Thursday, August 18, 2011

Space to Breathe

(image (c) Mark Ryden)

Sometimes a story feels so expansive and exciting that you have this desire to get it all out at once. I equate the process to a traffic jam at the Holland Tunnel, too much being squeezed into too little at a rate that it simply can't handle. All you end up doing is gumming up the works.

As one who has suffocated many a story in such a reckless manner, I'm continuously trying to learn a little patience. It's never easy balancing enthusiasm with practicality, but it's a chore that must be done. In the end, I believe the story benefits from a tempered approach.

When I dive in too fast, too deep, I find that I'm in such a rush to get all of these ideas out that I forget the simple joy of writing them. A story needs room to grow within the pages. As a writer, you need to be in the moment of the place, not focused on the next place you wish it to go. I also find that spending some time in the moment usually leads to more interesting adventures than the ones that were previously planned. When in doubt, always take the scenic route.

1 comment:

  1. Love that image. I'm told painting can be like that - you're not sure where to start or what to put down first in the first rush of ideas. When I was writing articles I often had to write in layers and then drastically reduce at the end.

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