You Can't Start A Fire Without A Spark

Bruce Springsteen clearly has a lot to teach us. Okay, he might have been talking about love when he sung that line from Dancing In The Dark, but it's a pretty apt observation. You certainly can't start a fire without a spark. Not only is it applicable to love and life and adventures and happiness and new starts, but it coincides with writing.

At this very moment, I've sat down to write a short story, just to get into the habit of writing again, and I need the spark. I can't start without it. If I do, I will remain uninspired and the words will dry up, dwindle, and fade away, then I will have another beginning without a middle and end. The creative juices shall not floweth until I get a flicker. A bit of heat. Some sort of combustion would be nice. Something that will turn into an all out inferno.

It's hard to know when it will come. What will feed the fire. If the spark will fizzle due to lack of oxygen, much like every spark I've had in the last couple months. The best is when you do get the spark and a decent flame going, you're putting kindling on it, stoking it, blowing, and it catches! Oh, it's a glorious feeling to watch the fire build, then you need to put something bigger on it, so it can heat the whole house and not just the living room. This is where it turns into a real challenge. What if the bones aren't dry enough? What if it starts raining doubt and uncertainty? Sometimes a huge gust of negative wind will sweep through and threaten to extinguish the fire of creativity.

Sometimes it does, and you feel so angry that you spent all that time trying to build the fire. You're frustrated because you didn't get to put it out yourself. There are times you kick at the depressing ashes. Other times, you crouch back down and blow on the coals, hoping against all odds you can revive it. The joy that comes when you succeed is exhilarating, nothing compares, but so many times it simply burns out. You promise to come back to it later in the day. Days turn to months. Months to years. Every now and then, you revisit it.

All of this glorious work and frustration and excitement doesn't happen if not for one little thing.

A spark.

So, we wait.

Let's Keep This Pinteresting

The Sidekick hates Pinterest.

Not because he isn't a fan of art and pictures and such, but because people print off grainy tattoos that a hundred million people have and want to put them on their bodies. When all he wants is to design something awesome and unique to the individual wanting to put something permanently on their body. I can see how this can be frustrating. Do you know how many people have an infinity symbol with the world 'love' in it? A gazbillion. And where do they put them? On their wrists. Upside down, of course. Because it's for them and they want to read it.

And I never really thought about upside down tattoos until Mr. Sidekick said, "What are you going to do, have a whole sleeve the wrong way on your arm?" Whatttt???? Yep. So here I am, with two upside down tattoos on my wrists (neither of which say love or have an infinity symbol in them) and knowing I have to cover them up because they are in fact UPSIDE DOWN. Then I ask the man, "Why didn't the guy tattooing them steer me right?"

Do you know what he replies?

Because people don't listen. What a sad state of affairs! I would have listened. As soon as Sidekick pointed out how if I wanted to build a sleeve it'd all be upside down I felt silly! Thank goodness for cover ups. And just the other day I ran into a girl with upside down tattoos on one arm. The word 'believe' on her wrist, I believe, but then she put two birds under it, which were upside down as well, then another tattoo under that, also upside down. It looked terrible.

So, I guess I understand why Sidekick dislikes Pinterest. It's detracts from originality and spreads poorly done work. It's great to have an idea for what you might like and using pictures as a stepping stone and jumping off point, but there's something to be said about being open minded enough to have an awesome piece of work designed specifically for you.  

On the other hand, I love Pinterest. Mostly because I do love art and pictures and weird things and it inspires me. I can create boards for my novels and give myself visuals of the characters and places inside my books and that's something to be grateful for. Also, it allows me to save awesome imagery! There are some really odd things on the internet. It's kind of nice to have one place where I can collect these wicked and weird and beautiful pictures.

That being said, only one of my pins has ever really gotten a lot of attention. A picture of Charlie Hunnam (Jax Teller from Sons of Anarchy). Goes to show you where most pinners minds are at.

Anyhow, this is my account over there.

But before you click the link, beware. I am a bit of an odd duck. And no, I don't have a tattoo board.

Ass Kicker

Remember two days ago when I wrote a blog about nicknames?

