Transcendence and Indifference

Posted on by sereichert

Sometimes on this blog I talk about writing. Sometimes, I talk about books and poetry, and creativity. I’m going to dip my toes in deeper waters this week, and I hope you’ll join me. I’ve been reading some really interesting books lately. Some of them fiction, some of them philosophy, but all exploring different aspects of perspective, experience, and this strange little existence we’re all trapped in.

Particularly, I’d like to talk about transcendence. Seems pretty hippy-dippy, yeah? Like only those on a first name basis with insanity or theistic religion (one and the same?) may reach this state. Those have been the acceptable formats to use in our ‘modern’ and indifferent current culture to reach transcendence. But what if, every human has the capacity to reach it? And why would we?

Well, ironically, I’m going to ask you how detached you are from technology these days. (I get it, you’re reading this blog–I appreciate your momentary attachment to my words, I hope they do you more good than harm). In our society, indifference, disconnect, and relativism have all formed a trifecta of creating a malaise of ingratitude and apathy. Whoa! Big words, nerd, tone it down…

Okay, so we live in a virtual world most of the time, rarely face to face. We are disconnected from the smaller, more real worlds of our surroundings. When we are face to face, we’re bombarded with the cultural effects of making EVERYTHING meaningful and important so that, nothing really is. We are more concerned with being seen than being known. We contain our worth in ‘like’ counts and ‘views’. We’re overwhelmed with information, but often that information is sensationalized and skewed, so the depth with which it affects us if often akin to a kiddie pool full of mostly piss…. What I’m saying is that our world has shortened our attention spans and hardened our hearts. And that’s a poor state to be in if you want to experience transcendence.

Why do we need to? We don’t. We could live our whole lives without having it. Some of us will. But as a creative, a writer, and a person who gives a damn about the world, transcendence translates to the interconnection of ideas and thought, the loss of self, the exaltation and delight of being truly present in a moment AND simultaneously interconnected with all moments. It helps writers and artists see connections and solve problems. It’s like having both hemispheres of your brain working at the same time.

In the modern world, people are addicted to the feelings of transcendence (joy, exaltation, elation, ecstasy, a disconnect from their lives) and many find it… often through drugs, or alcohol, or falling in love on repeat. Constantly punching tickets for these roller coasters of chemical highs, and depressive lows…Short term gains with long term consequences. It’s the equivalent of taking the gondola up the mountain but not really appreciating the view at the top the same way someone who climbed the mountain does.

See, transcendence (the magical lapse, the alpha state, the eureka moment, the disconnect from our small selves) comes from putting in time. Time on your craft, investment in your art. It comes after working through problems, working past failures and over obstacles. It means letting go of your ego in favor of discipline, to have intense attentiveness to the world around you (not an easy thing to do in the era of the internet), patience, and observation…curiosity. Hands on work, and hours in the seat. It certainly can’t come if AI is writing your story for you.

It probably comes as no surprise that, in our era of entitlement, transcendence is rarely a thing experienced. No one wants to work hard enough to the point that the work becomes the ease. And the process becomes, in itself, a meditation. Building a bridge between our analytical brain and our inspirational intuition takes time, and practice. It takes silence, and contemplation. It takes noticing the world around you. And this isn’t just experienced in writing or artistic endeavors. As a martial artist I’ve understood that its only through intense repetition, years of practice, curiosity and humility on the floor do I attain precise and sharp motion when it is called upon. (Slow to flow, flow to speed, speed to power, power to grace.)

So how do we recapture it? How do we overcome the indifference and work towards this genuinely life-altering experience? I urge you to take pause from the instantaneous solutions and gratifications in your life. Climb more mountains. Do things the hard way. Stop thinking that focused time is a waste, and give yourself a gift of singular-tasks. Don’t give up when things are muddy or unclear. Don’t be afraid to fail, but go on, steadily up that mountain. Practice your craft, even when it means writing your synopsis or your back cover blurb, or that query letter…those are part of the journey. When you skip things, you miss out on more neural connections. More neural connections will lead to “Aha!” moments. Use your goddamn brain and don’t let the screen think for you. Get out of your echo chambers. Meet new people. Take an unrelated class. Read something you wouldn’t normally.

Why bother? Because human experience and potential is fading, right before our eyes. It’s being replaced by a strange and candy-coated lie. A shadow of what we are capable of. Our lives are being played out behind filtered photos and 25 second reels. And that life experience is no place to create from. Dig deeper. Give a damn about your short and beautiful trip. Make it count.

