Life's #1 Rule: Becoming The Expert Non-Expert

Life is filled with rules, and marketing your material is evidently no exception.

Writers and consultants I've read and heard suggest a myriad of rules to follow: Build a platform. Get a website. Blog. Expose yourself...

I think that means make your name and work known. At least, I hope it does.

A recurring suggestion states that the writer should become an expert in an area that makes him––and henceforth, his book––salable. 

The advice feels sound. Based on the evidence the advisers provide, it is sound. The problem for us marketing neophytes, however, is determining what that area could possibly be for us. 

I presented that issue to my wife one day as we emptied a trunkload of books into the garage. She said, “You have two bachelors degrees, went to graduate school, taught for 35 years, and have a library full of fiction, nonfiction, and reference books. You must be an expert on something!”

Sadly, no. 

That’s not false humility. I speak from experience. Every time in social and professional gatherings, whenever discussions veer into my favorite topics, someone knows more than I do. The problem, I have learned, is that despite my ego, it is quite obvious that there’s no subject where I know all there is to know.

Today I had a revelation: "Hey! That' s my area of expertise! I am the expert non-expert. In fact, that is my greatest asset."

I have absorbed life's greatest lesson: The more I learn, the more I know I need to learn. No time for resting on laurels. No time for medal/trophy polishing. No time to boast. Time to just shut up and learn.

A degree in history earned forty years ago? Times have changed. There's a little catching up to do.

A degree in English? Good chance I missed a few books written before 1976. There's an even better chance of having missed a few since.

Journalism? The practice and laws governing the practice have altered a tad. What was once only print and broadcast has morphed and now includes cyber pages, blogs, and Joe-Bob Wampeter forwarding fuzzy and creative “news” to anybody with an email account, a smartphone, and an IQ over 27.

Teaching experience? Every year at the front desk, one notices that techniques and students change. Science discovers more about how the brain works. Materials and delivery systems change. Technology improves. Subjects, programs, and entire professions disappear. As trends and appreciations transform, students teach as much as instructors do. 

Spiritual knowledge? Every truth leads to more questions. Every question leads to more answers and more truth, BUT more questions. The cycle continues ad infinitum. 

Here's the issue: Many of us find uncertainty and constant change frustrating.

If we are honest with ourselves, however, uncertainty and change are, in fact, liberating. Realizing how incomplete our learning is frees us to learn more. 

And that is the main problem we have accepting the title of expert. To accept the mantle of expert only confines us to what we already know, a position surely to be outpaced by events and discoveries. Only by realizing our inexpertise in EVERY area can we learn what we need to know.

Becoming an all-knowing expert is impossible. We cannot learn all there is to know about any subject.

What we can become––and be as long as we breathe––are authoritative learners, people knowledgeable on certain subjects, aware of our deficiencies, and willing to learn more about everything of which we were once so sure.

So how does one market being the authoritative learner, the non-expert? 

Learn all you can. Then, like all the world's "authorities," follow Life's #1 Rule: Fake it and fake it big.

With a few decades of practice, I'm kind of an expert on that.

The Dizzying Effect of Observation

There is writer's block and then there are the stone walls of procrastination, distraction, and pure laziness. I have to admit I've hit the block and all three walls the past couple of weeks. 

I've hit them face-first so hard, I swear my nose is coming out the back of my head. Searching for inspiration, concentration, and perseverance has been like riding a skateboard against freeway traffic. Hopeless and painful. 

Rather than fight the traffic, I've been bad.

What's irritating is that for years I've known many ways to overcome these obstacles. For example, just a few months ago, I wrote about the advantages of people-watching, particularly at McDonald's. As a teacher, I always told students that if you don't have anything to write about, write about not having anything to write about. I even constructed brainstorming lists on separate pages on this site to serve as stimuli.

So I have no excuses for not writing. Except sometimes I'm just a goomer with no excuses. I was so frustrated I just wanted to get away. 

So I did.

And it worked, though almost as painfully as running into the previously mentioned stonewalls.

Remember in ninth grade when the teacher assigned you to write about an embarrassing moment? It wasn't because he/she wanted to get dirt on you. It was because embarrassment is at once memorable and instructive. 

Which brings us to Washington, DC. 

Last week, my wife needed to go there on business. Since my mind was mush here in Minnesota and because I love exploring that city, I decided to get away and meet her there. 

Recently, she had been there and had eaten at the Skydome Restaurant in Crystal City. She raved about the food and the panoramic view of the city. 