I forgot one. Funny, really. Because it's pretty much the best one.

Ass Kicker.

One might wonder to themselves, how did this gentle soul of a woman who walks the earth barefoot get a nickname like Ass Kicker?

Pretty simple. I can be one harsh bitch. If there is an ass in need of kicking, I will gladly volunteer my foot, especially if it is someone I love. When people need help, I will help. This includes writers hoping to get an honest opinion out of someone.

I do not sugarcoat.

And, no matter how much I adore you, I will tear your work apart. In fact, the stronger my bond is to you, the more likely I am to bare my teeth and claws. Because I want you to succeed. I want you to have the best possible book, short story, novella, you can possibly have. Anyone who knows me, or is loved by me, understands ninety-seven percent of what I do is out of love.

Yes, I want to help others.

There are worse traits to have, I suppose.

And that is why, one such soul calls me Ass Kicker. Others just curse me under their breath and shake their fist. Some say I am scary. That's just honesty, though. It brings out different reactions in everyone. As I travel this path, I will try to hold onto this characteristic. Sure, it might not win me a lot of friends, but the true ones will understand and, maybe, appreciate it.

Quitting Is For Quitters

On a whim, I decided to go through all the blogs I follow. As it turns out, everyone and their mother has a blog and apparently I was diligently following them. The list mostly consisted of other wannabe-authors like me. Men and women toiling away, churning out blogs about their journeys, posting articles about writing and editing and just awesome life events and crap that is important to them.

Oh, wait, hold on.

While the blogs I followed were mostly other writers, they certainly weren't posting anything. This blew my mind. Not literally, just figuratively. Out of the 127 witty blogs with wonderful play-on-word titles, only thirty of them were still active. Most of them hadn't had posts in months and a lot years!

Now, I know how this works. Some of these blogs had been abandoned for new blogs, and I simply wasn't given the memo, but most of them were left out in the rain, much like that cake in that song. But, but, but, the abandoned blog owners will say. Everyone has reasons, right? Reason why they didn't write. Reasons why they didn't respond. Reasons, reasons, reasons. We are full of them.

Alright, I can sympathize. There are dry spells. When you're moving or birthing a child into this world, you can go months without posting but still have the intention of returning to your virtual stomping ground to deliver amazing content to the boys and girls following your blogs. You might be sitting there, baby on teat, thinking about all the things you want to say.

But those people are the exception, not the rule.

As I axed the inactive blogs out of my list of worthy reads, I picked out over seventy people who hadn't moved, gotten married, or pushed a child into this world. What is their excuse?

They are quitters.

Plain and simple.

Surely that's going to ruffle a few feathers. As it should. No one wants to be considered a quitter. But it doesn't matter how you cut it. Quitting is for quitters. And if you have a blog you haven't posted on since last fall. You're a quitter. I don't care how good your intentions are. That baby is out there floating in the blog abyss, cold, hungry and wondering what it did to drive you away.

Don't you love it when I personify a blog? I do.

Some of these crappy blog owners might say they ran out of things to write about. I've heard it before. No really. I have.

If that's the case, perhaps the whole writing thing isn't for you. Because, let me tell you, even when my wells run a bit dry, there's still water seeping in through the cracks in the foundation. The soil is always moist, if you know what I mean. Granted, I completely understand if you don't. It was a weird analogy. I think the point is - you should always have something to say.

Simply put, people give up. Sure, I am only talking about blogs here, and maybe they don't seem important to you, but if you can't muster enough creativity or energy to post a blog once a week then how the heck are you going to stay on top of marketing your book or responding to your readers.

Think about it this way. All these people out there who start a blog, write a book, self publish, sell ten copies, don't achieve the staggering famedom they were anticipating and just throw the towel in. It kind of terrifies me to think of how saturated Amazon is with these types of cases.

But people don't read my blog, the quitters moan.

Boo-hoo!