From Beneath A Pile of Tissues

Posted on by sereichert

Good morning, Gentle writers.

I hope that this blog finds you well and in good health. Over the weekend, I acquired a…virus? And what had planned to be an ambitious weekend, filled with a long-run in preparation for a half-marathon, finishing up my latest Vella, and reworking my two-act play, became the sad potato of me huddled in bed. I don’t get sick often. Certainly not the kind of sick that forcibly dunks me beneath the unconscious depths of two-hour naps. I get frustrated when my body does this. At one point, I even took my laptop to bed, determined that I could let my body rest and my mind could still function.

Brains don’t like fevers. That’s what I’ve learned. And the longer and stronger that fever, the less coherent I was. My brain got frustrated with me. It quickly became apparent, right before I was knocked in the head by the flu-fairy with a large sleepy stick, that nothing I wrote in that state would be worth a damn. So…I put my life aside and gave myself the permission to sleep.

Sounds silly, huh? Just sleep when you need to sleep, you don’t need “permission”! But when you’re a mom, and a woman, and a go-getter, and a do-er…it’s about the hardest thing in the world to grant yourself. Especially to do it guilt free. I lost space and time and the kids were just fine. The laundry still got done, the world did not fall apart. How little grace we give ourselves to rest, I thought, in between workshops of unconsciousness.

Know the best part? Besides the tripped out dreams (holy revisiting of homework-being-late paranoia)? I realized how much I really fucking love sleep. I realized how little of it I actually get in my day to day. I realized that I average about 4 hours a night. And that’s maaaaaybe not enough. I realized that after a day of sleeping, the twenty minutes of writing I did get at night was a lot easier to do.

So here’s my advice for the week. Don’t discredit sleep as a writer and a creative. You may be a super lark or a tenacious night owl, but if you’re not getting in the repair work that only sleep can do, not only will you likely catch more colds, but your brain won’t be its wrinkliest. And a wrinkly brain is a…is a…where was I going with this? *checks temp…feels sleepy* The point is, rest helps you rebuild, it also lets your brain play and take a few hours off of the stupid demands of reality. Play for a brain, translates to creativity and more writing for us.

I’m going to go blow my nose and take a nap. Take care of yourselves and I’ll *yawn, sniffle* see you next week.

A Super Secret Guide to Finishing Your Damn Book. Part Three: The Down and Dirty of Feeding Your Creation to The Wolves of the World

Posted on by sereichert

Hello, gentle writer, thanks for surviving that title up there…ahem. Let’s chat, shall we?

I suppose it goes without saying that after you’ve written your book and streamlined it into a gleaming beacon of fine-as-hell storytelling, you could easily stop reading this blog. You may even wish you could. But there is one more thing I’m going to need you to do…

Resist the urge to tuck that book safely away in a drawer.

Unless of course, all you want for your book is for it to sit on the dusty shelves of your den and no other eyes need apply. That’s cool.

We probably didn’t want to read it anyway, right? Your story? The shining soul child of your imagination and hard work? The obsession that’s kept you awake at night and in the zombie zone of blank-eyed stares over your cornflakes, morning after morning, while your brain builds the magnificent steel girdle of plot and your vibrant right hemisphere stretches the skin of detail and beauty across the iron bones to make something quite unique and amazing. Nah…We don’t want to see that. Who would?

Were you able to pick up on that sarcasm? It’s tricky in Cambria 12 font to really capture the essence of my meaning. Here, allow me be to be perfectly direct.

Show me your work! (Channeling Cuba Gooding Jr.—“Show me the Story!”)

It’s quite possibly the hardest thing you’ll ever do (even harder than killing your darlings? Why yes, even harder than that!) Being a writer is a parade of progressively harder choices and leaps of faith…but then again, so is life… hang on to your self-help hats here, she’s getting deep.

Yeah, it is scary. Because we’ve learned well by this point in our lives that when we put so much love and heart into our work it’s gut-wrenching to hand it over to someone who can’t possibly understand the grit and soul we put into it. They might misinterpret. They might not ‘get’ it. They might declare us wrong, or awful, or in desperate need to change our dreams.

Nobody wants to face that possibility. You are not alone in this fear. And let’s face facts; there are jerks out there. Legit, bonafide A-holes. Those that are quick to cut down creative efforts (especially when they get to hide behind the curtain of anonymity in some trolling-Wizard-of-Oz’s mother’s basement.) They LOVE to give a good criticism, because of their own fears of failure and are stung by the twinge of jealousy when someone else is bold and brave enough to create and share.

