Wednesday, November 4, 2020

TO WRITE OR NOT TO WRITE - THAT IS NEVER THE QUESTION

This post is part of the monthly blog hop/therapy session known as the 
Insecure Writers Support Group founded by the one and only, Alex J. Cavanaugh. If you're a writer, insecure, or just supportive of writers—insecure or not—please join us. It happens the first Wednesday of each month. It would be sweet of you to visit at least a dozen or so new blogs and leave a comment. Your words will be appreciated.  Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.   

 

My awesome co-hosts for the November 4 posting of the IWSG are Jemi Fraser, Kim Lajevardi, L.G Keltner, Tyrean Martinson, and Rachna Chhabria!

November 4 question - Albert Camus once said, “The purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.” Flannery O’Conner said, “I write to discover what I know.” Authors across time and distance have had many reasons to write. Why do you write what you write?


To me... 

Writing is like breathing...

I have no choice...

Ideas come to me from out of nowhere...

And I don’t even get to choose the format or genre. 

When I was young it was poetry...

Next came short stories... 

And then my first novel came to me... 

In the shower no less...

Random bits and pieces flowed to me...

And I had no idea where they were coming from...

But I felt compelled to write them down...

So, wrapped in a towel, I ran run to my computer... 

And wrote everything that was coming into my head...

It felt like I was taking dictation.

After a year of this...

I looked at what I’d written and thought...

I have a book here...

And I did.

But after clumsy submissions and scads of rejections...

My insecurities took over...

And I closed the file and didn't open it for over a decade. 

Then...

With the encouragement from writer friends...

I opened the file again...

And after editing until my eyeballs fell out...

I sent out more queries...

Then more rejections...

But I wasn't going to give up...

I decided to Self-publish. And here is the fruit of my labor.


And still...

Every morning while I'm writing on my computer...

I thank my muse... 

Because if it was up to me and my brain...

I couldn’t write a word. 

And yup...

I still get inspiration in the shower.

So?

 What about you?

Why do you write what you write?

 

Always,


Em-Musing 


P.S. AZAEL'S LOT  is available on Amazon under my pen name: 

Karen Lee Baldwin. And surprisingly the genre is supernatural thriller...

not humorous women's fiction.

7 comments:

Jemi Fraser said...

What a great evolution of a writer!
"Editing until my eyeballs fall out" is a perfect description!

Rachna Chhabria said...

Love the fact that ideas come to you from no where :) That's the best part of being a writer isn't it?

Rachna Chhabria
Co-host IWSG
Rachna's Scriptorium

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Congratulations! Very cool cover.

Sarah Foster said...

Congrats! Getting ideas in the shower has definitely happened to me.

Arlee Bird said...

I think you expressed the act and motivation of writing well. I was more prolific at writing when I was younger, but then I guess I had more time for it and less distractions than we have today. I'd agree about those ideas that just seem to come out of the ether and into our brains. I've been getting a lot of song ideas like that in recent years.

Congratulations on taking that initiative to publish your book. Gotta start somewhere and you've done it!

Arlee Bird
Tossing It Out

Nick Wilford said...

Congrats on getting that book out there. Yes, sometimes it seems like writing is not a choice, otherwise where will those ideas go?

Fundy Blue said...

Way to go publishing your book, Karen! I've felt exactly like what you've described. Things coming out of nowhere, taking dictation. Good look with your book! Stay safe!