Hoping I'm not that person.

Yep, my town, so awesome.

Philly lit night was awesome. Thanks to Frankie and Simon for another successful night. I'm not going to go into some of the discussions. Let's just say we laughed a lot and Simon has a great talent for speaking with multiple accents. Oh and now you know West Chester rocks. :) Also, the amazing Amy Garvey joined us. Her book COLD KISS was just released and is on my TBR list.

Awesome cover too.

So as I sat there with these amazing folks, I thought about querying. I know, weird. I thought for a second about the odds of landing an agent, and how out of all the people there, would I be the one who never gets one. I actually sat there thinking, holy crap, I may be the one. I may be that person who sits there waiting for that one day while everyone else gets it (they all deserve it) and some of them already have agents and book deals (again, well deserved). I might be the one who is only good enough to write daily blog posts and be a super cheerleader (I would do this no matter what, that's just me), but I think you get what I mean.

Now, I'm not getting all --the glass is half empty crap. In fact, the opposite. Yes, this thought pops into my head. It's natural. I get that feeling sometimes, but who doesn't. I'm not going to let it push me backwards. I have too much drive to stop. Of course, being in the company of such wonderful, supportive people helps. A lot. I'm, as you know, a natural born pessimist, but by the end of the night I almost saw the glass full (thanks Kate, most positive person ever, love that. I totally need your voice on a recorder for playback).

I have to follow what is meant for me. What feels right. If it takes me 10 years longer than everyone else then so be it. Okay, it would stink, but I would get there.

My point: Focus on you. Use your drive to get to where you want to be. Sure there will be doubts, it's totally natural, but don't slide down to the pessimist pool. It delays your success. As Rob Dyrdek says, Make your own luck. Yes, I watch Fantasy Factory. I like skateboarders remember. You have to find the positive in everything, he surely does and is super successful.

What are your thoughts?

How was your weekend?

Have a great day! 

Wicked Nightmares

So, I started a new project this weekend. I only have 3,000 words, but that's a lot for me. I'm loving it. I decided to save up my energy for that big war scene. I might tackle that next week. With all the junk in my head, I've been having a hard time sleeping. Not to mention my kids don't sleep, that well. One's five and one's 2 1/2. If one sleeps the other one is up and vice versa. My son also thinks it's hysterical to wake up at 5 am. The kids not sleeping, I'm used to, me not sleeping because I can't shut my brain off is another thing. Here's the issue. When I finally do sleep, I sleep super deep, super fast, which results in some wicked real nightmares. It started when my kids were infants and I was up every 2 hours.

The majority of these nightmares usually involves my kids. Not pleasant and extremely unsettling. One re-occuring one is my daughter being ripped from an airplane. Yeah, the roof flies off and she goes with it. It's horrible and disturbing, but feels extremely real. Now, I also chalk this up to being a parent. You can't help,but think of some of the horrible things that can happen to your kids.

Another theme of these realistic nightmares is my writing. Okay not as horrific, but still unsettling. I keep having nightmares of failure, people laughing at me, telling me I'm a joke and they were just being nice when they critiqued my stuff. It bothers me a lot. Maybe it's that doubt and insecurity that lurks in the shadows, ready to pounce on your weakest moment, sucking any optimism you have from your soul. It's part of the process and maybe it's because I started of a new project. I think I work hard. I  think I'm somewhat accepted. Do I have what it takes? I don't know, but the feeling is real and it stinks. I really don't like waking up feeling that way. Not a good way to start the day.

One thing that keeps going through my head is "The porch test." A speaker at a recent SCBWI conference spoke about this. The speaker told us to imagine ourselves in our 80s sitting on a porch, reminiscing about our life. I don't like to think of myself in my 80s (I fear getting old), but I played along.

The first visual is you got that agent, got that publishing deal, and became famous. You are probably extremely satisfied and happy.

The second visual is you went for your dream, wrote all the stories you wanted to write, but never got published. You're satisfied because you tried. No regrets.

The third visual is you never tried. You're miserable and grumpy. Regrets galore.

I thought it was a pretty good exercise. Uplifting. I know I don't want number 3 and I know if I keep traveling on number 2, well, I guess I would be fine with that. It stills doesn't help with doubt, though.