Perhaps you're putting boring as dirt posts out into the world. Or maybe you aren't utilizing tags. There might even be a chance your really crappy at networking. Comments and views and reads ebb and flow depending on the time of day you post to what it is you're writing about. Word on the street is that twenty thousand people start a blog each day. (Those numbers seem a bit high these days, but as we know humans are extremely opinionated) With those numbers, it's hard to fathom making a splash in that sort of a pool, right? I get it. I understand.

But here is how I think about this whole writing into the blog abyss. It's practice.

Practice for when my seven figure deal comes rolling in. All I am doing is showing the world I have drive and tenacity. That I am not going anywhere. No matter how few of views on my vlog, reads on my blog, or likes I get on my sardonic but ingenious Facebook updates, I am sticking around. Because this is what I want to do. This is my passion.

I ain't no quitter.

That said, I cannot guarantee the content posted here will always blow your socks off. But it will most of the time. Blogging is work. Whoever told you otherwise was lying.

Oh, yeah, I've decided to delete blogs off my reading list if they go a month or longer without posting. It's a harsh rule, I know, but maybe this will motivate some people to actually start taking this social media, blogging, virtual crap seriously.

Planting The Seed

Yesterday, I wrote a blog post. It wasn't anything controversial, I didn't talk about how I thought kitten stomping was a good idea, and yet, somehow, a fight ensued over it. The details of the fight don't really matter. What is pertinent is why I got my back up. I am not an overly sensitive person. I get called names and mocked daily, most of it self-deprecation. After all, I'm a firm believer in not taking one's self too seriously. I mean, what's the fun in walking around thinking you're faultless and infallible? Boring is what I say to that.

Regardless, I posted the blog (my last one about the book I finished co-writing) and shared it on my Facebook. The co-author of said book excitedly passed it along to her followers and the first comment she got was from another writerly type. To say the comment was condescending and disparaging would be like saying zombies like to eat people.

Now, instead of replying hotly, I decided to ask what he meant by it. You know, because I like to give people the benefit of the doubt. (Okay, you can stop laughing now.)

Well, the belittling just kept coming!

The impression received, not only by me, but by others, was that he felt we were incapable of writing Science Fiction. That we didn't have the knowledge to pull it off accurately. And, to sum up the whole battle, that we were out of our element in even considering to write a book in this genre. It didn't seem to matter to him that this was a YA book and the sci-fi aspects all took place on Earth. Actually, he didn't even bother to ask. By the way, he hadn't actually read any of our novel.

But that's all off topic and the fighting over me taking his comments out of context or blowing them out of proportion is moot because he later admitted to thinking we "didn't have the necessary grounding in science to pull off a science fiction novel". Yep, that's a direct quote.

Let me clear something up: I don't give a crap what people say about me. I really don't. I've been called ugly, fat, told my ideas are derivative, laughed at, poked, prodded and outright harassed for years. It comes with the territory--the territory of being awesome. Just kidding. The territory of being on the Internet and accessible to countless people from all walks of life who have an abundance of time on their hands in which they can either adore or attack me.

What I do care about is what people say to others. The reason for this is fairly simple: words hurt. They do. They say sticks and stones break bones but names will never hurt and that's an outright lie. We all know it, but we sing the mantra so that our children aren't as affected by schoolyard bullies when they head off to the playground and get called a freak. In reality, words can do more damage than a slap across the face, just ask every girl who has ever been called fat. Some things just stick with you.

People don't think. That's not news. I'm not breaking ground on some new theory. It's simply fact of life that people like to voice their opinions and often don't consider how other people will take what they say. Or maybe they just don't care. The ever-growing popularity of the Internet is only making this worse. At least in person when you say something you can see the person's physical reaction. If someone flinches, blinks rapidly, flushes red or furrows their brow, it's a clear indicator that they aren't happy with something you said. On the Internet, we aren't afforded the luxury of seeing how people react to what we tell them, so we say things we might not normally let slip. But that isn't a good enough excuse. Not in my books.

I'm not saying I don't have negative opinions about people's work. Of course I do. Sometimes it's a matter of taste and other times I simply don't think someone can write, draw or sing. The difference is, I don't go out of my way to say this to them. I might discuss it with a friend, but I don't post it on their excited status update or tweet it for all their friends to see. And the reason for this is common sense, but I'm going to spell it out for the masses, or the few people who will take the time to read this.