It’s a sad state of affairs but your work can become fresh meat for the slathering-mouthed, teeth-gnashers of the world.Wolf / Gray Wolf / Timber Wolf - eating White-tailed deer prey

You Are Not Alone. You aren’t the first they’ll try to tear down, and you certainly won’t be the last.

Do it anyway.

Why? Why torture yourself? Because, there are good people out there. People who love stories and story-tellers. People who understand it’s a process and that when you come to them with open pages and hearts, that they are taking on a mantle of trust. Trust that they will be kind, but honest. That they will work WITH you to make the story better. They will point out things you’ve been too close to see. They will point out things they think could use clarification. They will show you the loosened bolts and torn canvas so you can repair your creation. They will point out the beauty, the grace, the delicate details that gave them shivers or tears and it will embolden your spirit to fight for your creature.

Sharing your book is a monumentally important part of finishing your book. It will teach you what you didn’t know about your writing. It will teach you what works, and what needs work.

My challenge to you, frightened artist cowering over your pages like a hunched Gollum in the dark defending a scarred band of metal, is to offer up your precious. The beauty and the joy of creating are in the sharing.

gollum

I’ve had my cut of criticisms, hard and dirty. Mean. Some of them made me wonder if the person had even read my writing or just made assumptions based on my genre and lack of MFA gilding. I’ve wanted to take match and tinder to 8 years worth of my life on the front lawn while screaming profanities in the general direction of certain publishing houses. But I didn’t. I cooled down and let myself say these words to my disgruntled brain.

bookburning

“What are they seeing? What is slowing my writing/impairing my message? What can I change while still being true to my work?”

Opening the wound is to lay your ego out on the ground beside your creature and do the work that needs to be done. This is not an actual child. It’s an idea. And all good ideas can always get better.

Find a group of friends. Start there. Start with those that love you. Move up to those that think you’re decent enough, but aren’t afraid to tell you what they think. Give it to a few discerning hard-asses. Each step along the way, refining and tweaking, without giving up your voice or the elements that make your writing yours. No one can take that, nor should you let them.

So that’s it. The third and nearly final part of this series. Next week I’ll wrap it all up with a handy and bulleted (we all know you love the bullet lists) list of how to query your work to someone who can serve as a gateway into the realm of publishing.

Good luck, kiddo. And if all else fails and you don’t know where to turn with your work, send it to me or another writer you trust. Nobody knows the soul struggle better than your own kind.

Poetry 3-14-24

Posted on by sereichert

In honor of spring, I’ve dug this little gem out of one of the many unmarked-but-filled journals in my desk. My poor children will one day find all of these scratchings and will have to make sense of them, or they may chose to burn them (I will be gone and won’t offer protest). I hope some of my words survive. So they know the normalcy of a heart, wild-raging and how undefinable a life really is.

Sown

I am wakening
though this small seed planted
seems stagnant
and it is cold and dark 
the surrounding day
so dense and ungiving
but the seed is planted
and every seed has 
potential
for awakening

And this seed...
I know her concrete shell
her impervious coat
you think the darker,
the colder,
the absolute absence of love
would kill her
dead pod in ground
served justice for even thinking 
of blooming on her own

But you do not know this seed,
no one does
except me.
I knew when I plucked her 
from my heart in the solitary depths of 
lovely dispair, and whispered
incantations of self-worth
of imperviousness
of an unbreakable shell
an unkillable flame
the magic was set and 
it no longer needed 
what living things needed 
to survive

because she is survival
and her words will tendril
into the hard pack of your indifference
and she will feed off of your apathy
and she will shoot forth
arms to the sky 
that you cannot hold down
with guilt or obligations
or crocodile tears

because she is the boundless
and unshakable irreverence 
of me, 
and I will awaken 
in the absence of your love

Big News and…Less-Big News

Posted on by sereichert

Well, first there’s this…

If you don’t follow me on social media, the big news of the week is that “Raising Elle” was selected as a finalist for the Colorado Book Awards through The Colorado Humanities. The winners will be announced at the end of June. But until I lose (probable) I will crow about it wherever I can. Because I believe in the arts and this is a huge honor. Congratulations to my fellow finalists as well!

