Monday, April 29, 2013

The Struggling Writer’s Prayer


I'm in the middle of my current WIP and, given how much My Hockey Mom's Prayer has resonated with the struggles of one aspect of my life, I thought I'd jot down another prayer to get me (and hopefully some of you) through the struggle that is writing a book. I hope you get through your first draft relatively unscathed. I'm in the thick of the battle and I hope to see you on the other side!

The Struggling Writer's Prayer

May I find the strength today to open up my document and not be completely paralyzed by the blankness of the page.

May I grant myself forgiveness if I don’t reach a milestone word count, page count, hours count. Sometimes it is enough to just stare at the page, knowing it is there, and that I have gathered the strength to face it.

May I kick myself in the butt hard enough to write down a word, a sentence, a paragraph, even if I think it is horrible.

May I find the strength of will not to immediately delete the word, the sentence, the paragraph, even if I think it is horrible.

May I have the grace to accept the limitations of my writing, the intelligence to recognize its faults, and the determination to keep working at it to make it better.

May I take the time to celebrate the small successes, like finishing a chapter, figuring out the next plot point, or describing a scene.

May I have the courage to kill my darling, hard-fought-for words, and not think I am regressing. May I remember that sometimes to win a war you must retreat in battle and re-group so that the next attack comes out harder, more strategized and infinitely improved.

And, most of all, may I remember that I am not alone, even though it seems like it. That other writers are facing that blank page, those horrible words, that awful immensity of the challenge ahead and that they are there to offer support, humour, wisdom and, most importantly, wine and chocolate. That one day, the blank page will be filled, that despair will turn to elation, that you will have climbed the mountain and can sit at its peak, drinking your wine and eating that chocolate, and know, in that most fulfilling part of yourself, that you have written a book.

15 comments:

  1. Now, that's an excellent prayer. :)

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    1. Hey, Linda! Thanks so much - hope you are enjoying the publishing ride!

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  2. I'm going to print this out so I'll always have it. All of what you wrote rang true w/me- it's so good to know I'm not the only one! =)

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    1. So glad to hear it resonated, Leandra! And you are most definitely NOT the only one. :)

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  3. Amen.

    And today I can say it: AMEN. (Just finished the first draft.):)

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  4. Yay, Mirka!! Congratulations! I know the view from the mountain must be spectacular. :)

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  5. Wonderful prayer! I especially like the fifth point--one of the toughest things for me to accept is that it won't be perfect the first time through, and know that it is OK. Thanks for sharing this!

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    1. You are most welcome, Becky! Good luck and keep persevering!

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  6. A humbling and necessary prayer ... it's nice to know we're all in the same boat.

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    1. Hi Vijaya! Yes, it helps so much to know we have other writers to rely upon when we're struggling.

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  7. Apparently, you haven't seen Seventh-Heaven like I have; you're schtuck on this fast erroding planet without a moral compass (thank God for the Don: he'll hopefully bring back some sembalance of normalacy into our country).

    Nevertheless, I digress. Wanna join me Upstairs for the most zany, kooky, extremely exquisite and explicit, ethereal, physically psychotic, radical, tantalizin, stupendously-kick-ass, ultra-maximum-party-hardy at my place you ever encountered without d'New Joisey accent for an eternal slew of precarious, magnanimous and primeval absurdities etched in the Granite Corridoors of our eternity with a melt-in-your-mouth indulgence infinitely ...???

    trustNjesus, babe,
    and wiseabove to Seventh-Heaven, dear.
    Meet me Upstairs
    where we can RITE millions upon trillions
    of better-than-Dostoevsky's novelties in the Utopian Paradise.

    Cya soon...

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