***You can search throughout
the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and
affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere.
You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and
affection." Buddha***
Recently I was speaking with a person I consider one of
the best Arabian Horse artists in the world.
She had just returned from the Arabian Horse Nationals, and she
commented how much she loved going to events since she could concentrate on her
art and the people who appreciate it. She gets a lot of work done while sitting
in her booth, or in her motel room at night. Once she’s home, she’s generally
too busy being a wife, a homeowner, and someone with far too much
responsibility.
I had one of those epiphany moments that do come to me
once in a while when I realized I was hearing from her what I’ve said to myself
so many times in the past. I just never
seem to have enough time to get anything finished since I’m doing so many other
things at once. So I dash from emergency
to emergency, and somehow the last thing on my schedule is what I should have
attacked first, my writing. As though I am seeing everything else as more
important than what should be the most important.
I’ve learned some great tricks lately to get the most use
from the limited number of hours available to us. One is the digital timer
suggestion I learned from Susan Elizabeth Phillips. She sets her timer for two
hours, and writes for that period of time. If she leaves the keyboard, she
turns off the time. For me it works a bit differently. I set the clock for an
hour, and write for that hour. Instead
of thinking I must write a full hour, my takes seems to be I have only an hour
to write, and getting to the last fifteen minutes the words pour onto the page.
But for that hour, I am writing. Period. Not fixing a cup of coffee, not answering the
phone and not not not checking my e-mail, Facebook, or Twitter. Not. Well, sort of not. When I do I lie to myself
about how I just need to check, to be very sure the world hasn’t come to an end
while I was creating great works of fiction. When in fact I’m allowing my mind
to wander into the realm of “I’m not really a writer, how dare I think this
hour of writing is more important than the outside world.”
And we get back to the crux of the matter, and the topic
of my phone conversation. Whenever I let
the doubts slide in, whenever I lose respect for what I’m doing, then I’ve let
the doubting side of me overcome the creating side of me. We can call it left brain/right brain, or
give it any fancy title we want. Fact
is, when we lose respect for ourselves and our craft, we give permission to
others not to have that same respect.
And they will take advantage of our lack. Not necessarily with malice, maybe they think
it’s for our own good since obviously we don’t really think we’re writers if we
aren’t fighting for time to create.
My friend has taken the timer pledge, and I’m going to
indulge myself in a few days to ensure she stays on the path to self
respect. She’s too darned good to fall
off road. So am I. And so are all of us.
About
Mona
Mona Karel is the writing
alter ego of Monica Stoner, who wrote Beatles fan fiction and terribly earnest
(read just not very good) Gothics in her teen years. She set aside writing
while working with horses and dogs all over the US, until she discovered used
book stores and Silhouette Romances. Shortly after that she also discovered
jobs that paid her for more than her ability to do a good scissors finish on a
terrier, and moved into the “real” working world. Right around then she wrote
her first full length book. It only took her twenty seven years to be
published. She writes looking out the window at the high plains of New Mexico,
with her Saluki dogs sprawled at her feet. Distraction much? ? Sometimes these
silly dogs take over her life, but there is always room for one more set of
characters in one more book
http://mona-karel.com/
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