a writer | chatting at the sky

when the critic speaks

February 3, 2012

There is a critical voice that speaks to you, maybe even right now. You may not notice because you’re so used to it, but most of us can pin it down if we pay attention. Sometimes it’s a voice that sounds eerily like our own. Other times we are blessed to have our critics speak out loud and in our face. Oh look, she’s being sarcastic – said those of us with critics are blessed. No sarcasm here, friend. Because something happens when the critic speaks up, something that perhaps can’t happen any other way.

When the critic speaks — dismissing our art, narrowing eyes at our carefully thought-through choices, misunderstanding our intent — he reminds us of all the reasons we were afraid to move in the first place. And for a bit, we are paralyzed by the fear of ever moving again. One wrong move, and they could start pointing.

It isn’t a thicker skin that I need. Don’t paint me word pictures of wet-backed ducks, water rolling off feathers. Don’t give me a lecture on sticks and stones. The words of the critic sting. And I want them to sting because the sting means I am alive, human, frail. I used to wish I were made stronger, tougher, more naturally resilient. But the critical voice is teaching me my humanness, and that is not a bad thing.

In fact (oh, the hilariousness of this!) the more I confess my frail humanity, the louder I hear the sound of another voice rising up in me, one that has some weight behind it. It is the voice of Hope, and I know it’s Jesus but sometimes I make Hope a girl because she just feels feminine to me. And she speaks with courage and a bit of a laugh. Because when those things we most fear will happen actually happen, we have a unique window of opportunity to take inventory of the battle field in the aftermath. And we look around, blink our eyes, listen to the quiet and think to ourselves, I am not dead. That did not kill me after all.

How could it? If I say I’m a believer (and I am) and if I believe the Bible is true (and I do), then I have already died to that old life, the one that gropes and clings to assurance and acceptance the world has to offer. And so if I have died with Christ and been raised to life in Him, how can I die again at the hands of the critic? What have I to fear if death is no longer a risk?

The critic carries gifts he never meant to bring, motivation he has no awareness of. The voice of the critic forces us to face our biggest fears, and in so doing, listen for the voice of God. If we dare to believe Him, if we dare to believe His dying and rising back up apply even in this, we can then be oddly, ironically, deliriously free.

“And since we died with Christ, we know we will also live with him. We are sure of this because Christ was raised from the dead, and he will never die again. Death no longer has any power over him.”

Romans 6:8-9, NLT

Tagged art Filed Under a writer, art, faith 37 Comments

for when you’re not cut out for this

February 1, 2012

I hang up the phone and see I’m still shaking. That did not go well. More radio interviews line up every Monday in February. I’m not cut out for this. I try to distract myself with email and the laundry, but I can’t ignore my shaking hands and the sweat under my armpits, turning my pink shirt darker pink. Finally I sit, and try to reason it away. You’ve done countless interviews by now, why do you still get so nervous?

But I do and I wish I could talk myself out of it. The interview has been over for a full 15 minutes and I consider this blessed life I’m so thankful for but didn’t quite plan on, exactly. There’s no such thing as just a writer. You need to be a communicator in all aspects of the word – writing, speaking, sweat-less interviews. It makes me dizzy sometimes.

I’m not cut out for this. And even as I say it, as I say it, I hear the Lord whisper, No, you are not cut out. You have been placed in. He really said that, sure as the way I stumbled and uh’d my way through that interview. He reminded me I have been placed into Him. No, not cut out.

I am connected, sure, safe. If I’m looking to be cut out for something, confident on my own terms, standing on my own platform, unwilling to die? Life can be scary and tasks, daunting. God takes great delight in finding us in places where we don’t feel cut out to succeed. And that is where he sends his invitation of remembrance – that shaky, sweaty mess is a reminder that I am desperate to depend on a source other than myself. Success takes on a different shape there. It looks a lot like rest and feels a lot like freedom.

Have you found yourself in a role you don’t feel cut out for lately?

