Affirmation–The Payoff for Hard Work

To those of you who have followed this blog for a while, “Thank you.” I can think of moments when several of you, through comments, kept me motivated, tilting at my windmill–finishing my novel. When I doubted myself, you chided me. When I celebrated a breakthrough, you cheered me.

Besides writing my book, I had another goal: I wanted to share what I was learning with others. I wanted another writer to learn from my mistakes or discover a tool to save time. In that vein, I shared my embarrassing moments or time-wasters, so you could learn. Other times, I shared wisdom from experienced authors, so we all benefited.

Yesterday I received a tweet from youth book author Jim Denney that is one of those special remarks. The tweet read:

“Jim Denney‏@WriterJimDenney @MooreFay By the way you have an awesome blog for writers at https://faymoore.wordpress.com/ . Every serious writer should follow it. All the best!”

Thank you, Jim. If you are unfamiliar with Jim Denney, you can learn more about him here:

Jim Denney Author of the Timebenders series for young readers, beginning with Battle Before Time. Author of the ebook Writing in Overdrive: Write Faster, Write Freely, Write Brilliantly. Visit me at my Timebenders blog site: Jim Denney’s Timebenders and at my blog site for writers: Jim Denney’s Unearthly Fiction. On Twitter: @WriterJimDenney

My Uncle Dick

In our lives, we have people who have lasting influence. Uncle Dick is one for me. He’s a retired principal from the elementary education system. Had he been born in another time, I think he would have been, in addition to the Exchequer to the King, a Poet-Philosopher.

Uncle Dick’s wife, my maternal aunt, recently passed away. Aunt Jeanne routinely helped others and nurtured Uncle Dick. He habitually complimented her positive qualities aloud, publicly. Her loss hit him hard. His children arranged for a Care Corps volunteer to keep an eye on him. The woman who showed up at his door had many of the characteristics of my aunt. Of her, he wrote:

The volunteer from Care Corps–

To ease the vacuum of losing Jeanne,

So much like Jeanne in her caring ways–

Karen.

To me, Jeanne’s twin sister,

Born tardy, forty years late.

Uncle Dick appreciates humor. He sent me a quip about writing that made me smile.

The only way to create a sensation as an essayist these days is to write something mean about a cat.

He reminds me of the importance of awareness, being alive in every moment, at any age. Uncle Dick is in his nineties. In a recent newsletter that he sends monthly to family, under the heading “How to Think More about Sex,” he wrote:

“I quote from a book review for the author Alain de Botton, ‘Deep inside, we never quite forget the need with which we were born: to be accepted as we are, without regard to our deeds; to be loved through the medium of our body; to be enclosed in another’s arms.'”

Thank you, Uncle Dick, for giving me a living example of a love story, for demonstrating the power of language, and for teaching me how to live and laugh in the shadow of loss.

Quotation for 10-13-2012

If the wind fails to blow, take to the oars.

–Anonymous

Quotation for 10-10-2012

The best way out is always through.

–Robert Frost

FEAR OF FAILURE

Reading the comments over the past few days, I realize that many writers share a common malady: fear of failure.

Lee Warren, D.D. writes ” The most powerful forces known to man are not nuclear weapons, nor nature’s awesome wonders, such as the might of an earthquake, the power of the sun, or mastery of a hurricane, but the thoughts and ideas of the mind. ”

If the thoughts of the mind are fear driven, the power of the thoughts can be negative. For example, professional sports teams pay psychological specialists to work with athletes who are choking in the game because of fear.

Performance anxiety is common across a multitude of professions. Singers and stage actors often describe “butterflies” before a performance. However, when the fear grows, it becomes stage fright. It can stop the presentation in its tracks.

Writers fear reader rejection or critical censure. Self-doubt stymies creative process. A manuscript collects dust because the author is afraid to finish it. Fear incapacitates.

Buckminster Fuller wrote, “Whatever humans have learned had to be learned as a consequence of trial and error experience. Humans learn through mistakes.”

It is possible to move past fear. It helps to put fear in perspective. Try saying these positive statements out loud to yourself:

• I know that everyone feels fear of failing from time to time. I can learn to control my fear.
• Failing at something doesn’t make me a failure. I learn from my mistakes. Learning from mistakes is the sign of a successful person.
• I am courageous for expressing myself.
• I am entitled to my opinion.
• If what I tried the first time didn’t work, I can fix it. Or I can try something different.

“There is no failure. Only feedback.” –Robert Allen

Feedback is non-threatening. It helps us key in on how well we are communicating. It is the gauge of how we are doing in our growth process as writers.

When my daughter was a teenager, she talked about her career dreams. As is typical of a child’s mind, she believed she would start out at the CEO level of performance.  I explained that life is a learning curve. We have to start somewhere and then work our way up through skill development, practice and perseverance. We have to pay our dues.

As authors, we have to start somewhere. We write. We let others read it. We listen to the feedback from critical readers. We take the information provided to hone our skills. We dare and extend ourselves to practice, practice, practice. We write something. We let others read it. And the circle goes round and round. Eventually, we get more positive feedback than we did before. We keep pushing forward, paying our dues.

That’s the way it gets done. One written page at a time.