You Say I'm A Dreamer, But I'm Not

I loved Dinner for Schmucks. Hilarious movie. Steve Carell's character was loveable yet drove you nuts at the same time.  There was one scene in the movie that although it makes me laugh because he misinterprets a great John Lennon song, it also makes me think.

"You say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not."

Really the line from the song is "You say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one." While I love this song. Maybe the schmuck got it right.

I've been trying to prep myself for this headlong dive into finally publishing. It seems surreal, exciting and at times somewhat terrifying. I remembered I had downloaded Smart Self-Publshing: Becoming an Indie Author by Zoe Winters a while back. And while I had read a good portion of it, I went back this past week and started re-reading it. She has some great advice and is definitely someone I find to be a decent role model in this indie world.

Among all the good advice Zoe has managed to pack into this book one thing stuck out in particular. Something that really can be applied to anyone, not just a writer.

Dreamers are those that think about all the what if's and wouldn't it be nice. They don't actually DO anything, but dream...

But those that set goals...well they work toward them. Not to talk about the all-mighty roller derby again but, I set a goal to be able to play in games. I passed my tests...and now I will probably be playing in a game soon!

For the longest time I always said I wanted to be a writer. I wanted to publish something and have people read my books. Dreaming about it didn't get me anywhere.

It wasn't until I got off my lazy ba-donk-a-donk, finished my drafts, finished all the initial edits and started actually working towards publishing it that anything got done.

I know this is sort of a well  DUH post, but I just thought sometimes we need a reminder to stop dreaming and start setting goals. Things feel so much harder to obtain when we are dreaming about them. But they become a reality when we start striding toward them.

So my goals right now are finish the final edit, get Mistaken to the publisher and formatted and uploaded for electronic sales.

As I finish reading her book I plan to set some more goals as well as figure out more my road map.

It is sometimes hard for us to actually grasp when one of our goals is within our grasp, and I feel like that is where I am now.

Just a few more steps...

Check out Zoe winter's blog here  .

Mapping out the plot...

When I first started writing stories, it was purely for enjoyment and relaxation. I was about 10 or 11 at the time and writing and reading were my escape from the world. Writing especially. Why? Because during that time in my life, a lot of changes were taking place, not all good ones. In fact most were pretty unpleasant. Writing was the one thing I could control. I could make two people fall in love, I could send one flying off a cliff! I could even invent my own species!

My parents were divorcing, and I had to adjust to gradually never seeing my father and other not so fun issues that come with a messy divorce; including losing the house I'd grown up in, moving to a shady part of town in a horrible roach infested apartment, as well as slowly losing any semblance of a relationship with my sister as she turned into violently rebelious teenager.  Sadly she still hasn't changed nearly 17 years later.

Oh, and I was going into a middle school where I knew nobody. Yep. A lot going on for a kid that age. I in no way regret going through those things though, because it has shaped me into the individual I am today, and it taught me to enjoy writing as an enjoyable escape from reality, instead of  other horrible things I could do to escape.

But my writing naturally has evolved since then. And one of the biggest things I have found now is I cannot write as freely. Not in a bad way mind you, but now that my stories have become more complex it is harder to just start writing. I can't just let myself go where the wind takes me. Sometimes, yes, you still pleasantly surprise yourself by ending up somewhere you never intended, but generally I need a map. Otherwise my story would turn out like the above picture. Jumbled and confusing. Disconnected.

In fact, one thing that stopped me writing previously had a lot to do with my outline for Mistaken. There was a few things I was unclear about...parts I was unsure of pacing or felt that not enough was going on. After taking a hiatus from it and coming back with a fresh mind I am finding it much easier to map out the story and making very good head way. 

Reworking the outline of the story apparently was exactly what I needed, and as a result I am actually finding a couple smaller characters are playing bigger parts than I had originally planned. But most importantly it helped me get back to the actual writing.

A good outline has other very important benefits as I am sure you all know, BUT maybe if you are currently suffering from writer's block, giving your outline the once over may uncover issues with the plot that are stopping you from writing. In my case, this wasn't the only thing that stopped me from writing, as some health issues as well as quite a bit of traveling got in the way, but when I was ready to come back to writing, revamping the outline has certainly helped!