Tagged writing Filed Under a writer, faith 59 Comments

The 11 Secrets of Getting Published

September 29, 2011

When I saw congrats and squee!s for Melanie at The Big Mama Blog burning up twitter yesterday, I scrambled to find out her news. After refreshing her crashed blog 47 times, I finally read that she recently signed a contract to write a book for Tyndale! And I quietly rejoiced with her in my heart because I know her journey was not quick and easy. I know the fear and the responsibility that come out of the shadows as soon as you sign your name on the line above the word author. I know the unexpected panic that seems to accompany a book contract, the kind you are completely unprepared for, tempting you to want to do anything but write that book.

Might I tread lightly into uncomfortable waters for a moment? Am I wrong to say that sometimes when a blogger announces they have an agent and are writing a book for a publisher and everything, am I wrong to say that sometimes it can bring a heavy cloud of discouragement? Because even though everyone knows that one person’s success doesn’t decrease anyone else’s chances, sometimes it feels that way.

And so we sit in a corner of scarcity, fearing our ideas will never be read, heard, seen, or appreciated. Three years ago when I was busy working on a book proposal, I was sure any real person in publishing would laugh at my ideas all the way back to their big city book office. Sometimes it was difficult to hear the success stories because I worried there were secrets I didn’t know. I worried my ideas were ridiculous, my writing was mediocre, and my desire to write would always only be a desire. Nothing more.

If publishing is something you are serious about, if writing has always been your thing, please don’t allow discouragement to derail you in your journey towards publication. Might I offer you some encouragement today in the form of words from a friend and writing mentor?

Mary DeMuth has written a fabulous 300 page book called The 11 Secrets of Getting Published. And she should know. She wrote in obscurity for ten years with no book and no recognition. Now, she’s the author of 12 books and counting. This girl knows some secrets. One of the things I love about Mary is that she is relatable, touch-able, personable and honest. (Okay that’s four things). She is a successful author who has translated her work into tips and keys for the rest of us. And then she put them all in an ebook for us to refer to as much as we want. There are no secrets with her.

11 people who need The 11 Secrets of Getting Published:

a man or woman who wants to learn more about publishing or writing in general
anyone who wants to clean up their writing, hone their skills, and better learn the craft
anyone who needs encouragement on her journey towards publication
a writer who wants to write a book proposal and wants someone to tell them what to do
an author who is published and wants advice on marketing, career, and purpose
a fearful writer who worries about both failure and success
a non-fiction writer who wants tips and perspective
a fiction writer who needs direction and motivation
a writer who wants to learn more about the difference between self-publishing and traditional publishing
a blogger who is curious about publishing and what it might mean
anyone who has always wanted a writing mentor

Mary holds nothing back. She shares her own fears and frustrations on her journey and is a wise and encouraging voice for the rest of us. Not only does she share lots of practical advice on the craft of writing, she also uses stories and behind-the-scenes snapshots to remind us of the work it took for the success stories to become successful.

“Did you know that George Clooney appeared in The Golden Girls’ episode, “To Catch a Neighbor” in 1987? He was one of the two police officers who stayed in the women’s home as protection. And now what’s he up to? Anything he wants. But George had to work. He had to pretend he was a young police man on The Golden Girls. He paid his dues.”

Mary DeMuth, 11 Secrets

The 11 Secrets of Getting Published is only $4.99. For the cost of a venti frappuccino you can have Mary’s hard earned wisdom and advice at your fingertips. And it won’t give you a stomachache or cellulite. You can have it delivered to your Kindle, Nook, or email as a simple PDF. Today, Mary is giving away 10 copies to 10 commenters on this post! Simply leave your answer to this question to enter:

If you could write about anything in the whole wide world, what would it be? Magical fiction? A blog about cooking? A rich and full memoir? Short stories? A book about the love of God? A column in a magazine? Pay no attention to that voice of reason. Just answer honestly in the comments. Ten winners will be notified Friday September 29. Go.

