More than Writers

  Stop writing?  Unthinkable.  You couldn't, could you? I blog (on my own blog, Write On ) on the first Wednesday of every month for the Insecure Writers’ Support Group , an American writers’ ‘bloghop’.  In July our optional topic was what – if anything – might persuade us to quit writing. As my computer-related headaches, neck and shoulder pain were giving me particular trouble at that time, I’m afraid my response, ‘Well, now, at this moment, not a lot!  For me, writing hurts.’  However, I received many helpful and supportive replies from the IWSG lot, so here I am, still at it.   Yet, composing that blog post earlier this month got me thinking about what would make – not just me, but any writer – give up writing.   …Apart from computer-related headaches, neck and shoulder pain, commonly known as RSI (Repetitive Strain Injury).   We’ll call that number one.   It affects almost all of us. Lack of success.   Maybe we had set our heart on becoming published or getting shorter pie

...and the rain came down and the floods came up... My kids love music and singing, so whenever we travel or I do stuff in the kitchen, there will be music. They love Bible songs especially, so whilst howling along with some songs the other day, it made me think when I sang about the floods coming up and the rain coming down. One of the worst affected small towns in the recent floods in Germany is called Schuld. I immediately thought of the Bible question about the fifteen on who the tower of Siloam fell, as Schuld means Guilt. Were the people in Guilty more guilty than those living in places like Glückstadt, Lucky City? Singing along with the wise builder, it suddenly struck me that the circumstances were the same for both builders. They both had floods coming up, rain coming down on what might well have been similar-looking houses. I always imagined the sandy builder to be rather smug, knowing he had cut corners but probably saved himself a lot of money and time. How do we writ

Image Credit:  Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos. Do you have seasons in writing? I don’t write to a season but I do have periods where I produce lots of work and other times when it seems, by comparison, I am “fallow”. I’m not. I’m usually developing ideas for writing up later or am editing a project. Neither of those show up well in terms of being able to point to something produced or a word count achieved.   But it is all writing. It all counts. This is why I don’t set a daily word count target. I set tasks to do and, for the larger ones, break them up into sections. The advantage of doing this is I always feel like I’ve achieved something for the good reason I have and that in turn encourages me to be even more productive. It also allows for those times when life inevitably gets in the way and you have to accept your writing plans are on hold for a bit. I take the view as long as I try to get something written during those times, that’s fine.    If I can’t, then i

Creativity: Is It All in The Mind? Anyone who occasionally visits my blog ( http://crossandcosmos.blogspot.com ) or who has followed my monthly entries on this blog will have realised I have an enthusiasm for seeking out places, situations or ideas that illustrate the greatness of God through science.   I get many of my ideas by reading the ‘New Scientist’, the subscription for which is Pam’s (my wife) annual  birthday present to me: an hugely enjoyed, repeating, weekly gift.   From my point of view, the sheer range of articles from, let’s say, palaeontology to those on  the latest space ventures, are rich seams. Recently there has been a lot of information about consciousness with many neuroscientists exploring how the brain works.    To a writer/armchair scientist, one of the fascinations of these particular articles is to look for some insights as to how creativity arises in the brain and equally, why creativity can be so evasive at times.   Immediately the subject is mind-blowing!

Today whilst on holiday in Norfolk, my friend Marilyn and I decided to go for a day of browsing in the shops and spending some gift cards we'd both recently received. I've always loved clothes shopping but the enjoyment is usually tempered by a vague feeling of guilt that I'm wasting both my time and money when I've already got all I need. I  browse furtively, hoping I won't be seen and judged and will probably either leave with nothing or buy something on impulse that I know I'll have to return.   Today was different!  I had gift cards and with these in hand I felt we had 'permission' to nose around the displays searching out the brightest colours and most frivolous styles and have fun trying them on for the first time since the start of the pandemic.  We left the shops laden with 'free' clothes. Having the gift cards was like having a key to enjoy guilt free shopping.  In fact, I'd have felt guilty if I hadn' t shopped because the gift

 As those of you who join in with Wordy Chat know, I went camping last week. Just me and the kids. Camping itself is an interesting experience. It’s a bit like publishing a book for the very first time. Before you even start writing you think, “Wouldn’t it be fun to write a lovely story?” So you sit down at your laptop and start. Halfway through the first chapter, you realise that some planning would be a good idea. But it’s still looking relaxing and fun. Just like booking a campsite, getting the tent down to see if the pegs are still in the right bag. The first few chapters just roll off your fingers, but it’s getting harder. We’re on chapter ten, and the end of the story is nowhere in sight. It’s going to be harder than we thought. The campsite provides all kinds of people at that stage. There are the kids, who sat in the car with long faces, fear having stolen their joy. What if... What if camping isn’t fun after all? What if the tent falls down? What if we have nothing to do?

