The Process

Over the past several days, I have had ideas floating in my brain, ideas that I wanted to expound upon in this arena.  One was about the smell of mint, which led to the idea that fragrances take us to memories, which ended with the idea of childhood and a tall glass of tea -- mint, of course.  Another idea was about an old barn that I passed as I was driving, a white delapidated barn with shoots of something -- trees?-- growing in its gutters.  That idea led to another topic, that of the loss of the art of driving, and I still might write about that some day, so I won't elaborate now.

But then this morning I checked the blogs I follow; such a kind service these nice blogspot people provide, that the ones I follow appear in my dashboard!  One of the blogs mentioned a book called The Writer's Compass.  It describes a seven-stage process to help writers go from idea floating in Never Never Land to finished, edited, publishable work.  It looks very interesting and helpful, which is the key.  I may end up buying it, and I am writing about it here so that if I forget the title, I can look here and find it again!

This leads me to mention another book, Quitter.  This book describes how to go from job you work to put food on the table to dream job.  I heard the author discussing it on the radio.  One of the things he said is that you have to start working toward it now, and not by taking time away from your family: "Sorry, kids, we can't go to the park because I have to work on this dream job."  No.  If it is important enough for you to work at it at all, then it comes out of your time, i.e. early mornings or late nights.

I don't have family that needs my attention, but I do like my sleep.  This could be the catalyst that helps me --finally -- put action behind idea!  I already have my dream job; I teach at a Christian school and I wouldn't trade it for the world!  But I also want to be a successful writer, and I believe I have some talent.  It is just a matter of making that talent get off its butt!