Filed Under a giveaway, a writer 243 Comments

for when you want to change your art

September 15, 2011

We talk a lot about finding your passion and doing your art. And I love it all. I love to see your eyes light up when you are finally honest about what you really want to do. And then, when you realize that’s what you were made to do? Shaped and formed by the Maker Himself? Oh, the blessed gift of it all!

But living the art doesn’t come out like riding on the back of a unicorn in gold-dipped shoes and galloping softly down a rainbow. It comes with grit. Exposure. Risk. Fear. Humility. And sometimes humiliation. Over the past two years, I have wished so many times that my passion was food. Oh, to write about tomato soup and eating around the table with family and making scones. I visit cooking blogs and make recipes and I feel safe and inspired. But those things don’t make me come alive from the inside out.

Shannan wrote a post yesterday about sitting around with new friends some years ago, answering light-hearted questions about favorite foods and pet peeves. Easy stuff. And then somebody asked what her biggest fear was and she quickly answered, “Being wrong.” Here’s what happened next:

“Everyone stopped talking, the game wasn’t fun anymore, and maybe the world stopped turning for a beat or two. I wanted to reach out and grab those two stupid words and stuff them right back in. I had spent my life being right. Admitting that I was afraid of being wrong was absolutely not right.

Why didn’t I just say “falling backwards off a steep cliff?” Why didn’t I say snakes? Speeding tickets? Slow drains? Camper toilets? … It’s funny how the truth takes new shape when it moves from your secret heart to the wide open air that you breathe. It becomes even bigger. It floats around and catches the light. It becomes a thing.”

Shannan, Flower Patch Farm Girl

It isn’t exactly parallel, but writing Grace for the Good Girl was one long why-didn’t-I-just-say-snakes experience. Why do I have to be passionate about something that is just so personal and exposing? Why do I feel compelled to splay my weaknesses in a book that is now sitting on bookstore shelves, bedside tables, car front seats, couch arms? Why can’t I just write about food? Animals? The weather?

I know the answer and I’m learning to receive it: talking about the grace of God makes me come alive. It’s deep and it’s serious and it’s sometimes heavy. It’s awkward to hold and it’s too long for an elevator pitch and it doesn’t look great in a tagline. It’s hard to market, difficult to summarize, cumbersome to share in the carpool line. But when I look into your eyes and I see you get it too, when we can talk about the secret things and the mystery of this hope of glory — it’s like someone turned on the music.

Have you ever wanted to change your art, to adopt some skill or gift that you think would be easier to live with? What makes it worth it?

***

The blog hop/tour/visitation/review/giveaway fun continues this week with one of my favorite bloggers, Shannan at Flower Patch Farm Girl and one of my favorite authors, Mary DeMuth. They both are giving away copies of the book this week and would love to have you stop by! Check out the blog tour schedule under Grace for the Good Girl in the navigation bar to learn more.

Tagged art, grace for the good girl Filed Under a writer, art, Grace for the Good Girl, inspired 46 Comments

You are Invited to a Party at the Nest

September 7, 2011

My sister is hosting a party at her house in Charlotte. And you are all invited. I realize when I say ‘ you are all invited’ I’m really only speaking to those of you who live within driving distance slash close to Charlotte. Still, you are invited. And here’s the proof::Once you know you can come, email The Nester at :: nestparty@gmail.com In the subject line of the email if you would, please write the number attending with your group. For example: 3 coming to the nest — you don’t even need to write anything in the body of the email. Once you send your email, you will get an auto response with directions. Here are some more instructions from The Nester:

If you aren’t sure you are coming or are not planning to come, please do not send the email. It will totally throw off my plans to have an estimated head count and my husband will be forced to eat extra cupcakes for weeks. If you are coming with a group of 4 girls, only one of you needs to email with 4 Party People in Your House or something like that in the subject line of the email, that way I only count 4 once instead of four times.

I do hope you can make it. We’ll have food plenty of book themed decor and lots of books for sale. But whether you can come or whether you cannot, I want to tell you thank you for your sweet support as this book has been released. The terrifying is mostly over, and I’m settling into content and thankful. I’m content that this book that has been rolling around in my heart and head and hands is finally out of mine and into yours. And I’m thankful to know you’ve been receiving it.

