Sandra Rodriguez Barron
1. Free yourself from ego & expectations for several years. Give yourself time to play, grow, learn, make mistakes and breathe. Trying to force your creative spirit to perform right away is like expecting your child to behave like a little adult. It's almost abusive. Your muse will rebel and hate you and torture you. Don't do it.
2. Be very specific about your reading list. If you have an idea about a theme or style of writing, read everything there is in that category. Then read interviews or biographies about those writers and find out who they were influenced by (there is always a trail of DNA to all art) and read those books too.
3. I think every fiction writer should read poetry. Not formally, just scan anthologies or journals for bright bits of language that you could imitate in your prose. It will make all the difference because most commercial writers don't do this.
4. Find ways to believe in yourself. I don't mean that your should surround yourself with friends who will tell you what you want to hear. I mean work hard, make progress and earn respect from the inside. Just like athletics, creative work requires stamina and perseverance and focus. No one can tell you that you're a good golfer or skier or runner and have it be true just because they said it. You either build up a skill or you don't.
5. Learn to emotionally detach from your work. It takes years to read your own work with a sharp, merciless eye. I recommend carefully chosen critique groups as training to become your own editor, reader, critic. It's somewhat schizophrenicto be the playful wild child (the creative) and the scissor-wielding editor. This multi-tasking is so difficult for all writers, but it's the greatest challenge of the beginner. You gain maturity in your personal life by falling and getting up. Same goes for your identity as a writer.
6. Connect. This would be a trite statement if I was talking about social media. Everyone knows it's important to interact online to get our work out there. It is essential to get out of our writerly, academic, or personal bubble of isolation and connect with the world. Do volunteer work for a cause or social issue that matters to you. Talk (and listen) to children, to old people, to your relatives, to random people you encounter, especially people who are not like you. Keep your ear to the ground, listen to the pulse of humanity, because that's where powerful stories come from. Make sure you're getting your inspiration from real life, not from artifice. You can turn to other books or films for structure and guidance, but make sure that the spark of life is coming from the real world. Don't beat yourself up for not writing if what you were doing instead can be called fully living. Writing and life go hand in hand.
7. Trust the thoughts you have in the shower. When you're alone and naked and the hot water is melting your neck tension and you are hidden behind a curtain from the world, your thoughts are also free to run around naked. Whatever menagerie of images and emotions make an appearance in this safe space are your primary concerns in life and your writing should stem from your emotional core. Same goes for images and ideas and feelings you experiences when you are doing other things than writing. Movement is a great generator of creativity.
2. Be very specific about your reading list. If you have an idea about a theme or style of writing, read everything there is in that category. Then read interviews or biographies about those writers and find out who they were influenced by (there is always a trail of DNA to all art) and read those books too.
3. I think every fiction writer should read poetry. Not formally, just scan anthologies or journals for bright bits of language that you could imitate in your prose. It will make all the difference because most commercial writers don't do this.
4. Find ways to believe in yourself. I don't mean that your should surround yourself with friends who will tell you what you want to hear. I mean work hard, make progress and earn respect from the inside. Just like athletics, creative work requires stamina and perseverance and focus. No one can tell you that you're a good golfer or skier or runner and have it be true just because they said it. You either build up a skill or you don't.
5. Learn to emotionally detach from your work. It takes years to read your own work with a sharp, merciless eye. I recommend carefully chosen critique groups as training to become your own editor, reader, critic. It's somewhat schizophrenicto be the playful wild child (the creative) and the scissor-wielding editor. This multi-tasking is so difficult for all writers, but it's the greatest challenge of the beginner. You gain maturity in your personal life by falling and getting up. Same goes for your identity as a writer.
6. Connect. This would be a trite statement if I was talking about social media. Everyone knows it's important to interact online to get our work out there. It is essential to get out of our writerly, academic, or personal bubble of isolation and connect with the world. Do volunteer work for a cause or social issue that matters to you. Talk (and listen) to children, to old people, to your relatives, to random people you encounter, especially people who are not like you. Keep your ear to the ground, listen to the pulse of humanity, because that's where powerful stories come from. Make sure you're getting your inspiration from real life, not from artifice. You can turn to other books or films for structure and guidance, but make sure that the spark of life is coming from the real world. Don't beat yourself up for not writing if what you were doing instead can be called fully living. Writing and life go hand in hand.
7. Trust the thoughts you have in the shower. When you're alone and naked and the hot water is melting your neck tension and you are hidden behind a curtain from the world, your thoughts are also free to run around naked. Whatever menagerie of images and emotions make an appearance in this safe space are your primary concerns in life and your writing should stem from your emotional core. Same goes for images and ideas and feelings you experiences when you are doing other things than writing. Movement is a great generator of creativity.
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