one piece of writing helps me bring another work along, stirs my energies to see the latter into completion.
We have all heard at one time or another the adage, “Less is more.” As will other areas of our lives, this also holds true for writing.
Trimming the excess delivers readers the essential and pristine part of the story–all they require and desire.
From this I have now come to believe that, “Slower is faster.”
Traveling this way gets me to my destination sooner than anticipated and by a route more scenic and fulfilling.
In times of uncertainty and dread sometimes the greatest miracles arise from staying true to what lies in our hearts. From this we peel back the layers of defenses rising from our fears.
And it is here in this process of carefully plodding despite our concerns that we uncover who we really are, and discover that we possess more than ever imagined.