Tag: inspiration

The River Keeps Flowing

Mondays with martinThe day was warm and the breeze gentle.

 

This combination made many students want to lie down on the green, campus grass after lunch and take naps. I made myself comfortable on a shaded bench under the largest oak tree and relaxed. With twenty minutes to spare before starting my next English class, I felt the warm, August sun trying to find me. I looked up at the white, floating clouds, and my mind began to wander.

Imagining what Huck Finn and Jim felt on their crude raft while floating down the mighty Mississippi River, leaving their troubles behind, ignoring their families, forgetting the problems of growing up, averting their minds from mature challenges, overlooking racial prejudice, and communicating the way two males, a young white boy and a black man, would have in that place – in that century, I smiled. As each day began for those runaways, the warm sun twinkled between the fluttering leaves of cottonwood trees along the river banks, gently rousing this friendly duo to new adventures.

Huck and Jim were thankful for the many opportunities that came their way. With child-like understanding, they did their best to comprehend that little corner of the world and their places in it. If life is a stochastic process, they enjoyed and accepted their days as they found them. They did not hate life away, and they would not waste time ignoring it or being ungrateful. In their simplicity, consciously or not, they found excitement in learning, even though their vision was short and blocked by the bends in the river.

Continue reading “The River Keeps Flowing”

3 Things Successful Writers Have in Common

Don’t Clip Your Wings

bpwAs the host of Back Porch Writer: The show for writers, about writers, and writing, I have the pleasure of learning from an amazing variety of writers, editors, publishers, marketing, and publicity experts. After over a year of interviews, I can tell you that they all have this advice in common:

1) Go after what you want. No one can do it for you.

Is it easy? No.

Is it necessary? That depends how hungry you are.

The one thing that distinguishes a published writer (self/indie or traditionally) from an unpublished one, is a burning desire to make something happen. That burning desire is the same thing that drives successful entrepreneurs, the street hustler, and, if you have young children, their insatiable need to find answers to everything, or focus intently on creating something, from the cardboard box that cool toy you bought them, came in. It’s not luck. Sure, luck has something to do with it, but it’s not the key ingredient.

2) Raise your expectations. For yourself.

If you’ve never watched Stand and Deliver, do it. Now. Well, not now, now. Finish reading this post first. Jaime Escalante said it best. Check out this clip.

Your desire to write and to publish must be stronger than your fear of rejection/failure. Rejection is nothing more than one editor, or agent’s, subjective opinion about the salability of your work. It’s not necessarily a reflection of the quality of your work.  A quick Google search yields a great list of literary giants who received numerous rejections from agents and publishers.

Let’s not forget one very important detail: Publishing no longer belongs in the hands of The Big Publishers. The publishing landscape is changing daily. Check out Author Earnings. You and your potential readers are in the driver’s seat.

Fifty Shades of Grey started as fan fiction. Whether you like the book or not, the author’s desire sent the series soaring.

No successful entrepreneur or street hustler puts all his eggs in one basket.

3) Sculpt Your Future

Now, more than ever, you have the unique opportunity to take control of your writing life — if, you have the desire. You are the sculptor.

Do you wake up ready to go after it? If you answered no, then you’ve clipped your wings.

How can you increase your desire?

  • Make and post a list of rewards for accomplishing your goals.
  • Observe other successful people (in and out of your field.)
  • Clip pictures that remind you of your goals. Post them where you can see them.
  • Visualize yourself being interviewed about your books. Is Oprah interviewing you? Are you on The Today show?
  • Use affirmations.

I’m sure there are other ideas. Post your suggestions in the comments. And, if you’d like to be a guest on Back Porch Writer, or write a post for the site, shoot me a message. I’d love to hear your ideas!

Deadly-Sins-Cover

Kori Miller is an author, entrepreneur, and podcaster. She welcomes guest bloggers via two of her websites: Kori Miller Writes and Back Porch Writer.
Her book, Deadly Sins: A Dezeray Jackson Mini-Series, was released in 2014.

 

Making the Great Novels into Your Own

*Today’s essay is from Fine Lines Senior Editor Stu Burns

Writers Read, Right?

A while back I read the first draft of a friend’s novel then punched out my critiques and advised her to read more novels. This would give her a sense of how she could finish her work and take it to a more mature conclusion. That was the diplomatic version. Privately, I was wondering if she had ever read a novel. As I typed, I looked at the reflection in my monitor’s glare and realized I was staring at a hypocrite.

reading quote

I was trying to write my own novel at the time, an entry in the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) creative project I’d floundered on the previous November. I am a voracious reader, but mostly of nonfiction; I will argue all night that the life of Moe Berg is more interesting than anything J.D. Salinger ever wrote. Novels had never been something I looked forward to. When I read them, it was out of obligation, either for school or after years of prodding.

If I was going to be able to write my own fiction, I had to read novels and like them. In other words, it was time I indulged in outright thievery. There is a much-abused quotation from T. S. Eliot:

Continue reading “Making the Great Novels into Your Own”

Prescription for All Artists

David Martin, Fine Lines founder, writer, and teacher prescribes every artist to watch this video of Neil Gaiman’s 2012 Keynote address now, and again, whenever you need a shot in the arm.

Mr. Gaiman goes beyond giving you, yes you, permission to create. It is a call to action. You! Create!

Do not doubt your mission, watch and then go. act.

What did you think?

We are anxious to read what you do next.