Packing Up Day!

I have loved this week.... I've loved chatting with some of you and praying for all of you.

I've loved our guest counselors that came along... Deb Kastner, Sandra Lee Smith, Mary Connealy and Linda Goodnight....

I'm delighted that they were able to carve time out of their busy summer schedules and hang out with us this week. Thank you, ladies!

Mostly I've loved seeing the great conversations. Seeing shy people open up. Seeing people chat about their stories at the brainstorming campfire... seeing posts resonate with authors.

Because yes, you are an author.

You are a writer.

It's not a designation that needs contracts or stipulations. If you write, you are a writer. If you finish a project, you've become an author.

Some of you know me from Seekerville.

Some know me from reading my books.

Some from facebook.

Some of you didn't know me at all.

Here's the thing, and here's why we love doing things like this for writers like you: It's easy to find folks who will offer advice for a price.

It's very different if you're trying to find folks to offer advice for free. The kind of folks who long for your success.

There are no shortcuts. Writers write. It's what we do. Developing the habit of writing is clutch to your success.

I'd love for all of you to stay in touch with me, either through my e-mail or Seekerville. Either way, I'd love to see what this coming season brings your way!

I'm hoping to do another retreat in January.... Post-holidays is a wonderful time to jump start things because the holidays are a wonderful six week season of very important family and faith things!

January tends to be a great time to re-start our engines, to get back in the habit of writing.

We've got a great breakfast planned for today... I know some are flying out later today, a couple are heading out first thing in the morning... and several are hitting the road driving straight after breakfast!

Thank you for being here.

Thank you for taking a chance.

Thank you for joining folks on trail rides and walks and campfires.

And may God bless you richly, abundantly, amazingly... in all walks of your life.

Ruthy

Lasso Those Negative Thoughts

Friday on the ranch, my friends, and it’s a glorious day as the sun rises over the mountains and calves moo for their mamas. Something about breathing in fresh mountain air and warm horse flesh (among other horse smells) clears the senses and gets my creative juices flowing, so I rose early and moseyed out to the barn. Shane was there, saddling up for the day ahead, so we jawed a bit. He’s not a writer, but he’s about as wise a fella as ever stuck his boot in the stirrup.

What did we discuss? You, and this week of watching writers push out of their chrysalises like pretty butterflies stretching, stretching toward the sky. Shane said that. And I told him he should have been a writer. He laughed. He also helped me focus on a common thread that seemed to run through this week’s posts. So here we go. Hitch up your garters, tighten up the cinch and listen in.

Confidence, or lack thereof, is a theme I see in many of your comments. Trust me, it’s a plague. Most writers I know deal with self-doubts, some more than others. But note the operative words: Writers deal with it. How? Here’s a few tips:

·       Stop the negative thoughts. Just stop. Remember in 2 Corinthians 10 where we're advised to cast down imaginations and to bring into captive every thought--- the negative thoughts, not your story imaginings. Replace those negative voices with positive ones. Remind yourself of your successes, however small. Finished a page? A chapter? That’s success. If someone once said you could write, replay it like your favorite YouTube video. For years, I lived on my high school English teacher’s words. She said I could write, and oh, how desperately I wanted to believe her. I repeated those words in my head through all the dark rejections, contest agonies, and wicked voices telling me I would never make it. Guess what? Those voices lie.

·       Listen to the voices. What? Didn’t I just say to ignore them? These are different voices, the good ones. The voices of your characters, of the story that plays in your subconscious. You have them, don’t you? Most writers do. Other "normal" people don’t. Once, while speaking to a group of non-writers, someone asked where I got my ideas. I mentioned the people and stories I'd always had inside my head. When they looked at me a bit funny, the truth hit me, so I asked. To a person, none of these non-writers had ever had a story scene or a voice or a insistent character push into their minds. I’ll admit I was shocked. It was at that moment I realized writers are wired differently. It’s our gift. And if you have it, wouldn’t it be an insult to the gift-giver not to use it? So go ahead. Listen to those voices.

·       Realize you have something valuable to share  through your words that no one else has. No one.  You never know when you'll write something that is exactly what a reader needed to hear. They'll write to you and tell you, and you'll be both gratified and humbled.

·       Remember Deb Kastner’s personal GMC. Write your answers down and revisit them now and then. The hard, cold truth about writing is this: No one will force you to write except you. Writing is one of those rare jobs that is both freeing and daunting because it is 100% self-motivated, especially in the beginning. If you really want it, and I think all of you do,  you will write, whether you ever publish or not.

·       Do it afraid. Do it insecure. Do it with those nasty voices whispering you’re not good enough. Maybe you aren’t yet. But you can be.

·       Study the craft. And never stop learning. The more you know, the more confident you become of getting it right.  But, as this old dog was reminded recently at RWA, “Don’t let technique get in the way of the story.” Wham! That hit me right in the keyboard. Even now I’m guilty of thinking too much about sentence structure and such when story must be king. Technique is important, don’t get me wrong, but don’t get so hung up that you lose your voice, your style, your story. Remember, you have something valuable to share. 

