Author: Kevin
.
Back From the Camino – Ready to Write!
You know when you know? Yes you do. You know what I’m talking about. We’re writers. We percolate. A writer can sit still for a week and be working as hard as anyone out there. Because we write from that vast landscape of the mind. We see moving pictures float past us at a hundred thousand miles a minute. We are always working. Like sloths, though, you sometimes can’t see the progress right away. But we move.
I know it’s time to write. The kettle is about to whistle. The pressure is building to a crescendo and the release valve needs to be…well, released.
I just got back from walking the Camino de Santiago (THE WAY OF ST. JAMES) in Spain. With a small leap of faith, I walked out onto the vast rooftop of the cathedral and and I sighed. I’m not sure, but the sigh may have been heard around the world. Like a butterfly flapping its wings in Japan to create a tsunami in Mexico, my sigh gently pushed its way out to the ocean and carried itself on a wave to lap against the shore on the Atlantic coast of Canada.
Yeah. I’m a romantic. It’s true.
As I stood up on the rooftop of that cathedral, I was certain that I was at the top of the world. And I was also certain that the top of the world was wherever you wanted it to be. It’s not a place on the map that needs to live by the laws of physics and altitudes and logic. The top of the world is a feeling. And I found it on my journey.
I walked through villages, cities, forests, fields, vineyards, mountains, rain and snow. I jumped barefoot into mud puddles and streams. I balanced, like a child, on ancient walls and sidewalk curbs. I walked with strangers and people who would become anything but strangers. I walked with Germans and Asians and French and Dutch and Americans and Canadians and Hungarians and Africans and Mexicans and Colombians and Irishmen and Peruvians and Scotsmen and Englishmen. I walked with the world. And I walked with no one. And I walked with ghosts and goats and cows and bulls and dogs and horses.
At the end of my journey–like Dorothy–I woke up. And in the magical city of Oz…er…Santiago, I found all the people I had shared my dream with. In a city I had never been in, I walked around and saw a thousand faces I already knew. Jean-Claude from France–the man I couldn’t look at without bursting into tears. He was there, too. Smiling and embracing every pilgrim he met along his own journey. And Jean-Claude held court with many people of many nations. He will be carried to many corners of our globe. Jean-Claude will never be forgotten. And he is just one of the peregrinos I encountered.
I discovered that the top of the world–like Kansas–was there all along. Perception is the only thing that needs to change in order for one to be there. You can walk hundreds of kilometers to get to a sacred land of emeralds and gold and gild-edged beauty. Sure…you can do that. And you can have the time of your life doing it, too. But in order to get home…in order to get to your bliss…you need only click your heels together. You need only open your eyes to it.
I have a story in my belly. Like the magical mystical ladies of Casa Verde, who could pour shots like nobody’s business, I am ready to shout. I will write about the Camino. I know I will. One can’t not.
AS USUAL, YOU CAN FIND MY BOOKS ON AMAZON. (-: Just click this link to get there.
A Writer’s To-Do List of Non-Writing Stuff That Will Help With Writing
All writers have time before and after (and in-between) writing time. How should we use that time? Better yet, how could we use that time in a way that may be useful to the B.I.C. (Bum In Chair) time we are afforded for our writing?
How about we make a short list?
- READ MORE – This is the easiest thing a writer can do to assist their own writing skills. What you put in to reading, you get back tenfold as a writer. As your neurons are connecting in new and interesting ways with the stories you read on the page, so too is your imagination working in the background on your own creative avenues of adventure. Never underestimate the power that reading gives you as a writer.
- RECOGNIZE THAT YOU ARE A PART OF A BIGGER FAMILY – It doesn’t matter what we write, writers have great opportunities to commune with one another in many interesting ways. Join writing circles, both in-person and online. Help other writers and accept help from other writers. There is SO much you can do. Host them on your blog, either in the form of a guest post or an interview. Offer to beta read their work. Be creative…if you can think of something that would benefit you, chances are it would benefit your fellow writer.
- NOTE TO SELF – This sounds corny, but it helps. Really, it does. Leave yourself little post-it notes on your mirror. Today, I will write an amazing sentence! I will edit Chapter 16 today! Today I will finish my first draft! I am a great writer! I will be published! I am going to submit something today! An agent is going to ask me for a full! You get the picture. Write yourself positive affirmations about your writing, about your writing life…
- VISIT THE HARD STUFF – We all skirt that place in our minds where we fear to tread. You know those demons you carry but dare not write about. Go there. Go to the deepest darkest place you can find inside of yourself…and when you come back from the journey, write from there! Be fearless. Your heart has a story to tell. Listen to it. Be authentic.
- GO FOR A WALK – Yes. A walk. It’s simple. Do silent meditation walks through the forest. Walk downtown and listen to the traffic. Walk downtown and listen to music screaming in your headphones as you drown out the traffic. It doesn’t matter how you do it…a walk is a fantastic thing for a writer to take. Your mind forgets the niggling day to day things when you’re out for a brisk walk…it’s free to wander. You can get it working for you in writerly ways.
- TAKE YOUR SHIT SERIOUSLY – Write out goals for yourself. This is a bit like the post-it notes, but the mind is a terrible enemy of the heart. We have to repeatedly poke it to get it to do what we want it to do sometimes. Once your goals are on paper, see to it that you achieve them. You’re the only one standing in your way. Nobody else is going to give a shit if you succeed or fail. Do it for you. 200 words a day times 365 days is 73,000 words. Break your goals down into manageable bites if need be. I just showed you an example of this with a goal to write a novel in 1 year. Seems like a hell of a hard thing to do—write a novel in a year. Then you break it down into 200 words a day and you can’t imagine not being able to write a measly 200 words in one day. 200 words is nothing, right? This bullet point alone is almost 200 words. Do this many words every day for a year and you have yourself a novel. Treat your writing like it’s important—like your shit matters. Because it does. It’s yours. It’s the result of your creativity. That’s golden.
- SERIOUSLY, CHILLAX – Writing is fun. Writing is allowing your creative side to do cartwheels across the floor. Writing is liberating your inner-child to sing at the top of his/her voice in the library where quietude is mandatory. Writing is using every colour in the crayon box to colour in your horse, just because you want to. Don’t, for the love of god and all things holy, make it a chore. When you feel that writing is becoming a chore, step away from it. You’re doing it wrong. Go read some poetry—maybe Shel Silverstein or Dr. Seuss. Don’t be serious. But be serious.
- FIND WAYS TO LEAVE YOUR COMFORT ZONE – Yes. Do it. Book yourself at an open mic event. Or get your own audience of friends and peers and read aloud from your work in front of them. Get yourself into a writing commitment with a seriously scary deadline. Offer to teach a workshop at your local library. Do something that will put you out on a limb without a paddle, or up a river without a parachute. Make yourself breathless with fear.
- TAKE INTERESTING COURSES THAT HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH WRITING BUT LOADS TO DO WITH CREATIVITY – You must have other interests? Macrame? Underwater Basket-Weaving? Photography? Stained-Glass Window Design? Theatre Arts & Drama? Oil Painting? Finger Painting? Bamboo Carving? Glass Blowing? Totem Pole Carving? All these things feed the creative monster inside. Learning new skills also gives you more to write about.