Haven’t been around here before? Watch the video. Read the first chapter. Buy the book. Have a cookie. (sorry. no link for that last one.)

Tagged grace for the good girl Filed Under a sister, a writer, Grace for the Good Girl 13 Comments

how to build your author platform

August 12, 2011

When I signed a contract to write two books for Revell back in December 2009, I had one magazine article to my name. And that was it. I did not have an agent (and I still don’t have one, by the way). I had about 1300 subscribers to my blog. That alone wasn’t very impressive to a publisher. Build your platform. That’s what they tell us. I’ve heard literary agents say you need to have at least 5000 subscribers to your blog before you will be considered for representation. I’ve walked out of sessions at writing conferences feeling defeated, discouraged, and nearly beat up. If you are a writer who has a blog and would like to pursue traditional publication, I’m sure you can relate. Here’s a comment I received on yesterday’s post.

“As a writer who loves to blog AND wants to pursue publication, how do you reconcile the whole concept of ‘don’t worry about the numbers’ when publishers only CARE about the numbers??? I mean, in the end, numbers=people. They aren’t just numbers. They represent the number of readers who are impacted by your message. For a publisher, they represent the number of people who will likely buy your new book. So, really…numbers DO matter.”

Sandy Cooper

I don’t know that publishers only care about the numbers. If that were true, I never would have gotten a contract. But agents and publishers do talk about platform. And platform is important. But it can be endlessly frustrating for a writer because it seems like you can’t have a book until you have a platform, and you can’t have a platform without a book. There is no formula, and I can’t tell you exactly why Revell took a chance on an unpublished blogger with a meager platform. But they did, and here is one thing I did that I think helped.

I focused on building a bench, not a platform. Several of the families who live in our cul-de-sac have been there for over 40 years. Their children are grown with children of their own, and I watch as these women walk slow to their mailbox, chat with one another in the street, and go back inside. They can’t stand there for long.

Last spring, we bought some benches to put in the grassy area of the cul-de-sac so we could sit and watch while the kids ride their bikes. But something else happened with those benches when we weren’t around.

One afternoon, I noticed two of my neighbors leave their house at the same time and shuffle towards the benches just before dinner. I went outside to check the mail and entered into the conversation with them for a while. They spoke of children and grandchildren, aging siblings and friends, the weather. They enjoyed the breeze and waved at the occasional passing car. They lingered. I made my way back to the kitchen to finish up dinner but kept my eye on them. They stayed out for nearly an hour. I’ve not seen them do that before. It isn’t that they didn’t want to be together, but before it wasn’t so easy. Now, they had a bench to sit on. And the bench made all the difference.

The bench didn’t give them something to talk about. It gave them a place to do it. People want to talk about things. They want to relate and live in community and converse and be together. Sometimes they just need a bench. They need a place to get the conversation started, a platform that allows them to linger and find one another.

A platform is a stage with the spotlight on you. A bench is a community with no spotlight at all. Build your bench.

I love how Sandy says numbers are people. And people do matter. People need benches, a place to relate and connect and identify with one another. When I wrote my book proposal, I didn’t have impressive numbers to show them. Instead, I focused on the reader, the girl who would come and sit on my bench if only they would help me show her where it was. Because you can build the most beautiful, relevant bench in North America but if no one knows it exists, they can’t come sit on it.

And so in addition to building a bench with quality content and a clear message, we need to have the confidence to talk about it. It’s not about me, it’s about you. It’s not about a massive audience, it’s about being a part of a community. It’s not about self-promotion, it’s about believing in your message enough to share it. Not because of you, but because of them.

What about you? Can you relate with Sandy and this sometimes frustrating dilemma of building a platform?

Tagged blog Filed Under a writer 51 Comments

But I want to write books, not blog posts!

