Thinking About Writing

I’ve been thinking a lot about writing.  Have you?

Have you spent time mentally creating a story, holding plot lines to the light, shifting them here or there, looking for the best fit?  Have you focused your attention on where you’re going?

Don’t be in a rush to whip through your manuscript.  It takes time to grow a crop, to gestate a child, and to grow into an adult.  And it takes time to plant the seed of a story and allow it to unfold to its fullest potential.

Sometimes an idea needs to brew for a time, like a fine elixir, to draw out the magic within.

Giving yourself permission to approach your story slowly takes discipline.  But when you’ve had the opportunity to pick that idea up, and turn in slowly in your mind, allowing your imagination to spark off each aspect of possibility… that’s when you move deep into what brings your story to life for the reader.

Like an appraiser of valuable paintings, you move away, observing from a distance.  Once you’ve seen the wider picture you creep closer, and still closer, discovering separate brush strokes that create the whole.

You apply delicate pressure to this silken thread, work your way through that tangle of coarse twine, and finally heave the heavy hawser into place, tying the details of your plot and characters into a coherent tapestry.

Now, the time has come to stop thinking about your story, and to start writing.  And your writing is easier, richer, sweeter for the thought you’ve put into it before you wrote your first word.

 

If your normal method is to jump in and start swimming upstream, try a slower, more thoughtful approach for your next piece.  Then leave a comment and tell us what you discovered about your completed story.

 

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