4/1/12 - 4/8/12 | Apathy's Hero

Frustration

The SEO likes the quotes about suffering, and this one just really fit my thoughts today. So that post yesterday about entitlement? Totally about me. And I'm still in vent mode.

Except I have no idea what I'd do with a sword shaped like a phoenix feather that came out of an event gift box. I like dual-weilding my short swords.

But I'm frustrated. And it's because there's this little voice at the back of my mind asking "what are you missing?" "Why can't you get it right?" "What do they all know that you don't?" "There's a piece somewhere, and if you could just see it, it would all click."

It's not about 'paying my dues'. I get that. Life is hard work. I'm not afraid of hard work. I'm afraid of being mediocre. Of only being adequate. Of being good, but not good enough.

Ooh, Fear is a good f-word too.

So's Fed-up.

But the most annyoing voice of all? Is the one asking "you already know the answer, why are you spinning your wheels looking for a different solution?"

And, BTW, F.....rack-off is a good one too.

Because the answer is, just because it's hard work, doesn't mean I've worked hard enough.

And that's what it takes to keep from Failing: Fortitude.

How do you Free yourself From Fumbling and Falling into the Frustration of Failure and Find the Fortitude to Free yourself and Finish those goals that bring you Fullfillment?

(also, I'm listening to Flyleaf right now, which is either helping me feel better or worse, but it's definitely appropriate ^_^)

Expectation & Entitlement

During the entire month of April, I'm participating in the A to Z Blogging Challenge. The alphabet will be my motivation, though the content of the posts will be very similar to what regular readers are used to. Check out the link for more amazing bloggers, and enjoy April!

I don't have a picture for today's post. And no snappy quote. Five days in and I've already gone picture-less on two of them. But I had a difficult time with 'E' today. Which is funny because I had dozens of ideas for other letters, half of them have already passed.

This is a rant. There's some writing/publishing related sentiment in here, but it's further reaching than that. There's a mindset that I see more and more as I get older. I don't know if it's because it's always been there and I'm just more aware now, or if it's because our culture really is changing.

I see a lot of people, young and old, who just expect they should be given things. They have a sense of entitlement that tells them if they want something, it's their right to have it. I play an online game and have for many years. I'm one of the older players, because this is a 'free' game (meaning, it costs infinately more than a subscription game. I'll explain how that works another day). So it draws in a younger crowd who doesn't want to pay a regular recurring fee.

The cute characters and endless wardrobes don't hurt either.

Anyway, if you've ever played an MMORPG, you're familiar with events. For a set period of time in game, you follow a series of instructions and/or quests, and the reward is something rare and unique that (in theory) can't be acquired any other way in game. Armor, weapons, whatever.

In the game I play, the rewards are almost always random. You do the quests, you get a box, it has a random award in it that may be rare and awesome, or may be health potions. One of the points in this game is to do the quest over and over again in the hopes that you get that epic rare item (that you can then sell for millions of in-game gold because you don't really want the item, you just want to say you found it. Again, a different post).

And I hear this a lot. A LOT. In game. "I opened five boxes, and I didn't get anything good. This event sucks." or "I should get something good just for being here." or "I know I've only played for two months, but it's not fair that I can't get one of those rare items they gave away two years ago."

I'm a part of a vast online writing and blogging community and have been for several years. I'm one of the younger writers in terms of number of words written, number of queries sent, etc. But more people join this group every day, which I guess puts me somewhere in the middle, experience-wise.

Anyway, if you've ever read any of these blogs, you're familiar with the posts about the trials of trying to get published. Someone writes a manuscript, they edit it, they polish it, and then they go about getting it put in print.

Several of the blogs I read are by published authors, either traditionally or self-published. You know, either someone else decides to publish your book, or you do it yourself.

And I hear this a lot. A LOT. From various places. "I queried 5,983,402 agents, and no one wanted to rep me. Big publishing is a scam." or "I self published a book and put a link on my blog and only one person bought it. Self-publishing is a scam." Or "I know I just wrote my first 50,000 words ever in a single story last November, but why am I not making millions in advances, overseas rights, and movie deals yet?"

First of all, to both the gamers and the authors: life isn't fair. I wish it was, but fair for me is unfair for someone else somewhere who worked at least as hard and deserves it at least as much. Every single one of us has a separate path to walk, and if we expect ours will be like someone else's just because we like the way their journey looked, we'll always be disappointed.

I'm as guilty of this as anyone. There's always a twinge of disappointment when I open that in-game event box and it has mana potions instead of the most epic sword in the existence of this week inside. There's always a hint of envy (even though it doesn't last long and I don't have the desire to indulge it), when I hear about someone new landing the book interest I was trying for.

But all of that expectation and entitlement is replaced by a desire to see someone else enjoy what they worked so hard for. It doesn't make me feel like I deserve short cuts, or I should be bumped to the front of the line because I put in more hours.

And fortunately, with my closest writing buddies and all of you that I interract with personally (instead of stumbling on a blog post or Facebook status), I don't see that. And that makes me happy.

What kind of expectations do you find yourself pushing aside because you know they're counter-productive?

Discovery

I have always said I'm a character driven writer. I imagine the characters, they tell me their story, and I flesh it out on paper. In the last couple of months I've found a flaw with this statement. I've discovered it's too simplistic. Let me take a step back.