 In a recent online ' Pray as you go' I was reminded that I was made to praise God and challenged to surrender everything to Him. How counter cultural is that? What does it mean? As we emerge from an unprecedented period of personal and social restrictions, I delight in the thought of returning to normal but at the same time question how normal 'normal' was anyway. If I was created to praise God then I became the mistress of being sidetracked. Something I've had to recognise during the endless lockdowns is that my former life was full of distractions. Some helped me avoid what I didn't want to do (like decluttering); others blocked deep reflection; many were short term fixes and indulgences. But I'm not beating myself up because experience has taught me it doesn't do any good. Perhaps the 'stick' works better than the 'carrot' for some, but I respond best to 'carrots' – like our ageing spaniel whose bottom is parked permanently be

If you’re looking in the Old Testament for a Christian Writer role model (for some reason the OT is often the first stop for role models), you can’t do much better than Barukh ben Neriyah. Barukh was the close associate, friend, and amanuensis of the prophet Yirmeyahu (aka, in the mangled English form, Jeremiah). It’s evident that he did his job faithfully, for Yirmeyahu’s prophecies have come down to us complete, though possibly in a slightly jumbled order, and with a few explanatory add-ons. As I’m sure you know, Yirmeyahu’s message was a tough one. The Lord commissioned him to announce to his fellow Judaeans that they were about 90% likely to meet with total national catastrophe. This would be the result of persistent worship of false gods, oppression of the poor and weak, injustice, faithlessness, cheating, corruption, and refusal to adhere to a supranational power bloc. They had a faint chance of escape, dependent on a change of heart. In the event they did not take this path, and

  The Writing Process: Sharing by Rebecca Seaton Write On! Magazines can be a great way to share shorter fiction and opinions.       Sharing is a big deal for many writers. Some of us are very self-conscious and only want to share when our work is as perfect as we can get it, others regularly share all kinds of work at various stages. I’ve definitely seen the benefit of sharing work in different ways and believe as writers it’s important to share our own work and help others share theirs.     The Bible is very clear that we are meant to work together, not in isolation: ‘…we who are many form one body and each member belongs to all the others.’ (Eph 12:5) and ‘As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.’ But how does this work in practice?     Writing Groups     In a writing group, there are a lot of opportunities to share writing, often in the early stages. I attend the East London ACW group and have shared extracts for what I’m currently working on, as well as wri

“I need your help, please,” I said to my niece this morning.  Ideas for this blog were not exactly flowing, so I thought I’d ask her for inspiration.  “If you were writing an article about writing, what would you put?”  She considered this. “Well, the first thing to think about is what to write about.”  I think the girl may be a genius, actually.  But I needed more….  I asked her how she’d decide what to write about.  “I’d write about what I can see.”  Again, genius.  I asked her what she’d write about just then.  She pointed, “I’d write about those lilies.”  “What would you write about them?”  Already my mind was awash with the conversations the lilies might have with each other, and things they’d observe, and….  “I’d write an instruction list on how to keep them alive.”  (She’s just popped in, read what I’ve written so far, and agreed it to be an accurate account….)  While I think an ‘instruction list’ on how to keep things alive writing-wise would be good, I know others have r

"13  … one thing I do [it is my one aspiration]: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,   14  I press on toward the goal to win the [supreme and heavenly] prize to which God in Christ Jesus is calling us upward."                                                   Philippians 3:13-14    I am sure we could all identify with having a goal, a desire, a commission from the Lord to complete in our life time.   Yet life is fraught with challenges that threaten to take us off course. Despite those, the Lord directs our paths, knows our innermost thoughts, turns everything to good, and brings peace on knowing His timing is perfect.   In lockdown I was writing a daily 500-word blog.  It was an ongoing story and the plot flowed.   My daily structure before, and during lockdown, remains the same, time with the Lord, answering emails and organising our lives before a sometimes a late lunch, and daily writing until 5.00 pm. Sunday a