Don't Give Up!

First published in the Ink Drop Newsletter

Every year many people make a “New Year's Resolution”. Work harder, lose weight, plant a garden, get married and so on. Most of these will never happen. People quit. Some as soon as the next day.  It is so common that a study was done (I don't know by who) about how long it takes for resolutions to be abandoned. It seems most resolutions (80%) are dead by the 2nd Friday of January, officially called Quitters Day (look it up on Google). I personally have made a resolution to lose weight by eating healthy and getting regular exercise many times, only to give up because my favorite foods are high in calories, or I am just too tired to exercise (usually both), within just a few days after the New Year.

I want to tell you about writing. Each year we set goals for our writing, mostly to complete a novel or a chapbook. Yet, somehow, we give up after just a short time. If I haven't started by the second week of January, I start to feel I'm just not committed to writing this novel. Something always seems to get in the way. It's too noisy at home. It's too quiet. I have to write in a coffee shop but I have to keep buying coffee or they chase me out. The biggest excuse is time. I just can't find the time.

About writing challenges, I have heard many excuses:

I have this great idea for a novel but 350 pages is so much. Writing a novel is a daunting task. Yet there's an old saying “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” I have on numerous occasions told members if you just write one page a day, after a year you will have 365 written pages.

I can't find a writing space.

There was an author who lived in a small apartment with his wife and children. His wife placed his small desk in a corner of the room facing the wall like an errant child being punished for some wrong doing. He felt demoralized. Still, he persevered and wrote a novel accepted by a publishing house. With the advance from the publisher the family moved into a house with a den, a writing room with a full-size desk, and plenty of space to concentrate on his next novel. But try as he might he couldn't write a word. Finally, he moved his old student’s desk into a corner facing the wall and began to write.

Writing is too hard. I can't tell a proper story.

Recently one of our members made a resolution to submit his writings. A very good idea in my mind. He submitted to a writing contest; the limit was 350 words. “Not enough,” he exclaimed. “I couldn't tell a proper story with so few words.” To that I reply with a flash fiction by Ernest Hemmingway. “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” I don't have children but the first time I read this it brought tears to my eyes. For me it invokes a story of loss.

I just don't have the time.

Each November since 1999, writers around the world take up the challenge to write 50,000 words in 30 days. It's called NaNoWriMo. National Novel Writing Month. 50,000 words in 30 days. That's 1,667 words a day, or approximately 7.4 pages each day assuming 225 words per page. Each year approx. 500,000 writers take up the challenge while only 10-15 percent ever finish. Yet many will take up the challenge again and again. Even if they don't finish. But just because you don't finish in November doesn't mean you should give up (or wait until next November) on finishing your story.

Some proficient writers can turn out a novel in just a few months. For others, it can take a lifetime. There will be setbacks, there will be times when you have no inspiration, or too much noise from naysayers. But like the writer in the corner, you must hold on to your dream. You must persevere. All I'm saying is don't look for excuses, look for inspiration. And above all, don't give up.