Category: Writing

Preptober; or, the art of procrastinating by blog

Audra Edmonson2 Comments

Preptober is a pretty awesome time. For one thing, it takes place in October, one of my favorite months since I love Halloween so much.

Preptober is the name given to October for those of us who take part in the yearly madness that is NaNoWriMo (short for National Novel Writing Month – we’re fond of acronyms, can you tell we’re wordsmiths?). It’s a time when, supposedly, we’re hard at work outlining scenes, sketching characters, pinning location pictures, and gathering snacks and rewards for the month ahead.

In practice, everyone’s preptober looks a little different. Since I started doing NaNo in Korea and did the next two there as well, my prepping was fairly limited in scope, as my job was pretty demanding. I thought about my story a lot and wrote some vague notes and scene sketches, but that was about it. I saved most of my planning for when I needed it in my writing.

This year, being back in America and with a much less stressful job, I decided to kick it up a notch.

I printed out calendars, checklists, got some rewards planned (like real ones, not just cheesy ones), and even printed off an announcement of my novel on the NYT bestsellers list, as recommended somewhere. That was fun. It’s hanging on my bulletin board, a little embarrassed, but still pretty neat.

And….it’s actually going okay. I’ve gotten further into planning than I ever have pre-November. I’m able to actually visualize and distinguish my two main characters from each other, a feat in itself, and have a solid grasp on their story arcs.

I have location notes, an overall plotline, some incidental characters, and even some useless background information.

Here’s What I’ve Learned

Preptober is never going to be as productive as you want. You can watch all the videos, print out all the calendars and checklists and schedule away, and life will intervene. In case I forgot, life happens. Oh, right.

No checklist has everything you need, and a lot of them have stuff you don’t need. Cross those off and continue. Don’t get into a check-mark-induced tizzy because you didn’t actually do the thing you didn’t need to do and can’t check it off. Just check it off anyway. Weirdo.

Organizing your bulletin board of prep materials does not actually count as prepping. Right.

Blogging about preptober doesn’t actually count as prepping either. Stop it. Stop it now.

What I Used

I’ll admit, I kind of went nuts, and some of this stuff is redundant, and I certainly didn’t complete everything, but here it is anyway. Use it well, friends.

Huh. When it’s all laid out, I didn’t use much, did I? Well, it’s still about three more things than I used last year.

To all my fellow NaNo-ers, good luck. To everyone dealing with a NaNo-er, good luck to you too.

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There was this awesome year I did this…

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…and I may do it again this year. I haven’t yet though. I mean, that one was just so perfect…

A Response to Mark Manson’s Life Purpose Questions

Audra Edmonson5 Comments

I first came across Mark Manson’s article on life purpose a few years ago. At the time, I answered the questions quickly in my head without giving it much thought.

I stumbled across it again recently and was surprised how much my answers had changed. Between my first reading and the present, I’ve moved abroad twice, finished college, been through a health breakdown, and am currently sort of floundering for what my life purpose is.

Firstly, I love the opening story of Manson’s brother, who, at the age of 18, knew he wanted to be a Senator and went on to do everything in his power to become one. Manson rightly says his brother is a freak – although as a multipotentialite, I would just call him a specialist.

Secondly, Manson gave me a big wake-up call when he says;

Here’s the truth. We exist on this earth for some undetermined period of time. During that time we do things. Some of these things are important. Some of them are unimportant. And those important things give our lives meaning and happiness. The unimportant ones basically just kill time. – Mark Manson

Of course that’s what life is, but as someone who was intent on finding her purpose in life and how to best use her life for the earth and so on and so forth, it was both jarring and refreshing to realize that my life is just a series of some things.

Manson goes on to say that instead of asking what we should do with our lives, we should be asking, “What can I do with my time that’s important?”

So here are Manson’s 7 strange questions and my answers.

 1. WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE FLAVOR OF SHIT SANDWICH AND DOES IT COME WITH AN OLIVE?

Right now, my answer is writing. Writing, as all writers know, isn’t really about the writing. It’s about the psych-up and coming around to it. It’s the notecards and weird midnight text messages you leave yourself with ideas. It’s the getting up for coffee and then more coffee and the wondering if you have carpal tunnel. It’s searching for the perfect notebook to take notes in, and the guilt knowing you’re wasting all this time NOT writing.

The writing takes about 10%, I would guess, of a writer’s actual writing time. We deal with it. It’s the shit sandwich. But the olive (or bacon, in my case, I hate olives) is so, so good.

 2. WHAT IS TRUE ABOUT YOU TODAY THAT WOULD MAKE YOUR 8-YEAR-OLD SELF CRY?

I don’t wear what I want. My style is dictated by comfort, budget, and my perceived body shape failures, not by what I like.

Four months ago I would have said being a teacher though, so it’s some improvement.