What else is in news? Well… I’ll be teaching at a sweet little mountain retreat in May. I believe there are still spots open and its going to be a great way to kick start your next project, or help you overcome the roadblocks you might be having. The Writers Retreat, sponsored by the Writing Heights Writer’s Association is May 6th through the 9th and will feature workshops as well as free-write time. Food and lodging is included, and its really a great deal. Don’t wait, because spots will fill up fast.

Whenever someone asks me how I finished my first novel, it was because I invested in the time to work on it. Time is what a retreat offers you, away from the demands of the day so you can throw your heart into your work. And that’s how books get written. Register HERE.

Hm…also…I will be teaching a few Saturday classes through the WHWA coming up. But even if its not me teaching them, you should attend. Every third Saturday, for a very small fee (free if you’re a member of WHWA-register here) you get two, one-hour classes on craft, business, and writing related topics.

If you have a youth interested in writing, this is a GREAT time to get them signed up for my youth classes (every 2nd Saturday from 1-3. Free, no charge, and fun) we’re working on putting together a book, and the young writers will be paid for their submissions. Check out that website here.

The yearly conference for WHWA is on July 19th-20th and will focus on the other aspects involved with writing, including goal setting for writers, contracts and dealing with copyrights in the era of AI, marketing, formatting, and building up your platform. It should be really helpful for those of you who are taking next steps in the process. You can Register Here and we can hang out after all the braining for a martini or a cup of tea.

In other, lesser news…I’m stalled out on my writing. I don’t know if its a combination of everything else happening in life (kids, pets, surgeries, existential dread, running injuries, feelings of inadequacy, lack of sleep, imposter syndrome, anxiety, depression…lack of fucks to give? disillusionment, loss of romanticism, loss of…will to create anything at all. I don’t even want to make a sandwich) but I’m struggling. I’m trying out playwriting… I’m failing. I think I’ve rewritten the current project (not even complete) four times over and I’m barely making headway… I don’t have a new book ready. I don’t even have any of my older projects done…my current Kindle Vella is…DOA, and I feel like I’m bereft of purpose. So….yeah. Happy week I guess? I keep telling myself it’ll come back. But the snide and growing voice in the back of my head keeps sneering…”what if it doesn’t?”

what if it doesn’t?

Maybe life just goes on. Regardless of what my little nothingness of an existence is doing. Life will go on.

A Super Secret Guide to Finishing Your Damn Book. Part Deux: Seeing The Bigger Picture

Posted on by sereichert

Bonjour!

I’m so glad you decided to come back.

How was last week?

Did you separate the amoebic tendrils of your technological parasites long enough to remember how to write, free-style? Did you get hand cramps? Keep it up, before you know it, you’ll be cleaning and jerking 7,000 words a week, vocabularian veins popping out all over the place.

For this week we’re going to zoom ahead to the future; to the cumulation of all your writing efforts and the massive chunk of story sitting in front of you. All of those beautiful words you’ve poured into a pile are just waiting for the dexterous hand of a good story teller.

Your rough draft is like a thousand pound hunk of stone. If you want to get all “Americana” on it, you could even say its akin to a 100 pound ‘pat’ of butter. Yeah, let’s go with butter.

The rough material has potential. Your story has energy and power. But if you were to send in a stick of butter to the Iowa State Fair judging committee, they’d probably to one of three things: write you a scathing review for wasting their time; send it back and write a scathing review for wasting their time; or batter it, deep fat fry it, and send their thanks for the mid-morning snack.

jabba butter
Jabba the Butt(er). No? Come on. You have no idea how many hours I spent looking at butter sculpture.

Your book, your words, your ideas deserve better. If you loved it enough to write it, then love it enough to shape it into the best it can be. And by that I mean…learn to edit your work properly. This week’s true secret to finishing your damn book is something you won’t hear from a lot of writers and here it is:

Being a great writer is 20% writing. and 267% editing. Shut up, I’m not good a public math. Seriously though, when you get your ass in that chair and throw all the good and bad down, and your mind learns to work in the space and time you give it to create, you can really accumulate a massive amount in a short period of time. But the art of writing, the finesse, the je ne sais quoi, if you will, lies in the ability to edit that beautiful mess into a story that captivates.

Que voulez-vous dire?

How does this magic happen, you might ask? If you’ve been around in the writing game for any amount of time, you’ve had the old adage banged into your skull over and over “Kill your darlings, Kill your darlings…” Yes…yes Maestro Faulkner, whatever you ask!

