{"id":7260,"date":"2018-05-03T01:00:43","date_gmt":"2018-05-03T08:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thewritespot.us\/marlenecullenblog\/?p=7260"},"modified":"2018-05-03T01:00:43","modified_gmt":"2018-05-03T08:00:43","slug":"guest-blogger-rachael-herron-keeping-the-spark-alive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/guest-bloggers\/guest-blogger-rachael-herron-keeping-the-spark-alive\/","title":{"rendered":"Guest Blogger Rachael Herron: Keeping the spark alive."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/thewritespot.us\/marlenecullenblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/Rachael-Herron.2.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-7261 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/thewritespot.us\/marlenecullenblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/Rachael-Herron.2.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"264\" height=\"302\" \/><\/a>Guest Blogger, Author <a href=\"https:\/\/rachaelherron.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Rachael Herron<\/a> has this to say:<\/p>\n<p>Hi readers <em>and<\/em> writers,<\/p>\n<p><strong>You\u2019re an artist in some way.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Yes, you. I see you there, hiding there in the back shaking your head. <em>I just like to read books. I\u2019m not creative. <\/em><\/p>\n<p>What do you do that brings you joy? What do you make? Cookies? Scarves? Do you sing in the car? Do you have a great eye for color?<\/p>\n<p>Yes, keep reading. You\u2019re creative, and I\u2019m so glad to talk to you.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m back from my month off (oh, joy), and I\u2019m <em>so relieved<\/em> to be back at work (I don\u2019t relax well). I\u2019m currently revising a thriller. It\u2019s a departure for me, and it\u2019s what I\u2019ve wanted to write for years. The 911 dispatcher picks up the phone to find her daughter on the other end of the line, and it&#8217;s bad, y&#8217;all.<\/p>\n<p>I <em>was<\/em> a dispatcher for many years, and I always knew that when I didn\u2019t work for the department anymore, I\u2019d write about the long, tedious hours, and the pure adrenaline that pounds through your system when lives truly hang in the balance. I&#8217;d make it exciting and realistic.<\/p>\n<p>I wrote the thriller. It\u2019s got a mother\/daughter team that I just love. I adore the book.<\/p>\n<p>And man, is it kicking my <em>ass<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>My incredible, intelligent, and very market-savvy agent is having me revise it <em>again<\/em>, to get it into the best shape possible before she tries to sell it. She\u2019s right about everything that I need to fix, even though the <em>last<\/em> time I sent it to her, I was pretty sure it was just about perfect.<\/p>\n<p>It wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p>And every single day, I don\u2019t want to work on it. It feels like doing the same thing over and over. What\u2019s the point?<\/p>\n<p>Sometimes?<\/p>\n<p><strong>It\u2019s just <em>hard<\/em> to keep going, no matter what we\u2019re in the middle of doing. <\/strong>The political climate is beating us down. Loss happens. Grief arises.<\/p>\n<p>Just getting through the day can be rough.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>If you\u2019re a mother, tomorrow will dawn, and you\u2019ll have to get up to do it all over again, no matter how little sleep you get tonight.<\/li>\n<li>If you\u2019re a musician, you wonder if your best composition is behind you.<\/li>\n<li>If you\u2019re a writer, you struggle to string three words together, even though it\u2019s all you want to do.<\/li>\n<li>If you&#8217;re a mother and a musician and a writer, then I simply bow your magnificent direction. &#x1f64f;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So that begs the question:<\/p>\n<p><strong>How do we keep going?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>I had a chat with my friend Marrije this morning. I asked how her writing is going, and she held up a small blank book. She told me that every day, no matter what, she writes one page in it from the point of view of one of her characters. Often that work makes it into the novel she\u2019s working on, and sometimes it\u2019s background work to better understand her characters.<\/p>\n<p>But it\u2019s her baseline.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s the least she allows herself to do.<\/p>\n<p><strong>It keeps her creative writing spark alive.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>I picture Marrije leaning down and blowing gently over the paper, once a day. Even if she has no time for anything else, the fact that she touched the work, that she blew until the ember glowed, keeps her going.<\/p>\n<p>And because she does that, the world speaks to her. She finds synchronicity in the happenings around her\u2014she sees an article that inspires a new plot point, or she hears a conversation that illuminates a character trait.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What\u2019s <\/strong><em><strong>your<\/strong><\/em><strong> baseline?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s the bare minimum you can decide to do daily to keep <em>your <\/em>spark alive?<\/p>\n<p>Marrije also pointed me to an AMAZING (truly) talk by the wondrous Austin Kleon with 10 Tips to Keep Going. You should watch this. You won\u2019t regret the time spent. The end, especially, moved me.<\/p>\n<p>So, my friend, find your baseline. Name it. Know it.<\/p>\n<p>Then blow on that spark gently. Grow the ember to a flame and then to a blaze. Feel that warmth. You\u2019re worth it.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note from Marlene:<\/strong> I watched the 26 minute\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Qy62eCeTnAA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Austin Kleon video<\/a>. Totally worth the time. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Guest Blogger, Author Rachael Herron has this to say: Hi readers and writers, You\u2019re an artist in some way. Yes, you. I see you there, hiding there in the back shaking your head. I just like to read books. I\u2019m not creative. What do you do that brings you joy? What do you make? Cookies? [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"selected_specialist_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[2698,1345],"class_list":["post-7260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-guest-bloggers","tag-austin-kleon","tag-rachael-herron"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7260"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7260\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breanamarie.com\/playground\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}