For many, many years, I only had so many characters. All of my stories centered around them. I would get an idea, write 10k-40k of random words and then realize I couldn't pull it all together and give up. Those would probably be best described as my 'pantser' days, and the reason I plot now. But I loved the characters, so I would never get rid of them. I'd see what story they were going to work in next.

Sometimes it would be an amalgamation of previous stories, and sometimes it would become it's own, brand new story. For my very favorite of those characters, I finished their stories. All in the last three months.

A couple of things I discovered because of this:

Since none of them exist in the original story the brought to me, I'm not shooting from the hip and writing what the voices in my head tell me to. Not exclusively anyway.
I still have all these old story ideas that are actually viable now that I have a better grasp of novel writing

I don't know if anyone else has ever worked this way in the history of anything, but it seems to be what's working for me now. I'm going back through all my old story ideas and seeing which I want to tell. Those 10k-40k worth of words have become loose outlines (Because I wrote the scenes all over the place, I had the major conflicts sketched out).

Except, I already used those characters. Not just personality traits and physical descriptions. Like those exact characters down to the same names, back stories, all of it.

So now I've got these plots created for these characters who already have a world of their own to play in. That means...I have to create characters to go with my plots? That thought threw me off when I first had it. I couldn't do that. Plots are driven by characters.

Except apparently they're not completely. And characters don't seem to be completely driven by plot. As I come up with new people to fill these holes left by the originals, I realize I still can't write the stories until I *know* these new people. Where they're from, how they dress, what they do for a living (but not their last names. I hate thinking up last names. They're unimportant to my creativity and only tossed into the story if I need them).

And what I discovered was both are so intricately intertwined that I need to find out little things about each before I can discover more about the other. I need to know what my female MC does with her free time to know what she brings to her new apartment with her, but I need to know that she's going to lose something very important to her before I figure out how she'd react to it.

So I'm no longer claiming to be either a character or plot driven writer. I can't let one or the other completely control the story, they have to be able to compromise to make things work.

What kind of discoveries have you made about your own writing as you've grown in the craft?

Cool

Buzzwords

In my research for today's post, I stumbled on this. If you're a corporate drone like me, or if you know one well, go check it out. Dilbert on buzzwords ^_^

I've worked in technology for...more years than I care to count this morning. And for a lot of that I've worked in marketing. Even though they change from month to month, buzzwords always exist. Teambuilding, rightsizing, talent pools, the list goes on and on.

Buzzwords are kind of like trends, but not quite. And they permeate other aspects of my life as well. Like..writing. Ever heard this before?:

I love your voice/this needs more voice!
This first page doesn't quite hook me/This first page really has me hooked
Vampires/Angels/Mermaids/Gods are really out/in right now. Be careful of the oversaturated market
I don't care about your MC yet. Make me care.
This is so gritty and real/this just doesn't feel real. Make me feel it.

Voice, hook, trends, caring, feeling, etc, etc, etc.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's all important to keep in mind. But out of context and/or given by itself, it doesn't mean much. I know something like 'voice' is hard to define. Loving a writer's voice is kind of like loving chocolate. Some people do and some people don't.

I just think it's important for us to know what buzzwords mean before tossing them around because we read them in a forum or on a blog somewhere.

Which buzzwords have you caught yourself using because they've become part of that month's trend in online writing advice?

Advice

I got an email on Friday that really set me off. Those in my immediate rant vicinity know that I fumed pretty seriously about it. The details of the message aren't important, it was the general idea. Someone was offering me unsolicited advice, and it was delivered in a manner I found offensive.

But that's not just writing, that's life, right? Every day someone has a suggestion for us. A boss, a spouse, a child, a neighbor. Ranging from the simple "your hair looks cute down, you should wear it that way more often" to the more time-consuming "I wouldn't have done it the way you did, but if you'd like, I'm happy to help you redo the entire thing to adhere to my vision." (Not to say that some hair styles aren't time consuming, but I've already spent years on that freaking story...anyway).

The thing that's easy to forget - for me anyway - is advice is an opinion. It's not law, or fact, or a rigid 'must do' of any sort. Just because someone suggests something, doesn't mean we have to listen. On the other hand, just because we don't agree doesn't mean the advice isn't good.

There's a fine balance. I think one of the harder skills for most artists to learn, is where that balance is. Listening to and considering advice, and weighing it fairly against your vision for your work. You can't incorporate everything. But it's probably best you listen to at least some of the input, even about changes.

Say, for instance, you really wanted to write a story that blended mythologies. Greek, Norse, Egyptian, etc. And your story was set in modern days, with all of your deities walking the city streets and interacting with people.

Feedback that suggested you only use Greek gods because Isis and Artemis weren't created at the same time in history may not be conducive to your vision.

Feedback that suggested you explain why all of these gods were living this way may not damage the story as much as help the reader understand your vision.

And if they if they suggest a rewrite of the entire thing, is it because you didn't write it the way they would have, or is it because you have a flaw running through your entire plot? And do you refuse because then it wouldn't be your story any more, or because fixing it would be too much work?

And the list of questions to consider goes on and on.

My question is, how do you determine if the advice you receive from day to day is useful or not quite for you? Or to take it a step further, what if the intention is right, but the suggestion isn't? How do you use the advice to take things in a more appropriate direction than what was suggested?

Apathy's Hero

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