"Hmmm," I thought. "Maybe that can shake something loose in my brain," so that is where we went our first night in town.

Just so you know, there's the something-loose-shaken brain and the totally spin-dried, God-schmucked brain. I got the latter.

When the elevator door opened on the fifteenth floor, I could barely move. The view stunned and riveted me. 

To our left was the Pentagon, the Air Force Memorial, and Arlington National Cemetery.

Across the Potomac from them stood the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument, the Old Post Office tower, and the Capitol. 

From the right, a jetliner rose from Reagan National Airport and streaked away.

I stood speechless, attempting to drink in the beauty, the bustle, the vastness, and the palpable air of history shimmering over the entire spectacle. I didn't want to move.

Then the waiter said, "Follow me, please." My wife gently pushed my elbow.

I don't know if it was my gaping mouth or my twisting and turning as we crossed the room, but she smiled and whispered, "I told you."

We sat at a table near the window, but I wanted to see more. I kept craning my neck to see more while muttering, "Wow." 

This was the first time my wife laughed at me. It was a restrained chuckle, but laughter nonetheless.

I was not offended. I understood perfectly well why she did. 

Here she was with an incoherent country boy babbling and gawking at the big city, impressed by what natives consider commonplace and mundane. If I saw the same thing, I'd laugh, too. I smiled with her and ordered a steak dinner to comfort my bruised ego.

Throughout dinner, we discussed our separate flights from Minnesota, our plans for the next day, and other assorted minutiae. It was a perfect conversation in a perfect setting.

Then the noise from the kitchen and the television above the bar began to distract me. Annoyed,  I thought, "I wish the waiter hadn't put us so close to all the noise. I wonder if he'd move us."

Evidently, my scowl gave voice to my thoughts. "What's wrong?" my wife asked.

"It's kind of loud..."

"Yes, but it'll be over in a few minutes," she assured me.

To my frustrated and grumpy mind, that seemed unlikely. "Why?" I asked innocently.

"We'll be past the bar," she said, tilting her head in that "Don't-you-get-it?" way.

"What?"

"We're moving."

"Moving? What?"

"It's a revolving restaurant. Didn't I tell you that?"

"Moving?"

"Yes. Why do you think they put a number on our table?"

"I...I don't know. I thought it was like Arby's or Culvers'."

She didn't exactly cough up her gall bladder laughing, but not for lack of trying. Had she not struggled to keep the sound in, she probably would have. 

Embarrassed by my own naiveté, I made the mistake of averting my eyes from her and looking out the window. Then I saw the disturbing truth.

We were moving! In a circle!! 

I don't care how slowly; we were moving in a circle!

I didn't feel so good.

"Are you dizzy?" My wife asked.

I gulped and nodded. 

This time her laughter was not silent. I can't blame her.

After recovering my equilibrium back in our room, I realized that besides the great food and majestic vista, this whole dinner had been illuminating. Not just about my lack of knowledge, not about my wife's patience and sense of humor, but about life in general. 

As mortifying as the experience had been at the time, I learned it's easy to get distracted by both the overwhelming and the ordinary. Amidst the spell-binding and the unremarkable, you can miss the important and meaningful. This is especially true for curing writer's block.

Eventually, you have to stop and observe what's happening around you and what's happening to you. What you see and what you hear will awaken not only your senses, but your thoughts, your conscience, and your creativity. It's when you fail to pay attention that you shut down and miss the obvious, the significant.

Waking up can make you dizzy, sure. It can be embarrassing what you've missed. But when you get by all that, life will be so much more fascinating and spectacular that you can't help but have material to write and thoughts to share.

It all begins with observation.

Just for your edification, you may want fly over the stone wall of embarrassment rather than running smack into it like I did. Unless you like your nose sticking out the back of your head.

The Great Unplug: Breaking Through the Bleh

Writer's block is not the worst occurrence in the writing life. If you don’t write anything, at least you don’t say anything stupid.

Writing bleh, on the other hand…

Writing bleh occurs when everything you write is verbal mucous. Brain phlegm, if you will. 

And you want to fix it. You really do. You simply can’t. 

What frustrates you the most is you should know how. You’ve taken all the writing classes. You know all the rules. You’ve learned the techniques of revision. Your numerous thesauri lie next to the keyboard, anxious to give you direction.

It should be easy.

So you highlight what your congested mind coughed up before, take a deep breath, and...hack up a lung!

In frustration, you search your bookshelves for a helpful writer’s guide. You slog through the Internet for worthwhile exercises. You search for the inspirational quote from the world’s greatest authors. 