Now, I know my goal. I know what I want. Can I get it? Time will tell. I just want to sleep and get away from these stupid nightmares that push me down. Maybe I should try dreaming of my characters, they talk in my head all day. Maybe they go to sleep at night. At least someone is sleeping.

How do you get rid of nightmares?

How was your weekend?

My goals this week: Trying to write the new story. It's so much fun. The soundtrack is developing too. Lots of Blink-182 and punk rock.

Any goals?

Have a great day!

Stress can make you react in weird ways.

Well folks, I'm not myself today. I'm sorry. I had a critique that threw me down. A while back I had an opportunity for a critique by someone in the business. I'm not giving names or details. I highly respect this person and to be honest the critique was very constructive --so today I'm taking it that way. It was extremely helpful but I have to make major changes. There was also a comparison to a book which I read after I wrote my story and at the time I read it I freaked out because the beginning scared the crap out of me. Some of the parts were frightenly ( I think I made up a word) similar. So I have an evil eye for this book and have been trying to change some of those similarites. I knew this might happen and totally hated the thought then and now.There are positive points to the critique so I'm sure why I reacted this way. I can take critiques and this one was not that bad.

At first, I did what I try not to do. I cried. Yes, I did and hard. I wanted to ball up and disappear never to be heard from again. I see now how stupid it was after my daughter said what's wrong. I think mainly because I've been stressed out. My house, my kids, my life--lately has been stressful. Again, I will not bore you with the details. The critique broke me. Like I said it wasn't bad, it just threw my brain into a tizzy and made me react in a really stupid way. Stress with real life sucks. It makes you react to things in weird ways.

I just kept thinking how flippin hard I've been working on this changing it a gazillion times and now I have to re evaluate my whole story. My whole idea. Most of the night, I tortured myself on how much I sucked and I don't know why I think I even have talent. How I put every flippin ounce of energy thinking about this story and how to change it to make it better. Taking every stinking moment I had alone and some I would sneak when the kids were quiet (unlike right now) to work on this. Why did I start this now? With small kids? Am I insane?

I'm also trying to catch up with all the books I want to read and can't. By the time I get the kids to bed, I want to write and that's at 9:30-10. I try and write for an hour but most of the time it's unproductive because I'm too damn tired.

Then I told myself I have no time for the negative-- this is a sign, right? A sign to make me work harder and prove that I can. Right?

I feel bad because I felt for a second that I was putting all this time into this and what if I fail? That's part of the whole thing-- failing can happen.

Doubt crept in pushing me to quit but I'm pushing that aside. For now.

I love this too much. I have too many characters speaking to me. Ian and Anna looked at me with tears as I tried to forget them.

I'm in too deep. I'm willing to put in the time and learn.

I know more of this will come.  Pain and torture. This is only the beginning but I really know what some of you mean. I know how it feels and I don't have an agent or editor yet. So I give all of you the biggest credit and hugs. This is hard --I've always known that. It's only going to get harder. Can I take it?

I think so.

Crying only sheds the pain--releases it. Determination builds the strength and helps shield the doubt.

It's a small bump and I can take it. (I hope). Here I was writing all these posts about self esteem and determination. Now I plop back down. Sorry. Human here unless Edward puts me out of my misery. Where is that boy? Needed a distraction.

Thanks for reading and if I don't post for a few days (which may be hard) I'm just trying to get back on track. Taking a breather.  Re evaluating my story and my idea. Because I'm not sure where its going to go. Can I continue it? Part of me hates not to finish the revisions but I don't want something that sucks either. I have other ideas-- should I start one of those? I don't know right now.

My CPs will slap me a little I'm sure. :)

This is only the beginning.  Please don't think I'm a whiner. I feel like every couple weeks I post something like this. Sorry. I'm putting a positive spin on it and trying to apply that to the rest of the stresses I have.

After the whole night, ideas did begain to surface on what I might be able to do. Changes that even though require some work will make this WiP better. There are signs from this and I'm thankful for the person who did this critique. It would have happened sooner or later but I'm glad it happened now.

This also made me smile. This is by Abby Annis. I hope she doesn't mind that I used it for my post.

Oh and please excuse any mistakes. My brain was not thinking clearly when I wrote this. Have a great day!