 3. WHAT MAKES YOU FORGET TO EAT AND POOP?

Such a delicate question, Mark. Well, for me, right now, it’s D&D. I’m working on campaign prep for my first ever full DM experience, and when I’m in the midst of planning, time just evaporates.

Another big one is, as Mark mentions, getting lost in a fantasy world. Good stories just capture me, and I’ll read four hours straight in a good book (or play four hours in a game or watch four hours of a show – wherever I find a good story).

I wish I had written writing, but it’s not true. I spend a lot of my writing time thinking about lunch.

 4. HOW CAN YOU BETTER EMBARRASS YOURSELF?

One, in D&D, I’m going to be the DM for a group of 6 players, of whom I know 1. So I will need to be gregarious, extroverted, attentive, and goofy to make it all work. I’m so, so willing to do that.

Two, in writing, I’m embarrassing myself weekly with the flash fiction Friday things. I know they aren’t great, but I still keep putting them out there. Poetry too. Oh man do I embarrass myself. Let me do more.

5. HOW ARE YOU GOING TO SAVE THE WORLD?

Realistically, Mark? I have no idea. But I’d like to start volunteering. I have this great idea to take my two great passions, writing and D&D, and bring them to kids or the elderly. I wish the 826 Organization had a chapter near me, but they don’t. Hey, maybe I could start-

6. GUN TO YOUR HEAD, IF YOU HAD TO LEAVE THE HOUSE ALL DAY, EVERY DAY, WHERE WOULD YOU GO AND WHAT WOULD YOU DO?

Barring having to make money doing something, I’d pick something like foraging in the forest in Romania, or learning to sail in the Hebrides, or writing in a cabin on the cliffs of Scotland. Something tame, you know.

Really, at this moment, I’d just like to play and DM D&D forever. But I’m in one of my obsessive moods, so ask me in a week.

7. IF YOU KNEW YOU WERE GOING TO DIE ONE YEAR FROM TODAY, WHAT WOULD YOU DO AND HOW WOULD YOU WANT TO BE REMEMBERED?

I’d definitely start a local chapter of 826, and then I’d write a letter to each one of my friends and family, and then I’d write a journal detailing my year waiting for death to be published posthumously.

I’ll end with a quote from the article, which sums it up nicely.

Discovering one’s “purpose” in life essentially boils down to finding those one or two things that are bigger than yourself, and bigger than those around you. It’s not about some great achievement, but merely finding a way to spend your limited amount of time well. And to do that you must get off your couch and act, and take the time to think beyond yourself, to think greater than yourself, and paradoxically, to imagine a world without yourself. – Mark Manson

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The Multipotentialite Writer: Multipotentialite Series

Audra Edmonson4 Comments

When I discovered I was a multipod, I realized that my tendency to pick up interests and drop them ad infinitum was not a deep character flaw but simply a characteristic.

It was liberating to realize there was nothing wrong with me.

But it took me a little longer to realize that my identity as a multipod has meaning for my writing as well.

I write like a multipod. What does that mean? Well, currently, I have several projects I’m working on; fantasy/folklore, horror, memoir, and this blog. I also have a lot of ideas for other kinds of stories in various genres.

There is an internet full of writing advice, and I’ve read many, MANY books on writing in the past few years. Most of it tends to have the same problems for multipotentalite writers as conventional career advice does for multipotentialites in life.

Finish what you start.

– Most advice

As multipods, we’re told to stick with one career, one passion, for life. That’s being debunked as we speak by awesome people like Barbara Sher and Emilie Wapnick (go Puttytribe!), but there’s been so little on multipotentialite writers.

Finish your story, even if you don’t feel like it, or it’s not what you’d envisioned, or it didn’t go the direction you thought. That’s what I read and saw in dozens of places. And it always, always made me feel guilty. Yes, I have finished stories. I think there is incredible value in finishing something, to know you can and to develop the ability to finish a story to its end. I felt hugely accomplished when I finished my first novel two years ago.

But is it always the right thing to do? Is it worth it to keep working on a story you fall out of love with? Writing advice is a bit like dating advice; you’ll stop feeling it, but you must still commit and work at it. That’s what love is. Yes, I agree. That’s what love is. Is that what writing is?

I love metaphors as much as anyone, but in this case, I don’t think love and writing match. Just like I don’t think love and careers match for multipods. The whole “soul-mate,” one-for-life kind of things works for love. I believe in monogamy. I believe in working out a relationship with someone you love, especially when the going gets tough.

I don’t believe in a career soul-mate. Not anymore. It doesn’t exist for a multipod, who will move through careers and passions and interests and must do so. 