What does that really mean? Well–*le sigh*–it means you as a dreamer, a wordsmith, a lover of story and character…you, creator…must become a destroyer. A hard, eagle-eyed machine; disconnected from the rapport you’ve built over the years with your characters. You must let go of the personal angst, pain, and joy you’ve brought into the world enough to see its true potential. You have to take that beautiful hunk of marble (or butter) and break the rough and useless parts away to reveal the true work of art beneath.

buttered saddled cock
Yep…that’s a giant butter cock with a saddle. You. Are. Welcome. (By the way, ‘giant butter cock’ is now trademarked. By me.)

Oh, Mon Dieu!  (which literally translates to OMD—OMD Becky, regarde ses derrière!)

The practice of “Killing your Darlings” is meant to make you understand that editing is hard. That letting go of the phrases and pieces of your novel that you love, when they are distractions to the story and its flow, can be the best thing you do. Cut. Cut deep. Cut the subconscious catch phrases and passivity. Give your readers a stronger character by making them the center of the action; by putting the reader in their shoes. Stop telling us everything. Cull the useless, the distracting, the stuffy, the monologues and head hopping. Give us the moonlight glinting off of window panes.

Take that lump and make it into something where details pull double-duty and every word counts. Line by line, strike out that which does not serve purpose or cause emotion to rise in the chest. Because even the most indescript lump of butter can turn into something quite magnificent when given the time and attention it deserves.

angelic butter
Sweet, Angelic Milk Fat.

Next week…after all of you hoodlums have taken a hard look at your work and gutted it to buttery perfection, we’ll take a look at what you can do next to get that silky minx out into the world.

Until then, keep writing. Drop me a line. Tell me how you’re doing.

Does anyone really want a giant baguette right now?

 

 

 

A Super Secret Guide to Finishing Your Work In Progress. Part 1: Technology vs. Creativity

Posted on by sereichert

Hey there, writer? Whatcha doin’? Surfing the Internet? Caught up in some devilishly clever blog post that has promised to give you the secrets of the craft in one easy-to-read, bulleted list with some fancy-schmancy graphics?

 

I see you.

 

I’m glad you’re here, actually, I DO have some important advice in this my first lesson on finishing your work in progress.

 

Get off the Internet and back to your writing, you filthy animal.

 

Ok…wait! Not right now…just hear me out. I promise, I’ll be brief (500 words or so…Look! Only 420 left! 418…)

 

Fewer things deter the creative process like the multi-faceted distractions we face in our interconnected world. The phone, social media, the addictive thumbs-up ‘likes’ and sympathetic sobbing emojis. Constant information streams into our overworked, underfed brains; the lies, the truth, the barrage of sight and sound that, when boiled down, amounts to so much nothing. So much noise.

So shut it down.

That’s it.

That’s all. Part 1, in a neat little nutshell. Expand? Ok, but only because you asked…

Do you want to write more? Then disconnect. Grab a pen and paper and sit your ass on a park bench or in a coffee shop with your phone and laptop “conveniently” left at home.Stop Wasting Time

 

“But…but I can’t just write! I won’t be able to spell check or word count (320 left) or research the typical milk production of a Nubian goat in April!”

 

First of all, my little perfectionist, rough drafts don’t need to be spell checked the moment words hit paper (shocking, right?)

 

Secondly, one page of average handwriting has about 250 words give or take. You’re welcome.

 

Third (ly?), you sound like someone who could use my patented “Blah Blah” technique to avoid distraction in the middle of your writing flow.

Not familiar? Well, don’t search it on line (Jesus, haven’t you been listening to me?) It’s a secret I share with only my closest creative misfits, lucky you.

When you don’t know a factual detail of some part of your scene, insert the words “Blah Blah” into the space and move on.

Image result for images eye roll

 

Did you—did you just roll your eyes at me?  Watch it…I will mom voice you so hard…

Observe:

“Victoria knew that the Nubians would produce at least blah blah of milk next month, giving her blah blah bars of homemade soap to sell.”

It also works if I’ve forgotten a secondary character’s name but know that scrolling back to find it will dry up the good stuff that’s pouring out:

“ ‘You’re a handful,’ Mr. Blah Blah said and scowled over the drag pole fence.”

Don’t fiddle with your flow. Let the unnecessary lay in wait and avoid the pitfall of jumping on the Internet to do some ‘quick research’ which will curtail your thought process and take you away from your work (16 hours of baby-goats-in-pajamas-videos later and I’ve forgotten evil exists in the world. Good for sleep, bad for fleshing out antagonists.)