You try to write and again nothing.

Do not worry. There’s a far more efficient way to stimulate the mind.

Walk away.

Notice that I did not say, “Throw away.” No, leave what you have on the screen and WALK away. To another room. To another house. To another county.

Before you throw up your hands and lunch in disgust, think of this solution as resetting your computer when the only thing you can do to make the darned thing work is to unplug it, count to 30, and start over.

What happens is miraculous. All the programs that mucked up the system before, now work flawlessly, and you’re back in business.

When I ask techies why unplugging works to re-establish a working computer, none of them can tell me. “It just does,” they say.

Just as your computer gets clogged by trying to do too much with too much, so your writing also gets clogged with critical-analytical overload where all the creative writing/editing “programs” you’ve learned over the years try to kick into gear at once, clogging up your brain until NOTHING works. 

The only thing you can do is unplug.

Unlike the 30-second computer model, however, to unplug your brain, take at least 30 minutes and do something else. 

Wash the dishes. Build a snowman. Take a walk to McDonald’s and have a Shamrock Shake. (Unless you’re on Weight Watchers and the 660 calories doesn’t fit into your daily point total. Then I suggest coffee, tea, or diet soda.)

After your McDonald’s Moment, go back to the computer, bring up what you wrote earlier, and see how much easier the process is. 

With all your “programs” reset, everything you already know simply works without prodding or cajoling. Like the computer geeks who recommend the Great Unplug, I can’t tell you why walking away from your writing rejuvenates your work. It just does.

No more brain phlegm. No more anxiety. No more bleh.

When exasperation and anxiety mount, remember the old commercial and smile. "You deserve a break today."

Just unplug.

Writing Tools: Pencil Boxes, Book Bags, and the Trouble with Tribbles

For nine months this pencil box has sat next to the computer pleading with me to stop sputtering and ranting at the idiotic comments in the local paper. Channeling Ernest Hemingway, the box quietly states, "The writer must write what he has to say, not speak it."

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 

Stupid box. When I need your help, I'll ask for it.


What is especially irritating about the engraving is that the box just sits there looking great and inspirational on the outside, but the inside is empty. 

Nothing to write with. Nothing to write on.

Empty. EMPTY!!!

Kind of like a person's head after watching fifteen minutes of afternoon television.

Blech! 

Some people would say it's a nice decoration, but it shouldn't be a decoration. Far more than a fancy container, it was made for a purpose. It was given to me with a purpose. And I've been ignoring it...kind of on purpose. 

It's difficult to ignore because even though it speaks silently, it speaks loudly. It reminds me that I have work to do and this is my toolbox.

I hate the term work. 

One could justify the box's emptiness, I suppose, by asserting that pencil boxes have lost their usefulness in the age of computers. That's a copout, however. If nothing else, pencil boxes are symbolic of a writer's toolbox, and as such, should be filled. Which started me thinking, "What should be in the writer's tool box?"

The teacher instinct kicked in and proclaimed, "Let's make a list. Or better yet, let's make THREE!"

Here they are: The Old School List, the Digital Age List, and the Book Bag List. 

Old School pencil boxes are made to accompany piles and piles of journals, loose-leaf notebooks, and legal pads. The most obvious element inside would be, to nobody's surprise,

1. Pencils. And their cousins the pens. At the initial stages of brainstorming ideas, writing utensils are probably enough. 

However, as your project evolves, you may want to add...

2. Highlighters. Fluorescent markers make words stand out. If you come up with something particularly witty, the luminescence of these markers make the writer look smarter. Unfortunately, if you're particularly mundane or foolish, they only accentuate your kinship to a lethargic wombat, but...

3. Mini-Moleskine notebooks and Post-it pads are great for ideas and mess-free edits. On the other hand, if you really want to get rid of ridiculous phrases, Sharpies are great for blotting them out forever while conserving paper and the salvable material. 

And let's not forget every teacher/secretary/writer's friend, 

4. The paper clip/binder for keeping your good stuff together. 

It may be hard to tell, but the Hemingway box above, and maybe yours, is large enough to also contain an

5.  iPod with accompanying earbuds. What songs should be loaded onto it? See the page published earlier "Artists for the Perfect Playlist."

For those who have given up on long hand or who have the penmanship of a flopping carp, the previous list may seem pretty prosaic and boring. "What about digital writers?" you ask. I have answers, but I also have to preface my list here admitting my preference for the Mac. 

If you are a PC person, I'm sorry... 