·       Now, go write your beautiful book. 

Winner of the RITA Award for excellence in inspirational fiction, Linda Goodnight has also won the Booksellers’ Best, ACFW Book of the Year (twice), and a Reviewers’ Choice Award from Romantic Times Magazine.

Linda has appeared on the New York Times, USA Today, Publisher's Weekly, and Christian bestseller lists, and her romance novels have been translated into more than a dozen languages. A  former nurse and teacher, Linda loves writing fiction that carries a message of hope and light in a sometimes dark world.

Linda enjoys cooking, reading, and travel. Next on her bucket list is Israel and Scotland. She lives in Oklahoma with husband, Gene, who, ironically, doesn't travel at all, and two of their daughters, Masha & Victoria.

Shane told me to keep it simple

Welcome to the Rocky Ridge Retreat!

Shane told me to keep it simple, be encouraging, keep it upbeat.

Keep it short.

Finally he gives me a direction I can take!

Here’s the thing, writers write.

In my experience, people who write can’t NOT write.

Oh, there are people who quit…I’ve known a few…but mostly they seem to just meander back to the computer before long. Because they can’t stop.

It’s not a THING you want to do. It’s the way your brain is wired. Or at least it is for me.

I’ve never really quit in all the years I’ve been writing, which is right around twenty years now.

I wrote for ten years before I got published and on that fateful day when I received my first contract, I had twenty finished books on my computer.

Since I sold that book I’ve gotten all but about five of those twenty books published and written about thirty more, if you count novellas as books…and I DO!!!

So there are two things you need to be a writer. 

ONE

The mindset, the love, the inner fire to write.

TWO

Craft

That’s it. One you have or you’re born with, or you discover within yourself. 

If you don’t have ONE then there is a very good chance you will never be a writer. There are famous people with books I suspect someone wrote for them, but that doesn’t make them writers.

TWO …that is every book, class, blog post, conference session…all of it. All you have to do to gain the skills. 

TWO you can learn. Hard work, but you can do it.

ONE you’ve either got it or you don’t.

So ask yourself AM I A WRITER??? And chances are, if you are here at this retreat, there’s a good chance you are.

If the answer is yes, the rest is just hard work, persistence, practice. Just like any skill…brain surgery, pitching a baseball, cutting hair, frosting a cake.

Think about how hard really good surgeons study, how many heads of hair a beautician cuts to get out of school, how many frosting roses someone messes up before they start looking right.

I read once I think is was Jerry West, hugely successful basketball player, saying he spent two hours a day working on his weaknesses.

I remember reading once that the top 100 tennis players in the world, by all measurements, served at the same mph, returned hits at the same speed, were as fast on their feet as all the other 100 players.

So what’s the difference? It’s all mental. Completely mental. The difference between Serena Williams and some also ran 100^th seed is completely and totally mental.

Mary 'Cowgirl' Connealy

So practice your weakness, practice your mental toughness when you get hard news of a contest loss or an editor or agent rejection.

But write.

Writers write.

And you’re a writer!

Sandra Lee Smith Stops In!!!!

Howdy, Y’all. Sandra here. Isn’t it wonderful up here in this fresh air? I love being on the ranch. I’m a bit saddle sore though from the horseback ride I took the yesterday. It’s been a while since I’ve been on a horse and those muscles are screaming.

So today I think I’ll take a hike up in the mountains.  I love the smell of the pine needles warming in the sun. I love catching a glimpse of the wildlife out here: deer, jackrabbits, coyotes and maybe I’ll get to see a cougar. Mountain lions are rare sightings though. I’ve only seen one in the wild about four times in my whole life.

I love the feel of the warmth from the golden rays on my skin. Anyone else here getting some suntan? I have a few more freckles on my nose. Chuckle. 

Maybe I’ll see an eagle soaring up in that deep blue sky.

The thing I like about taking a hike is that the physical activity keeps my left brain occupied so I have full freedom in the right brain to create. This really helps me develop my story in my head. Anyone else get inspired from walking? Some of my best story ideas have developed while hiking out in nature. In fact, Seeker buddies Myra, Cara and I all have novellas set with the characters hiking in the collection Love Will Find A Way.     link for that    

  

Another strategy I’ve used to get inspired is to do what Ruthy advises and that is just plain write every day. Sometimes I get stuck so I find that instead of sitting and fretting about where to go in that corner, I go write another scene that will fit in another chapter. Or I write a blog post or even work on another wip. Sometimes letting the other sit and gel for a while works. When I go back to it, I have some new ideas.

   

So if you’re stuck, maybe you can go sit on one of the swings on Shane’s veranda and look out at the cattle, horses and gorgeous scenery and write about what you see. It could be like a daily diary or some journaling. And who knows, that info might come in handy in a future wip.

Share with us the ways you get inspired. Or what do you do when you need to mull over your story ideas? I always love learning new techniques.  We will then be wise like this great horned owl.

Happy trails, folks.