August 11, 2011

I am three weeks away from turning in my second book to my publisher. I am also three weeks away from my first book releasing in bookstores everywhere. Three weeks away to the day. I know what it is to write books. Ish. I say that to remind you that everything I say today is seen through the lens of a writer who is steadily approaching both a major deadline as well as a book release. I might be seven shades of crazy.

Publishing is business, and I know so very little about it. (Hello, this is my first book, and I am no expert. Nice to meet you). One thing I do know: If you want to share a message, you have to do the work. Maybe the work is a book. Or maybe it is just a few blog posts or a series on a blog or an ebook. You don’t have to know which you have when you start, but as you handle it and sit with it and simply do the next thing that makes sense, you will know. Here are some things to keep in mind if you have a blog but would like to pursue traditional publication.

Writing may be different from publishing. You may be a writer. Does that mean you are also supposed to pursue publication? Are all writers destined to be published? Should all writers try? Rachelle Gardner wrote a post about Writing vs. Publishing on her blog a few months ago and the comments are especially interesting. A common theme among writers is the desire to not only want to write, but to want to be read. I relate with that. But are we limiting ourselves when being read only means writing books?

Blog writing is not practice. Sometimes I get the feeling that bloggers write on blogs as practice for their books that don’t exist yet. But they don’t take it seriously. This is a bad idea. If you need to practice, do it in your private journal. Don’t operate from a corner of scarcity, hoarding your best work for a future book. Do the work now. Why wait?

Book writing is not glamorous. Examine your reasons for wanting to be published in the traditional way. This isn’t the place to gloss over your red flags, or to say you’ll figure it out when the time comes. Know your reasons, and know them well. Is it to see your name on the cover of a book? Is it for the affirmation? Is it because a book is the absolute best way to get your message out and there is no other medium by which you could do that?

I’m not here to talk you out of your reasons. As you know, all kinds of writing can be grueling, lonely, and difficult. But when you write in such a way that forces you to get to the heart of your message, when you set out to create a large piece of work for public consumption, and when you have to do it on a deadline, you will cry, hate, go crazy, complain, fight, neglect things, and see yourself at your worst. And then, at the end of the day, you are the only one who can do it. Just you. You can’t delegate it, ration it, or boss it. It’s you and the book, and it won’t leave you alone until it’s done. And then when it’s done, it’s not yours anymore. You do all the work, and then you have to release it, this thing you have loved, shaped, hated, surrendered, taken back, hoarded, questioned, feared, rejoiced over, and made – you have to write it and then you have to release it into the hands of people who might love, hate, question, or dismiss it.

Your message needs to have long legs. When you publish a book, you’ll be sitting with this one message day after day, month after month, week after week, year after ever loving year. You have to love this message like you love yourself. You have to care for your reader with grace and compassion and endurance. You have to be willing to talk about this message in some form for the rest of your life. I’m not saying you will be talking about it forever, but you have to be willing to.

Know the real dream. You may have a dream to write a book, and that is a legitimate dream to be sure. But the truth is the fulfillment of that dream is partially out of your control. If you are a writer who has something to say, an even deeper dream than writing a book is to have people who need to hear what you have to say hear it. That’s really it. Your dream doesn’t have to change, but the method might.

The message is more important than the method. Your job is to cultivate a message. Once you embrace that you are a writer and begin writing the things that make you come alive, then you will become well versed in this area of your message. And you will want to share it in conversation, on a blog, through an ebook, a newsletter, a magazine article, a note to a friend. And here’s another thing. If it’s worth writing a book for, then it’s worth having a blog for, too. It’s also worth leading a small group at your church and having coffee with a friend and writing a blurb about it in a newsletter. Once you know your passion, you can mold it to fit anywhere.

This week, I’ve been sharing some thoughts from a talk I gave at the She Speaks Conference two weeks ago. Tomorrow we will finish up talking about writing. Are there any specific things we haven’t talked about that you have been wondering? Share them with us in the comments.

Tagged art, blog Filed Under a writer 28 Comments