That's not nice. Sorry. I assume there are PC parallels for what I am about to suggest. I just don't know for sure. I'm willing to learn and share.

Digital Age pencil boxes usually come embedded in your device. Your computer, laptop, and tablet usually has some form of 

1. Word processing like Apple's Pages or Microsoft's Word. Google has Docs or something similar and useful. Speech-to-text features even take away your need to be a good typist. It's a good time to be a writer.

Speaking of Google...Sorry. Didn't mean to give you mental whiplash. But speaking of Google, a really good 

2. Search engine is invaluable to the digital pencil box. Some people like Bing. Others, Yahoo. Still others have access to academic search sites. Personally, I find Google and Wikipedia useful for background information in writing fiction. For more detailed information, use as many engines as possible. (Oh, for former students railing against my prohibition of Wikipedia lo, those may years ago....note that this is for BACKGROUND information. For more detail, Wiki can still be valuable if one follows the linked citations.)

3. Dictionary/thesaurus apps usually come with your device, but I also suggest you make sure you have access to Dictionary.com as either a bookmark or as a separate app. That site uses numerous sources, great etymologies, and provides access to both a dictionary and thesaurus in one place.

4. USB jump drives are simple ways to store your information, as are external hard drives. And make no mistake: Backing up your work is vital. The hard drives have more storage capability, but the jump drives are smaller and simpler to transport. Unfortunately, that size makes them easier to lose as well. Just be careful.

5. Music can be your friend or enemy, so take this advice with caution. iTunes works in two great ways for those who want access to their music. Your downloaded playlists can travel with you on your devices, or if you're daring and like surprises, the new iTunes Radio makes some great selections. 

That being said, I still like Pandora and am playing with Spotify. So any great choices on both.

For more information concerning music and writing, check in the August 2013 archives for the article entitled "Writing and Music: Building the Inspirational Playlist."

6. Organizational tools abound in the App Store, but let me point out one of the most useful that incorporates the best of the Old School and Digital Age lists: Scrivener. Designed with Mac in mind, one can assume correctly it works best in that format, but according to reviewers, the PC adaptation has retained the functionality of the original.

What does Scrivener do? It formats your material. It allows you to search, rearrange, outline with or without digital notecards. Writing tools include a dictionary/thesaurus in both British and American mode, a name generator, and many more. As great as Pages and Word are, Scrivener is much more powerful and writer-centric  Because of all Scrivener can do, it also has a learning curve that will slow you down at the beginning of your first project, but the program makes the compilation of material super simple. The online manual and tutorials are, in a word, wonderful.

The third list features the catch-all contraption that follows good writers wherever they go to compose, the inimitable 

Book bag.

The book bag can hold lots of good stuff, not the least of which is books.  What kind of books?

1. Inspirational books are staples of every trip to the library or coffee shop. These are not necessarily for information, but more for motivation and encouragement. Books like Tao te Ching, The Spiritual Emerson, Dale Carnegie, Will Rogers, and Walden are in my bag because their simple presence can spark a train of thought, an image, or a theme that can keep one writing for hours.

However, they are not the only books to bring to the table or desk. 

2. Reference books are good even if you have a laptop with all the reference apps. A particularly useful reference is, believe it or not, a hard-copy thesaurus.Occasionally, the right word is just not in the digital thesaurus because the writers don't always think the way you do when keying in a reference word. The ONE thesaurus that always seems to have the right synonym is Roget's Super Thesaurus by Marc McCutcheon, published by Writer's Digest Books. Honestly. No other thesaurus, including the massive Roget's, comes close to the usefulness of this reference. Even with Dictionary.com, Scrivener, and Apple, the Super Thesaurus is a must-have.

And no author's book bag is complete without

3. Writing books. It's easy to be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of selections in the writing section of Barnes and Noble, not to mention Amazon. What-to-write, how-to-write, and when-to-write books are about as numerous as pizza joints in the local strip mall, but there are a few that are especially helpful to have in your book bag. 

Four of the most helpful are The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers by Christopher Vogler; Gods in Everyman: A New Psychology of Men's Lives and Loves and Goddesses in Everywoman: A New Psychology of Women by Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D.; Vex Hex Smash Smooch: Let Verbs Power Your Writing by Constance Hale; and How to Write and Sell Your First Novel by Oscar Collier with Frances Spatz Leighton. 

Vogler and Bolen deal with archetypes that can guide plotting and characterization, two of a writer's most important tasks; Hale brings a different method to empowering your language; and finally, Collier gets into the culmination of writing––publishing.