When the creative dust has settled into a beautiful, uninhibited outpouring of ingenuity go back and find your ‘blah blahs’ (they stick out like sore typos, especially being ‘repeat’ words) and you can designate a specific, allotted time to research and check them.

 

There it is.

But in my forty or so words left, I should give you at least one bullet (I believe I promised it somewhere up there.)

  • More than just in your writing, consider disconnecting in your life. Be present in the world around you, not face down in a screen. Your writing will be better. Your life will be better. Power down for at least an hour a day. No phone, no television, no laptop, no screen. Live through your eyes, your ears… all those messy, beautiful human senses your mother worked so hard to make for nine months. Notice the vibrancy of color in nature, the way wind feels against your cheek. Listen to your own breath. Taste your food. Powerful writing comes from living with powerful intention.

 

Ok, now you can leave me. I apologize for surpassing the mark. What can I say? I didn’t want to mess with my flow.

Go work on your book. Your poem…your passion. Come back and let me know how it’s going.

I’m signing off for the day, but I’ll get back to you when my creative dust settles.

Habit vs. Muse

Posted on by sereichert

If you’re a writer or a creative of any kind you’ve known the sweet kiss of a muse. Sometimes it comes skipping through your bathroom, mid shower, and smacks you in the back of your shampoo-frothed head with a bat. Sometimes it tickles your ear, an errant breeze, while you’re outside waiting for your dog to be done with their business. Sometimes it meanders through the crosswalk, wearing clown shoes and a rubber duck hat while you’re waiting for the light to change. Whatever and whenever it hits you, its like the lighting of a match inside of your cold little cavern of a brain and its…brilliant.

With any luck, you’ve stashed pens and paper, notebooks, post-its, cocktail napkins and chocolate pudding in odd and disconnected places to jot down what it’s trying to tell you. Or I guess you could use your phone (old person eye roll). The point is, the muse is a beautiful part of what it means to be creative.

The trouble is…It doesn’t really exist.

A moment of silence for my former, favorite imaginary friend.

You see…”creatives” don’t have more encounters with “the muse” because we’re slightly unhinged and floppy in the gray matter (I mean, we might be, but that has very little to do with inspiration, and probably more to do with preferring to be in a state of la-la land over the past and current hellscapes).

We become ‘amused’ because we spend time building good habits pertaining to our art. Ideas are like seedlings, habits are the fertile soil. If you’re not building up healthy and rich (worthwhile not monetary) habits, there will be fewer little ideas sprouting up.

So what are these habits, Sarah?

Well, for one, you have to write.

Duhhhh…. Okay, I know that’s a easy pitch. But it’s really not that simple. So many of us simply won’t sit down until we feel inspired. Or we PROCRASTINATE with every other conceivable chore and ‘have-to’ before we sit down to write. Or we may sit down, but we stare at the cursor blinking or distract ourselves with ‘research’. Decide the baseboards need dusting, or the dog needs its ears cleaned. There are a billion ways we avoid it. I do too. And constantly I ask myself why.

*Side Quest* It’s because of fear. Usually. Fear that what I write will be shit. Fear that it will be really good and I’ll fall in love with it and lose myself for months and no one else will love it as much. Fear that what I write won’t lead anywhere. Fear that I’ll mess up my grammar, my POV, my plotline, my characters, my punctuation. Fear that it won’t be good enough. Fear that I won’t be good enough. Even with books out. Even with publications and awards. That old fear is a nasty briar patch to the rose garden of my work.

But habits are nothing to fear. At best they’re comforting, at worst, they’re droll. You can set something as simple as…

I will write for twenty minutes five times a day. Or I will sit my ass in my chair everyday at 5:30am and write for two hours straight. Or I will finish one poem a day. I will write three flash fictions every afternoon, or two ten-minute plays a day.

And then you sit the fuck down. And you write.

Its just that easy and its just that hard. But thats all it is.

And sometimes you will write shit. Sometimes you’re going to spend a whole day or afternoon or month on a project that just doesn’t work out. Sometimes it will be too raw or hurtful to share. Sometimes your POV will be atrocious and you’ll ellipses your blog to death…

But here’s your consolation prize to all of that:

Ahem…NO writing is bad. In every word, sentence, scrapped character or ridiculous poem, there is a certain fluency. A repetition. A practice. Bruce Lee didn’t fear the man who knew 10,000 different kicks, he feared the man who had practiced the same kick 10000 times. Because practice leads to progress…and closer to perfection (though who really wants that bullshit, it’s boring.)

