If you don’t follow the words when they come,

If you don’t follow the words when they come,

if you fail to pay attention or

if you think you can find them later or

if you make the mistake of ignoring them or

if you believe they’re unimportant or

if you hope you’ll be able to draw them out of thin air sometime later, 

maybe when you have the time, 

or maybe after dinner, 

or maybe just before you get into bed, or

if you put off writing just because you’re embarrassed 

to stand still in the middle of the sidewalk 

typing on your phone or jotting in your notebook 

as people pass you by 

afraid they’ll think you’re rude 

not to say hello or acknowledge those around you, 

if you don’t follow the words the moment they appear, 

listen, I’m telling you 

they’ll fade into the mist and disappear 

and it’s rare—if ever—that you’ll find them again, 

they’ll desert you in search of someone else prepared 

to hear their call, someone listening with an open heart 

the way you need to listen patiently for days or weeks or months, 

for however long it takes, for the sound you’ve been waiting 

and wanting to hear, and you—

you, the one who couldn’t spare a moment, 

who pretended not to hear anything—

if you don't follow the words when they come,

you’ll be left empty handed with nothing more than 

a faint dream of what might have been 

on the blank page in front of you .

The fear and magic of writing

I'm revising lightly as I go through the manuscript again, but it's not easy to face the truth of what's on paper. 

I put this off for months, and each morning I'm still putting it off, not wanting to find out if I failed, not wanting to find out if I'm a failure. 

This fear (of being a failure) runs through my veins. It's what causes my need to procrastinate. It's what keeps me away from the manuscript for days and weeks, from working on it for months, from improving it, from enjoying it. 

As soon as I manage to overcome this fear and return to the manuscript, though, I find myself absorbed by it, drawn back into that world, pulled back into the spaciousness of my imagination. 

Maybe that's what is so scary--leaving reality and its solid footing for the imaginary world, worried I'll lose myself there and never return? 

It's funny (I realized this morning as I was working on the revisions) the way holding the pen in my hand roots me to reality and takes me into the imaginary world simultaneously. 

Isn't it interesting how I can enter an imaginary world and stay rooted in this one, the "real" world, at the exact same moment?

My pen is like a talisman. Its mysterious properties let me go in two different directions at once. 

I can write my way into the world of imagination while writing words that appear on the page and remain physically present in this world, this reality. 

Maybe this is the magic of writing. 

It lets us inhabit two (or more) worlds at once. 

And maybe it's the magic of reading, too.

Procrastination and Perspective

After three weeks on the road—my wife and I went on a driving excursion through thirteen states, from Florida to Michigan and back—I sat down at my desk after breakfast last Monday morning to begin writing again.

But instead of diving into projects that I’d left behind almost a month ago, I turned on my computer and spent the time checking Facebook and Twitter, then scrolled through email accounts, and finally—after a few hours of getting settled in—managed to screw up the courage to open up the file of one of my older projects and begin reading what I’d written weeks ago.

It’s funny, really, how this habit of delaying work resembles the way that I get into the water. With the greatest resistance I step into the pool, taking each step very slowly, carefully dipping one toe into the water, then quickly withdrawing the toe before submerging it to test the water’s temperature again. I need to get used to the chill of the water, an inch at a time, before stepping in further.

What happened this past week was very much a reflection of my preference for going slow. Instead of diving into the writing projects right away, I spent a good bit of time measuring coffee into the filter and pouring water into the pot and selecting just the “right” coffee mug. Only then did I sit down with my coffee to turn on my computer and open a file.

But, as I say, I go into the water v-e-r-y slowly. So, before the Word document could even open, I switched to a different screen to check email, then switched again to review the latest status updates on Facebook and the most recent tweets on Twitter.

It took an hour, maybe more, to immerse myself in the water before I felt ready to look at the revisions waiting in the file that I’d opened earlier.

Clearly, I am not someone who plunges into the water but, rather, inches his way into words and the rhythm of sentences and paragraphs.

But here’s what I discovered on our three-week road trip: delays and distractions are part of the journey. Often, we’d set a goal for ourselves for the day, only to discover that an unexpected sign might delay or sidetrack us.

As we were leaving Oxford, MS, where we spent an afternoon visiting William Faulkner’s home, for instance, we headed east through Tupelo, MS. When we saw a sign for the birthplace of Elvis Presley, we decided to detour off our route to follow the arrow and discovered a place that we hadn’t expected to find.

Sometimes taking such a detour may seem like an act of procrastination, an unnecessary delay in the journey. But such a delay can often open your eyes to a new route or even a new way of conceiving the journey itself.