 There are many other books just as valuable that can give you guidance, including ones by such luminaries as William Golding, Ray Bradbury, and Stephen King. Find what works for you and which you will actually use and put them in your bag.

Books are not the only thing to go into your book bag, however. There's also the ever-important

4. Assorted stuff. "Stuff" can be real notecards, journals, staplers, three-ring binders, three-hole punch, ruler, and a rubber rattlesnake just to scare some unsuspecting frump hiding in the library stacks or an annoying child at the window screaming at his inattentive, head-banging mother locked outside in a Mercedes listening to Black Sabbath on noise-canceling headphones. Anything that might prove valuable on your excursion.

CAUTION: A word of warning about the use of book bags: It seems these totes have been infected by the tribble virus and tend to multiply exponentially if not kept under strict control. Untamed stacks can leap out of closets and cupboards, causing severe cranial damage without the slightest provocation.

That advice aside, the important lesson today is to fill your pencil boxes and book bags with the tools of the trade.

Trade.

That's the word. Much better than work. I probably could have found that in the thesaurus. 

Which is the second lesson: Use the tools.

The Final Task

According to Jean-Paul Sartre, we only have one small job to take on: 

What do you think?

from The Dyslexic Canine

Rockin' Rebellion: Get Down with Your Real Self

I have to admit I’m a Beatle fan. Always have been.

So central were they to my life that I bought all the albums from Revolver on just to prove Paul was dead and that we should have an international day of mourning. (Luckily, the music was as brilliant as the marketing scheme with all its graphic and musical symbolism.)

I was so moved by the band's innovation that, except for a maternal scowl that could have shattered Gibraltar, I would have bought the sitar advertised in the Sears catalogue just because George Harrison had one. 

Even though discouraging social convention of a small town prevented hair long enough to reach the eyebrows or cover the ears, in honor of The Beatles' pilgrimage to the Maharishi in India, I wore a Nehru jacket complete with medallion necklace for school picture day. 

I liked ‘em!!

So las week when Michael Tomasky released his new book Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!: The Beatles and America, Then and Now, I had to have it.

Thankfully, Tomasky doesn’t rehash the biographical histories written over the past 50 years. Rather he shows how and why they were so revolutionary musically, socially, and culturally. 

The Great Rebellion called Beatlemania, Tomasky shows, was not about being rebellious in the insubordinate nature of motorcycle gangs or punk rockers. Instead, the insurgence came from being authentically original. 

In other words, The Beatles didn’t try to be different; they simply were different.

Authentically different at a time the world needed them.

Which brings us to today and writing.

Daily, book critics assert that fiction needs something new. I cannot disagree, but like those critics, I have no idea what it needs specifically.

Except that whatever that something is, must be like The Beatles––authentic and real.

When I look back at the classic authors prescribed for teaching in Advanced Placement English classes, the one common thread among them is their originality within their genres and time. 

Ray Bradbury, for example, was not the only sci-fi author, but few others brought the humanity to the genre that he did. 

Jane Austen and the Bronte Sisters were not the first novelists, but they were the most insightful. Particularly of women.

Edgar Alan Poe was not the only Gothic/Romantic writer of his time, but he was the most…out there. "Out there" in a his own unforgettable way.

So how do modern writers become authentically different?

Strangely, there are “rules” for being original. Gretchen Rubin, writing for the blog World of Psychology at the website PsychCentral, found just such a list from an unlikely source: Kurt Vonnegut, one of the most inventive writers ever. 

Ironically, Vonnegut discounts the value of such a list by claiming that America’s greatest short story writer was Flannery O’Connor and she broke all eight of his rules except one. And, he says, all great writers do the same.

So much for the authority and control of rules.

However, Vonnegut's list has value. Rubin relates it thusly:

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
4. Every sentence must do one of two things — reveal character or advance the action.
5. Start as close to the end as possible.
6. Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them—in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To hell with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.

For a more information (like which rule did O'Connor follow) and a chance to respond to the psychology of such admonitions, you will find Rubin’s article at http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2013/07/23/kurt-vonneguts-8-rules-for-writing-fiction/.

Remember, rebellion simply for rebellion's sake attracts nobody and as such ,accomplishes little. To rock the world as The Beatles did, requires authenticity, truth... YOU! As we cool kids used to say, “Get down with your bad self.”

Unless, of course, you’re not bad…or cool…

The important thing is be real.

Which means it's probably time for me to put the Nehru jacket in a bag for Goodwill and stuff the sitar under the stairs with the banjolele and musical conch.

Later.