Wanderin’ Down the Trail of Life

Howdy, y’all! Deb Kastner here, excited to be today’s Rocky Ridge counselor. I’m so excited to be meeting you here at the stable, ready to take our trail ride with our knowledgeable wranglers--Jace, Thomas and Zeb as our guides. You won’t want to miss taking in all the sights in this beautiful area and in my opinion, there’s no better way to enjoy nature than on horseback.

Oh, but yeah—this is a writing retreat. Well, hey, we can multi-task, can’t we? While you’re out breathing the fresh air and hearing the calming clip-clop of the horses’ hooves, you can pray about your future, dream about your writing and envision reaching for the stars.

(Speaking of stars, the evenings around here are amazing, aren’t they? Without the city lights dimming the sky, billions of stars and the Milky Way suddenly appear. Gorgeous!)

As we ride I hope you’ll look at your writing a little differently than you have before.

If you’ve been writing for any length of time, you’ve probably heard of GMC, Goals, Motivation and Conflict. Applied to your main characters, GMC fleshes them out to be three-dimensional people readers care about.

But today I’d like to talk to you about a different way to use GMC. On yourself. That’s right. I’d like to turn the tables on you and ask you what your Goals, Motivations and Conflicts are in your writing (I do this with my life, as well.)

Your characters need good, solid goals to make a story hold its framework. They need something important that they are willing to fight for, both internally and externally. Can the same thing be said of your writing?

Do you know why you write, what’s important to you? There are as many answers to that question as there are authors, so I want you to take time and search your heart. To honor God? To make a living? Make a bestseller list? Because you can’t not write? All of the above and then some?

What will happen when you hit a fork in the trail? Which way will you choose to go? In the best of all worlds, how do you see yourself in a year? Five? Ten? Allow yourself to dream. You want to make goals that are specific and measurable, but I encourage you to stretch yourself and reach for the stars.

Once you have an idea where you see yourself going, check out the trail heads and start where it makes the most sense to you. A specific traditional publisher? Jumping into indie?

When you’ve figured that out, you’ve got to find your motivation. For many writers, even those like me who have published over 30 books, struggle with motivation, especially, for me, at least, at the beginning of a project. Sure, I’m excited to do something new, but at the same time, I have this little imp on my shoulder, nagging at me. How did I ever believe I was an author? I can’t write a whole book’s full of words. No one wants to read what I write. I’m a fraud.

Then there are good writing days and bad writing days. Sometimes the words flow so fast I can’t keep up with them. Woo hoo! I want to sing, and dance and spin like a fairy. (You don’t want to see that. Really, you don’t.) And sometimes it’s downright painful to write even so much as a single word. I call it bleeding on paper. Those days are tough, and every writer I know has them.

What make them a writer is that they write anyway, no matter how they feel. They know why they are doing what they are doing and it motivates them to write even when they don’t feel like it. They are consistent. Successful authors have found a trail that takes them where they want to go. You can only set aside fifteen minutes a day? Use them. Five hundred words? You’ll reach the end eventually, right?

There’s no secret sauce here, my friends. No magic wand. You get on the horse, and you ride. If you fall off, you get back on. And then you do it again, and again, and again.

Guess what? You improve. Pretty soon, it (mostly) feels easier. And when it doesn’t, when you’ve gotten a particularly nasty rejection (believe me, it doesn’t matter whether you’re a seeker or multi-published, it happens. A lot.) or when you’ve flipped head-first over the neck of your horse and landed on your patootie, you groan, get yourself back on your feet, brush yourself off, and climb back on. I give myself twenty-four hours to grumble and sniffle, and then it’s back in the saddle and heading down the trail.

It’s motivation that gets you from the trailhead to the end of the trail.

Aaaaannnnddd then there is conflict.

I’m sure every one of you has a “but.” (No, not the one you landed on when you fell off your horse.)

 Life. Is. Difficult. If it’s not one thing, it’s another. Some years are WAY tougher than other years. Big stuff, like when my sweetheart had a double stroke, and little stuff, like yesterday morning on the way to church when I managed to twist my lower back getting into the car from the sidewalk instead of the garage. Yes, I am that talented. After two hours of eye-ball crossing pain singing in the church choir, I gave in and went to urgent care. A week of taking it easy and popping handfuls of ibuprofen is now in my future—but so is finishing a novella.

There are some conflicts that I legitimately put before my writing, which is also my day job, lending added pressure. I was a physical and emotional mess when Joe had his double stroke. I didn’t write until he was safely tucked away in a physical therapy hospital.  I did write through my back pain. I have chronic migraines, so if I waited until I was pain free to write, I wouldn’t have a single book written.

But I have goals. Motivation. So when the conflicts come, I am ready to fight back. Sometimes my books are better for it. Sometimes God is providing a lesson I need to learn before my characters can.

So now you know my secret—GMC. 

There’s one last thing I want to say before we part ways. Riding—er—writing—is awesome. A beautiful journey with unimaginable joy along the way. Don’t forget to stop and take in the scenery. The end, whatever your end happens to be, is fantastic. But getting there is half the fun.

I would love to hear about your GMC, and how you find ways to enjoy the ride.