It also doesn’t exist for multipod writers. I have at least ten stories going. Conventional wisdom would have me finish each story before moving on to the next one, or, as some less narrow views have expressed, have two projects going that are very different, so if I experience writing fatigue with one I can still keep my writing edge by working on the other. But I’m not allowed to work too much on the other until I’ve finished the one I’ve set my mind on.

It’s bad advice for multipods. It just is. As in life and all our passions, we must be allowed to move between things. We must be allowed to go as far as we need to and let something go when it’s time.

I used to look at all my unfinished stories as black marks against my credibility, but now I see them as stepping stones. There are stories inside me that must come out, and sometimes I have to circle around to them through other stories before I can get to them.

I’m circling around my point as well.

The point is; if you are a multipotentialite and a writer, you will have many projects at once, and you will bounce back and forth between them, leaving some unfinished. And that’s okay. That is natural for you, as natural as bouncing between interests is.

Once I realized what was happening, and that I was feeling the same guilt with my writing as I once did with my interests, I had a real ‘aha’ moment. I decided to allow myself the freedom to write whatever I wanted, as long as I was hitting my mini-habit goal of fifty words a day.

I made cards like the Rotating Priorities Board, one for each writing project, and taped them to my wall – there to switch around as my feeling dictated per day. Now, I can look at all my options and go with the one I’m feeling most in tune with that day or week. And usually, it’s not a case of five minutes here, then five minutes there. I really don’t think that could be productive. But I have found that some weeks I’m really into blogging, so I write a dozen or so posts. That’s great because there are other weeks when I just want to work on my story, and I have those blog posts already ready to go.

And then some weeks I just need to journal, so that’s my writing.

But no matter what, I’m always writing, and I’m fulfilling my need. It’s just not in the same way as other writers; writers who, like the one-career-for-life people we see, can dedicate years and years to a single book. We think we should look like them. We think we should have the same kind of writing attitudes and work desk and schedule that they do, and as multipods, we forget that our multipod identity extends even within our interests.

I’m here to tell you that as a multipotentialite writer, your writing journey will look different, and that’s okay.

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Flash Fiction Friday: Speak

Audra Edmonson1 Comment

Jaz craned her neck over the endless line in front of her. It had been going for nearly thirty hours, with families taking turns to sleep and use the bathroom. Jaz had no family with her, but neither did the boy in front of her. The first hour they locked eyes, nodded, and both were able to leave when they needed to. Jaz clutched her papers tightly. Her mouth was dry. Her mouth was always dry, as if it lacked the water necessary to speak. No, her mother had said gently, you have no need to speak, Jaz, you have a heart that will speak for you.

It seemed like she might not get that chance. She didn’t know how she was going to tell her story since she didn’t know the language of this world. She clutched her immigration papers tighter.

“Next!” The boy in front of her went. Jaz knew this word, it meant, “come up to this booth.”

“Next.” Jaz was already stumbling forward.

“Name?” This word was said much more quietly. Jaz hadn’t heard it before. She started to sign, hoping they might understand.

“Damn,” said someone beside the man, and Jaz didn’t know what that meant either.

They looked at each other, and one left. The other kept his eyes down, cleared his throat. Jaz looked around for some paper, pointed. The man gave it to her and she began drawing feverishly. The man kept one eye on her while he went through her documents. She wasn’t good at drawing. The man was a stick figure, but she drew a big knife and herself as well she could. Would he understand? She wrote the word BAD in her language, but the man wouldn’t know.

“There’s a problem with this document, Miss,” the man was saying, and Jaz nodded, thrusting the paper forward, pointing at the man and herself, trying to indicate danger.

“Right, but there’s this problem. We can’t let you through-”

“Wait!” The word in her own tongue made Jaz spin around, and then the whole room seemed to spin. As if she had conjured him with her drawing, there was Thoris pushing through the line.

Jaz could only shrink in horror as he came forward, gabbling to the men in their own language. They were nodding, smiling. No…

“I am here to tell your story,” Thoris said.

Jaz was still shaking. After all he had done to their family…he was the reason she had had to flee their world, her family’s name in ruins. All because of Jaz. Because she taught the little ones things they weren’t supposed to know. Freedom, responsibility, even the word “no.” She had been teaching when they’d dragged her away.

“I know what I did,” Thoris was saying, and she saw the redness of his face was from crying, not anger. “I made a mistake. I will tell your story here, and mine. Show me.”

Jaz began to sign, and Thoris began to speak.

-a.e

I Want To Write…

Audra Edmonson3 Comments

I Want to Write Something So Simply
Mary Oliver

I want to write something
so simply
about love
or about pain
that even
as you are reading
you feel it
and as you read
you keep feeling it
and though it be my story
it will be common,
though it be singular
it will be known to you
so that by the end
you will think—
no, you will realize—
that it was all the while
yourself arranging the words,
that it was all the time
words that you yourself,
out of your heart
had been saying.

That, friends, is why I write.

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