Likewise, sometimes the time that you spend away from your project may hold the key to a problem, a kernel of something that you might not have seen before or expected. It’s almost as if the delay, the act of procrastination, gives your eyes (and brain) a chance to relax so that you can see more clearly where your work is going.

And when you return to work, you may be able to see things differently in your story—where the plot falters, where a character might need more motivation, where a paragraph appears superfluous—and make the changes that you weren’t able to see before you took a break.

Distance from your work—whether it’s in the form of a driving expedition through thirteen states or a thirteen minute “procrastination” break—can help you see your work in a new, clearer light.

For more information on gaining perspective on your writing, visit:

http://www.writersdigest.com/whats-new/how-to-gain-perspective-on-your-work

http://whatifyoucouldnotfail.typepad.com/blog/2013/05/on-gaining-perspective-on-your-writing.html

http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/guide-to-literary-agents/getting-perspective-in-your-writing-journey

http://www.copyblogger.com/writing-perspective/

https://www.createspace.com/en/community/community/resources/blog/2011/06/01/gaining-perspective-when-writing

Swimming Horizontally or Vertically?

I took the plunge a few weeks ago and opened a Facebook account, and it’s a wonder that I’ve got the time to write this blog post because much of my time since then has been spent learning how to function within this new Facebook world that I’ve discovered.

Facebook is a remarkable creation, a worthwhile forum for sharing ideas, re-connecting with old friends, and meeting new people, and an almost effortless way to create a supportive community and expand one’s perspective of the world.

But it’s also a remarkable drain on one’s energy and time, and, there are times, as I find myself grappling with the new technology, that I wonder if my time might be better spent reading a book or writing in my journal or practicing yoga or going for a bike ride–anything else, in other words, than spending time on Facebook.

Yes, Facebook brings people together in new ways. But I found it can create distance between people, too, when one night last week I noticed my daughter on her Facebook account in the living room while I was on my Facebook account in my office. Had Facebook brought us closer? No, it was Facebook that kept us from sitting in the living room together watching another segment of The Office (my daughter’s favorite TV show) or repeats of House (one of my favorites at the moment).

What I’ve discovered inadvertently from spending so much time on Facebook over the past few weeks is that Facebook requires a different kind of writing and, hence, thinking. On Facebook I write “horizontally” rather than “vertically.” Depth doesn’t really exist on Facebook (or, at least, I haven’t found it yet). The structure is designed to enable people to reach out in the broadest possible way ... on a horizontal plane. That is, it makes it easier to amass friends, to increase one’s horizontal presence, say, than it is to think deeply (due to the restriction on posts over 420 characters).

This kind of structure, with word limits and incessant news feeds, encourages people to write in the form of an old-fashion postcard, where brevity was an art, and to communicate briefly with friends. It's a good way to stay in touch. But the same structure doesn’t encourage other kinds of writing (or thinking) that might suggest deeper forms of thought. The space –and time– to do such writing and thinking simply isn’t available on Facebook.

You can make discoveries when writing horizontally as well as vertically, but the discoveries are different. They have different weight, different value. And, of course, there’s no predicting what will happen as a result of writing horizontally on Facebook. You may discover a life-long friend who has the inclination to think deeply and the desire to share thoughts and feelings with you, just not on Facebook. You may even find the spark for an idea, the catalyst that starts you on your next story or points you toward a longer, more complex writing project.

What I have to remind myself each time I sign on to Facebook is to be careful of deluding myself into thinking that writing horizontally is writing vertically. It’s not.

I also have to remind myself that time is a rare commodity. It slips away too quickly, as this anonymous Latin poet so poignantly suggests:

Death plucks my ear and says,
Live—I am coming.

It's a question, I guess, of how to balance your time so that you can make the most of it.

And these notes are simply my gentle reminder that as writers we need to think about how we spend our time.

It's wonderful to enjoy spending time on Facebook, as long as it doesn't mean that we sacrifice the time we need to write the kind of deeper, more thoughtful work that calls to each of us.

See you later on Facebook.

For more on procrastination, visit:
http://www.pickthebrain.com/blog/14-ways-to-procrastinate-productively/
http://www.lifehack.org/articles/management/seven-ways-to-procrastinate-for-better-results.html
http://merablogpadho.wordpress.com/2009/04/28/top-10-ways-to-procrastinate/
http://www.businessknowhow.com/homeoffice/procrastinate.htm
http://www.paulgardner.info/productivity/25-ways-to-procrstinate/