Habit will sustain you, even when the muse has left to find some other crosswalk or doggy doo pile to traipse around. And with those designated times (habit) you will train your brain to settle in and do the work when its time. And that work creates fields. Rich and good fields, that you’re tilling and watering, and sprinkling shit on. And things grow there. Things you didn’t even know were laying dormant. Ideas, new directions, new thoughts, new characters, new combinations of words, or exciting adventures. The lushness of a garden well tended.

So here’s my advice. Don’t sit around waiting for some finicky tart in clown shoes to lead you to the next great idea. Sit your ass in the chair, open your notebook or laptop and start writing. Lead yourself to your next great idea, by doing the work. It’ll be a lot more enjoyable than you think.

Courting the Lion: An Excerpt and Call for Thoughts

Posted on by sereichert

Gentle Readers:

I’m so in love with my new couple and I’m beginning edits on their story. I just wanted to share this scene with you. I hope you enjoy. And while I appreciate any feedback, keep in mind that I do not debate religious or ‘moral’ issues, with trolls on line.

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Thomas sat opposite of him and put his hands between his knees. Richard took his books from the satchel, donned his glasses and began to read.

“Are we not going to discuss the matter?”

“Are you going to discuss, or are you going to yell at me?” Richard said, over the top of his spectacles. The carriage started to amble through town, the hoofbeats and city noise keeping their conversation private. The blinds were open and Thomas looked out at the cobbled streets and bright doorways as they passed.

“Last night was—”

“Beautiful.” Richard said.

“A sin—”

“Thomas, I cannot—” Richard huffed, took off his glasses, tapped them on his knee and sat forward. “I cannot undo the years of abuse and hurt you have suffered. Not in a day of riding boats or carriages, and certainly not when we arrive at the source of it. I can only assure you that you are not alone. You are not the first man or woman to fall for one of their own. It is not something that we chose. Any more than our hair color or our height.”

“But the bible—”

“Has been interpreted and reinterpreted by hundreds of men in power who sought to repopulate the earth with the poor and pious as to remain in power.”

Thomas was silent. “Richard—”

“They do this with fear. Not for the love of a god, but the fear of his retribution. And it keeps us all subjugate. Do you honestly believe a God would make you, perfect as you are, and mistakenly lead you to sin? That love, in all its fantastical and natural forms could be wrong?”

“I do not know.”

“You are a learned man. Think on it.” Richard said, put his glasses back on and began to read. The carriage jostled and swayed as they left the smoother cobble stone streets of Chippenham and tracked on to the dirt road. Richard tried to focus on his book, poetry…a love sonnet, that could have been meant for man or woman, or anything in between. He’d said the word love to the duke. And the duke had not said anything in return.

It was silly to be in love after a week. But Richard had known Thomas for so much longer. Hadn’t he wished he could meet a man like that in his own time? When there wasn’t a chasm of hurt to travel across to reach him. Love was not love when it alteration finds, or bends with the remover to remove….

“It is an ever-fixed mark,” Richard whispered and stared out the window. Thomas sat, arm still crossed over his chest, eyes on the road that stretched out behind them, the rolling green fields. The stillness and the sway of a journey taking him back home to the expectations of his family.

Thomas let the swaying settle his mind. Richard could not change the years of abuse. But he could offer him a safe place. Thomas had been a great many things in his life. Rich, strong, kept and shaped. But never safe. He looked up, Richard was still staring out of the window, biting his bottom lip and thinking over whatever verse he’d just read. A warrior body, a scholar mind. Damn, if he didn’t love the man. He wanted to know more. He wanted to spend years learning what made Richard Shaw such an enigmatic mystery. He would not get to know him in silence. Or from so far away.

“Make space,” Thomas grumbled and came to Richard’s side of the carriage.

“My lord?” Richard began but the duke gently nudged him to the side and sat down, swinging his legs up on the seat and laying his head in Richard’s lap. Richard lifted his arms in surprise and looked down at the scowl on Thomas’ face.

“Well?” Thomas asked.

“What is it you expect of me?” Richard asked, his throat bobbing with a hard swallow.

