revelation: the power of words

I had another writing revelation today.  It's something I've always known but hit me in the gut again after a conversation today.  It's profound how an old truth can become real again when it is said in a new way.  (This, by the way, is something writers need to know. There are no new Truths, just new ways to say old Truths.  Originality comes in saying an old Truth in a new, unique, coherent or powerful way.) 

I came out of the movie theatre today after watching The Hunger Games.  My uncle joked that "You're only one year away and then you can be a Career."  I said something about not wanting to be a Career.  Then someone else with us says "Your weapon can be writing."  I replied:

"Writing can't kill people."

And then it hit me.  What I said wasn't true.

Writing does kill people.

Mein Kampf. Origin of Species. Communist Manifesto.  Many, many other writings.  Writings that have led, either directly or indirectly to wars, injustices, lies, the murder of the innocent, and other evils.

Writing is always about ideas.  Whether it's a story, song, poem, essay or blog article, it's ultimately undergirded by ideas, views on the world, on life, and on right and wrong.  Ideas have consequences.  That's a cliche, but a true one.  The ideas expressed in writing may be just words, but they lead to actions.  Good ideas -and by good I mean True- lead to good actions.  Bad ideas -and by bad I mean False- lead to bad actions.   Wars start as a result of bad ideas.  Every thing we write has consequences.

"The tongue has the power of life and death." -Proverbs 18:20.  Our words- both on paper and in life- have consequences.  

I want to be sure that I know what I'm saying and to ensure that I am writing ideas that are grounded in Truth and that lead to good. 

What putting Noisemaker on hold has taught me about writing

Some writing days felt like this.

So, it's been a hard writing time lately.  For several reasons, not the least of which is my own inconsistency and procrastination.  But more than that, I've just been having a hard time making writing work.  There's been more than a few days where I've groaned and struggled and spent entire afternoons where I end up with nothing to show for it.   There's been a few days where I've nearly cried.  "Why won't this story just WORK?!"

Most of this stress came from a recent project called Noisemaker.  I loved the theme behind it.  It's based on something I'm passionate about and I delved right into plotting, creating characters, and developing the theme.  The story changed its form at least a dozen times over the course of March.  But as time went on, I was having a harder and harder time actually writing it. I could write lots about it, but the actual words on paper- the actual story- wasn't working.   It had me nearly pulling out my hair with the fact that I couldn't pin a plot down.  It had a setting and it had a theme, but connecting the plot and characters to it was the challenge.  With such a big theme, I could write reams of essays about it but as a story the hugeness of it was stumping me.

The theme behind Noisemaker was so big that fitting it into a plot was time consuming and draining.  And by draining, I mean mentally and spiritually draining.  It was a lot of plot problems and a lot of frustration.

The stress of the project was just compounded by the fact that I need to have a full novel draft ready by the end of June for a writing workshop I am going to attend.  I got to the point of despairing if I would ever even nail down a loose outline, never mind write Chapter One or "The end."

Eventually I had to realize that this project was too big.  At least for now.  It was too new, too massive in proportion.  It needed time to sit and ripen and develop in my mind.  It wasn't ready to come onto paper.  Maybe it would be soon, but forcing it before I was capable of writing it wasn't going to be good for me or the story. 

I don't mean that there isn't a time to force your way through a story.  I know that just because a story is hard doesn't mean that it's not ready.  I'm not advocating giving up when the going gets tough!  But in this case, Noisemaker was so consistently difficult and between my own stress and the helpful counsel of my mom we determined that it just wasn't the right time yet.

Now I'm working on a novel of a very different kind.  It's a novel idea that started when I was about 12.  I've written countless notes, character sketches, chapter outlines, and theme notes.  It's a much better developed story in my mind.  It's had plenty of time to ripen.  Ultimately, it's ready to become a full fledged novel.  It'll still be hard.  That's what writing is- not all sunshine and words flying onto the page.  But this story is one I feel much better equipped and ready to write.

Noisemaker is on the shelf presently. And it's a good thing, because now I'm writing a story that IS ready to be written.  This process has been a valuable one, as I've realized that I can't white knuckle writing.  Sometimes stories need to sit. Sometimes an idea is good- but not quite yet. 

Why I love Lewis

"You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me."  -C.S. Lewis.   Mhmmmmm. That quote alone sums up many good things; Lewis, tea, and books.

The first C.S. Lewis book I read was The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.  My sister and I snuggled up next to our mum and heard the story of the Pevensies, the witch, betrayal, and the Love of a Lion for the first time.  I was probably seven or eight.

Now it's years later, but that story- as well as any and all of C.S. Lewis' other works- continues to have an indelible impact on my life.

Lewis had an ability- a gift- of telling the straight Truth in a way that was both beautiful, honest, and memorable. He spoke in metaphors and stories that made sense- connecting the mind and the heart by the way he described things.  A friend mentioned to me something she had been reading lately about how Truth is always beautiful. Looking at Lewis, he seemed to understand that.  God is Truth, and He made Truth, and He made beauty, so of course when it comes down to it, truth will be beautiful and that which is really beautiful will be Truth. The truth I've seen in Lewis' books is always a beautiful truth.  Sometimes it's uncomfortable too, but then isn't that often the nature of both Truth and true Beauty.

Another thing I appreciate love is that Lewis saw clearer than most the curtain of time and eternity.  His keen desire for something greater than this world (past the shadowlands) is so evident in his writing, both fiction and non-fiction.   In the Chronicles of Narnia, this shows up many times, but one that sticks out to me is the last paragraph or two of The Last Battle.

The dream is ended

"The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning."
And as He spoke He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot describe them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that the all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real stor. All their life in this world and all of their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before." -The Last Battle

^^ THAT ^^  Lewis is marvelous.