We, the creative types that we are, need to support one another because this is a hard business and a cruel world. We need all the support, motivation, encouragement and cookies we can get. The negativity that seems to be in abundance is pointless, not to mention damaging. Lately, I've been looking at the world from a different light and I see where we have gone wrong. Instead of offering up a kind word and excitement, we often put forth skepticism, cynicism and sarcasm. While all of those things certainly have a place in this macabre world we live, it doesn't belong in our reactions to other peoples creative endeavours, especially our so-called friends. I mean, if we can't be supportive and understanding with the people we care about then how are we supposed to give it to others? And how can we expect it in return?

Can you imagine what the world would be like if we all went forth with love, hope and optimism in our hearts?

Our daily encounters would leave us light, happy and renew the passion we have for living, learning and creating. Maybe we wouldn't feel so weighted down. Maybe we wouldn't feel so alone. The world is a massive place, but we have these virtual communities that connect us and give us something we should be thankful for, except some of us don't use it in a healthy way. Instead of giving guidance and providing a shoulder to lean on, they tear people down and shake their head at their efforts.

All this does is plant the seed of doubt. And doubt is a terrible thing.

It's fear and uncertainty. Doubt derails us from the paths we are on. It rocks our self-confidence. It destroys our faith. It makes us question the things we hold dear and forces us to look at things differently, and not necessarily in the right fashion. Doubt is evil. It leaves us feeling empty and lost, broken and battered. It staunches our dreams. It cultivates unhappiness.

Which makes me wonder, why would we want to plant that in someone else? Why would we want to sow that seed? Why would we want people to doubt what they love? To doubt something they get joy from? To doubt themselves and who they are?

Words are a powerful thing. As a writer, I know that all too well. Which is why it baffled, and irked, me so much to see another writer toss his words around without a care in the world. It's unnecessary to try and bring someone down. To give them unwanted advice. To kick their excitement to death. To put them in their place or judge them.

The truth is, people aren't going to plant doubt in me. I won't be derailed from my path, but what if this guy says the same thing to someone else? Someone not as stubborn or determined as me. It might stop them from creating and being artistic. It might prevent them from taking the leap and trying something new. And that's why I got my back up. That's why we should all get our back up when we see things like this.

We need creative people. We need artists, writers, bloggers, vloggers, musicians, painters, photographers and dancers to keep doing what they are doing. It adds beauty to this world. A world so focused on everything people are doing wrong that we don't see what they are doing right. Together we should work towards eradicating doubt because it's toxic and there simply is no use for it.

Like my mother always said, think before you speak.

And like I have started to say recently, drop the negativity.

It isn't doing us any good anyways.

Sensitive Writer Syndrome

The Sensitive Writer Syndrome is a common, and complex, disorder. While there are writers who claim they don't get 'upset' or 'take to heart' the critiques they receive, I sometimes have to wonder how honest they are being with themselves.

Not too long ago, I claimed to be one of these people. But over the last couple of months, I've really noticed how easily swayed I am by others views. Not consciously, of course. But all it take is a passing remark by someone to plant the seed of doubt.

And, as we all know, doubt can be a rather savage creature.

Second guessing myself and my writing because of other people is new to me. That's not to say I never questioned it or put to the side something I wasn't sure on. No, it's just saying I never did it because of what someone else might have said.

Oh dear. This is making me sound like a spineless jellyfish without a thick skin. That is not the case. Whenever you put yourself out in public whether that be through blog, vlog, twitter, facebook, Authonomy, Write On, or SlushPile Reader, you open yourself up for criticism. Everyone who's been along for my journey knows I've received plenty of criticism. And a lot of it does roll of my back, but sometimes, certain things stick.

Usually, it's the certain things said by certain people.

Up until the last year and a half, I didn't have an audience. It took awhile to adjust to it. After over 700 comments on Seeking Eleanor on Authonomy, I understood my writing isn't for everyone. Someone will always hate it. And you cannot please everyone. These are wonderful things to come to terms with, because once you do you can relax a little and just shrug it off.