“Read to me, Doctor of Books.” Thomas whispered, folded his hands across his stomach and closed his eyes. Richard smiled, the weight and warmth of Thomas’ head on his thigh bringing such a beautiful sense of ease. He began, soft, even and intoning the rich language of a man who knew the power of words. His hand fell to where Thomas’ were folded and he caressed the duke’s fingers. Soon, his own hands and eyelids felt heavy and he took of his glasses. Thomas was asleep, curled into his stomach. He gently caressed his forehead, brushed the dark blonde hair away from his eyes and leaned his head back on the cushion. He tried to think through it, be logical…breathe deeply and let go of what he could not change. He kept stroking Thomas’ soft hair and felt some of his tension ease. They were here, they were safe.

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New Horizons and Old Loves

Posted on by sereichert

Life, man… It is a perpetual state of change. In fact, one of the only certainties about life is that it will change. And humans are no different than any other oxygen breathing, carbon-based sack of stardust. The world changes. We change with it, whether consciously or not. We discover things we didn’t know (I hope) we learn and make different choices (also—I hope and that they are in positive directions). We take hurt and either learn to heal or use it as a weapon on the other stardust sacks near us. We find excuses to fall back into bad habits, or reasons to springboard into better ways of living. We are a constant swirl of contradictions and brilliance.

As a beginning writer, I always thought I’d write the same kind of book for my whole life. Because I loved love. And I loved romance. And I enjoyed participating in the happily ever after of a good swoon-worthy book. But as the world evolves so do we, and I am no different. This is not to say that romance is some basic-bitch level writing, it absolutely is not. Romance is hard to pull off (sexual pun completely intended) in a way that is both believable and reaches for something we all wish we had. Its maddening and beautiful and some of my favorite books are still romances.

Back to my evolution.

It didn’t take me long to realize that while I love romance…it wasn’t the genre that fascinated me. The trouble began (I feel like this is one of those old 1960’s “don’t let this happen to you” videos in health class) probably when I started genre hopping like a vagabond onto railway cars in whatever direction the tracks were going. Just anywhere but here. I was thinking about how and why I seemed easily distracted into forays of genre crossing, experimental writing, and odd formats…And I just figured it out.

I’m a character follower. I can’t stick to a genre because my storytelling is like a puppy out on a walk that wants to jump on and follow every new person home. I want to stick my noses in their crotches and find out where they’ve been. Ok. That—that analogy went too far.

The point is… People interest me. Characters interest me. Whether I’m watching them pirate a space ship, imagining them breaking up the scar tissue of a thoroughbred horse, or fear for them as they get possessed by the spirit they’re hot for. I’m curious about people. How they live, how they deal, how they fail. How they love… what they love. How they keep on keeping on and manage to use their big old squishy hearts towards better ends. Or bitter ends.

So I guess I don’t stray too far from love. But I like the depth of how love incorporates itself into our lives, whether its romantic or not. Knowing this about me feels like untying a corset, a big breath in, a cutting of old ideas binding me into “what kind” of writer I am.

I’m a character writer.

Which means I can write poetry, or gay romance. I can write socially conscious plays, or epic space farmer odysseys. I can write song lyrics or philosophical observations on love and meaning (but I repeat myself). I can write about characters because I love and respect each of them. I care about them. I am curious about them. I am compassionate for them. I can be the journalistic eye that follows character and changes the world and myself through their experiences.

This year I’m wrapping up some older projects (urban fantasy-erotic-trilogy based on the legends of Norse and Scottish mythology? Yes please…Genetic killing machine learns she has a conscious? Don’t mind if I do… A time traveling, hot as hell gay romance between two of my new favorite characters? My heart is all a-twitter… A literary first person POV exploration of grief, loss, and how we let go without losing our hearts? My soul didn’t know my brain could write like that…)

But I’m also hopping on new rail cars. Tentatively, 2 plays covering everything from the cost of pro-life legislation on a micro level and the oft-ignored life ruination of the high school to prison pipeline for black youth, a book of erotic poetry, and exploring my horror side with short fiction. It’s all a little ethereal and unsettled yet, but I see the stardust of potential, tossed out in the frozen dark of space, lying in wait for a gravitational pull to gather it into new universes.

Oh, and signed up for another fucking marathon so…that was stupid. That stardust seed is a cackling massive black hole I should have clicked away from instead of looking at the price and going… “Hey! That’s a cheap way to suffer immensely.” I bet I could have paid somebody less to take a bat to my knees, with the same outcome…but here we are. Eternally hopeful and stubborn.

So here’s to new endeavors, in your writing and your life. Open up that perspective a little wider and let some of the stardust in. But keep love…at the heart of your universe.