Wake up and get out of bed

"We read of spiritual efforts, and our imagination makes us believe that, because we enjoy the idea of doing them, we have done them.  I am appalled to see how much of the change which I thought I had undergone lately was only imaginary.  The real work seems still to be done.  It is so fatally easy to confuse an aesthetic appreciation of the spiritual life with the life itself- to dream that you have waked, washed, and dressed, & then to find yourself still in bed."  

-C.S. Lewis

I love this quote because it is something I have felt in my own life many times and something I want to fight against. It's that thing that makes me believe that I am noble and faithful and have done great things and then find myself in bed with the covers pulled over my face because I'm afraid of the shadows playing games on the floor.  The bounds of my comfort zone are merely my own fears  but actually getting up out of bed and putting my feet on the cold floor is the step hardest to take.   

Jesus is the one who takes my hand and helps me take that first step out of bed. He is the One that reminds me that being awake is infinitely better than remaining under the covers.

Good morning!

~Abby

'O! Wanderers in the shadowed land'

"O!  Wanderers in the shadowed land
despair not! For though dark they stand,
all woods there be must end at last,
and see the open sun go past:
the setting sun, the rising sun
the day's end, or the day begun
For east or west all woods must fail..."

-Frodo, The Fellowship of the Ring 

What did I say?   Beautiful.  And so very symbolic and True.   'the shadowed land' makes me think of C.S. Lewis' description of earth "the Shadowlands."  We are wanderers on this earth. But every dark wood has an end- and then the sunrise!

Right now I'm wandering on, learning as I go, feeling the wind on my cheeks and the biting cold in my bones.  Right now I'm growing thanks to the grace of God and His work in me through the Bible, situations, and people who love Jesus.   Every day I take steps forward, holding his hand, gazing at beauty and feeling the thump thump of the song of tomorrow in my heart.

A fellow wanderer in the shadowed land,
~Abby

Letters to the Characters: Kell Thurton

The closest resemblance I've found that Kell (my Hero from Broken Glass King) agrees looks like himself.

Dear Kell,

Today, I really don't feel like writing.  It's probably just me, but then I'm thinking, and I'm trying to write YOUR story, and it's just a complete fail.  Maybe you're not really alive, maybe you've died in my mind.  Maybe I left you alone for a couple weeks and you faded from reality into myth.  You were just coming out of your shell.  You were just taking those steps off the page and into my heart but something's slammed the lid on that and you are just a person sitting around in my head.  So tell me- why are you special, Kell Thurton?  Why shouldn't I just scrap your story and toss you into the folder of failed projects and forgotten people?  What about you can make me pry the lid back open and bring you again off the page and into something real.  You're so complex, aren't you.  Elusive but honest. Hiding but trying to escape your own little spinning head.  You want to be known but you just don't know how to express yourself.  You're half frightened to do it too. You want to open yourself up but it hurts and you don't know the right way to go about it without tearing apart your own soul.  Or the souls of others.  You're fighting in the war, but--

--Oh.  Fighting the war?

Is that what you need to do, Kell?

Leap back onto the page as a fighter, as someone who is on the front lines of the war?

Is that what I was missing about you?  I suppose I did create you to be a kind of diplomat, a keep-your-hands-clean leader who sat behind a desk and made tough decisions. But that way, you don't see the little girl dying in her father's arms. You don't pick up a sword and choose if you're going to run it through a man just like you. You're too plastic that way, too far away from the conflict.  Maybe that was part of the missing piece of you.

Come out of your box, Kell. I promise I'm throwing away the key- and I'll stop pre-deciding what kind of person you're going to be.  I'll follow you onto the battlefield and I'll write YOUR story.  Not my idea of what you as a puppet ought to do.

Love from your writer, 

~Abby

Beyond the shadows is the sunshine

I crash through the forest, roots sneaking up towards my ankles, branches swatting my cheeks.   Somehow I've lost my way amidst the darkness. The trees close in, but I press on, ignoring the scratches on my arms as I keep on searching.  I've got to find my way home.  Safety is there, at home.  Security is there. 

We're all looking for something. We're frantically searching,  desiring purpose, meaning.   Fulfillment.

My heart has a song, and it's crying out.  It's a compass, and it's pointing to something.  It's desperate for something more than the pain and work and weariness of this world.  It hurts to see pain and not be able to do anything about it.  It hurts to live in the world with all its disappointments and sorrows.  I hurt for the children without parents.  I hurt for the parents who've lost their children. I hurt for the lost, the addicted, the dying, the betrayed.

I know I was made to live for more than this 60 or 70 year life on earth.  I was made for the sunrise, for the eternal shore, for the Home beyond the shadows of the dark forest.  

How does one live for eternity?

I know Truth. So why do I run away and pretend that I don't?  When I try to leave behind truth and bury myself in mud sooner or later it crashes around me and I am left with dry dust in my hands.

What good is it to gain everything in this life, to laugh at every joke and have 500 Facebook friends and wear the right clothes and be liked by all and yet not have God?  

What good is it if I have so much of a virtual life that I lose touch with my family?  What good is it if I isolate myself and read and study and write and think inspiring thoughts but neglect my God and His people?

Eternity in my heart means that I know God's Word and that it fills my mind.   It means that I resist the temptation to set my mind on things that will fly away like dust.  It means that I choose something Higher than the earth I'm standing on.

Eternity in my heart means I live for something bigger than the latest fad, something grander than a tv show, something more worthy than temporal pleasure. 

Eternity in my heart means just that....the reality and consequences of Forever imprinted upon my soul.

Think about Forever.    Think about what Forever means.  

And then live with Forever in your heart.

Live with the song of tomorrow.
~Abby