I think I've adapted rather well.

Here's the tough part. No matter what sort of writer you are, whether you only plan on writing one book or you have three completed and working on your forth, it's personal. It is your idea, your time, your energy, and, in some cases, your blood, sweat and tears. It's hard not to be sensitive about it. And while we may grin and bear it, there are times that it really gets us down. And that's when the SWS comes into play.

Sensitive Writer Syndrome can strike at the most inopportune times. It could be on the third round of edits or the thirty-sixth 'not for me' rejection. It might do a sneaky ninja attack in the middle of the night and prevent you from sleeping. Hell, it might even show up when you're sitting on the toilet really regretting eating that second extra-spicy bean burrito from the dive Mexican place around the corner. The tricky part of this affliction is one never knows how long it will stay for, how debilitating it may be, or when it will go away. Sometimes it never goes away.

The key for all writers in regards to SWS is to understand your own version of it. Like a compliment, a complaint will render different actions from the person receiving it. All sorts of things come into play. Who said it? How they said it? When they said it? How detailed they are?

For example, while Jackie O'Mackie, the writer of Gothic literature, doesn't care if her friend Betsy Boom rips her work apart, she becomes an emotional basket case if her own mother says anything negative about it. And, quiet the opposite, Peter BoBeater, a writer with a penchant for creating silly little children's books, hates it when his wife Lena mentions his horrible punctuation, but is perfectly happy with his own mother's pedantic ways.

See how it can differ from person to person.

While I did make those examples up, shocking I know, I can only shed light for you on my own version of SWS, because it is rather unique.

Once my work is in completed form, the ending finished and at the stage where I start my edits, I am open to anything anyone says to me. This is not where my Sensitive Writer Syndrome comes into play. No, mine exists before the novel has been completed.

Up until this last year and a half, I didn't have an audience. I didn't have people who showed an interest in reading my work, least of all while I was actually in the middle of writing it. But now, I have people clamouring (that's so the wrong word) to read my work. They ask me to post snippets. They question what I am working on. And they seem excited about the idea of reading it.

This is where my back goes up now.

When I am in the middle of crafting something, I think that idea is amazing. It's all I am focused on. I eat breathe and sleep it. It consumes me. Literally, devouring me until I get it all out and can get back to my life. And so, when someone shows interest in reading what I have started I get a little thrill. But what accompanies this thrill is my SWS.

If I opt to let someone read my work at this stage I run the risk of being derailed.

This is something I know.

Depending on the reaction I get back, I could completely give up on the story. It could be something little, like the person suggesting I write it from a different POV. It could be something big, like someone saying they didn't like it and it had no substance. It could be something ridiculous, like someone not being as excited as I think they should be. And it could be something hurtful, like someone saying it's cliched and expected.

I know these are just their opinions. For the most part, I don't even want to take them into consideration! Especially when I know they are unprecedented and foolish. I mean, they are on a piece of work that isn't done! How could it be cliched and expected, they don't even know what's to come! And yet, still they bother. They plant that pea-sized seed of doubt, and that pea feels like a mountain when I sleep on it at night.

I love feedback on my work in progress. Wait...that's not clear enough. I love helpful feedback on my work in progress. Wait...that's not enough either. My Sensitive Writer Syndrome loves helpful and constructive feedback on my work in progress.

It's really easy for me to be derailed when I am in the middle of writing a novel. That's a unique characteristic to my disorder. I think I am a better writer for recognizing the traits of my special brand of SWS. And I think others would be better off knowing the nature of their own beasts, because there are things we can do to curb it.

We could avoid the things that flare our SWS up...because, like Herpes, it's never going to fully go away. Or we can face it. To be honest, I'm not going to stop letting people read my material, even though that's exactly what my urge is to do. What I am going to do? Cultivate a smaller group of people whose opinions I value. Try not to take to heart the comments I receive from the peanut gallery. And try with all my might to finish the things I start, and not allow myself to be derailed.