In Sympathy for the...Teacher: Poem with an Attitude

I discovered a poem all about attitude this weekend that jumped out and bit me in the face, and I just had to share. Unfortunately, I showed it to our good friend Crabby (the Crabby Curmudgeon) first and he insisted that I let him read it on video. Sigh.

Therefore, let me throw in this disclaimer: I did not write this poem. I do not subscribe to the thoughts expressed. I highly recommend if you find yourself feeling this way on your job, you immediately seek other employment...PLEASE! Especially if you deal with children.

That being said, here is the Crabby Curmudgeon reading D.H. Lawrence's poem "Last Lesson of the Afternoon."  The text of this selection is available at http://books.google.com/books?id=cQYRp8EQrzUC&pg=PA40&lpg=PA40&dq=last+lesson+of+the+afternoon+lawrence&source=bl&ots=l7HGniMzVH&sig=yADHE7RE4DokfMYc081NhovSgbE&hl=en&sa=X&ei=pKTmUvzeI8iIyAGblIGQDA&ved=0CEwQ6AEwBTgK#v=onepage&q=last%20lesson%20of%20the%20afternoon%20lawrence&f=false.

Crabby Curmudgeon comments:

Hey. Crabby Curmudgeon here.

You ever try to teach a composition class to a bunch of 8th grade boys the last hour of the day?

Let me tell you, it's not fun!

And it's never been fun! Just listen to these words from poet and novelist D.H. Lawrence written 1911. You'll understand.

POEM: "Last Lesson of the Afternoon" by D.H. Lawrence

Oh, yeah. That's found in the book The 20th Century in Poetry edited by Michael Hulse and Simon Rae.

So if you've never been a teacher with afternoon classes, now you know what what it's like. If you have, you have my sympathy

I'm the Crabby Curmudgeon. Talk to you later.

Characters: They Are Worthy!

One of my favorite scenes from the movie Wayne's World  occurs when Wayne and Garth spy rock gods Arrowsmith, begin groaning inarticulately, then fall prostrate before the band, raising and lowering their arms while proclaiming, "We're not worthy! We're not worthy!"

It's right up there with the two protagonists head-banging to "Bohemian Rhapsody."

But then again I also used to watch Gilligan's Island and Hee Haw...on purpose.

On a recent vacation I began thinking of that word worthy in a different context––in connection to a variety of sermons and writings by Minnesota pastor, scholar, and writer Greg Boyd where he talks about how every human being who ever was, is, and will be is of "immeasurable worth" to God; hence, the sacrifice of Jesus.

Boyd encourages us...rather, exhorts us..to see and have compassion for the invisible, to acknowledge our fellowship with the scorned and reviled, and to reject judgment of them in favor of loving them.

Now, I could get off on a spiritual treatise here, but that's for a different venue than The Write Wind. If you're interested in what Boyd has to say, I suggest three of his books: The Myth of the Christian Nation, Repenting of Religion, and Benefit of the Doubt. You may also hear him speak by clicking on the "Semons & Media" tab at whchurch.org.

What I would like to talk about here today is bringing this God-like attitude to your treatment of your characters.

It's a bit of a stretch, I know, but hear me out.

Just as the the Almighty formed the physical universe and all within it, you create the world of your story. You create the scene and all the people who inhabit it. For their sake, as well as for that of your readers and your own satisfaction, it behooves you to ensure and recognize that those people are, indeed, worthy. 

Too often, writers fill their stories or books with so many underdeveloped characters that if perchance one should show up later in the narrative, the reader is forced to scramble madly back through the pages to figure out, "Willie Armsdorfer? Who was that again? Was he the guy who ate fried okra during the demolition derby while wearing an orange fedora? Or was he the lawn tractor repairman's third cousin on his mother's side?"  

After vainly searching for hours, the reader's eyes glaze over, his fingers cramp up into arthritic balls, and he punts the book through the picture window while muttering not-so-vague obscenities.

The lesson to the writer: Don't turn your readers into book-punting, window-shattering,  arthritic curse mongers. The way to do this is to make your characters count.

How do you do that? Here are five ideas.

1. Know your characters. First, remember that in a metaphorical sense, you are God of your story. That means when it comes to the inhabitants, you are omniscient...or at least should be. You should know what the characters think, what they do, why they act, what their roles in the story are.

That being said, when it comes to describing these people,

2. Avoid the superficial. Yes, specific clothes, coiffeur, and possessions can help identify a person, but...Unless what a person wears reveals a person's propensity for dalmatian fur, unless his/her hairstyle symbolizes the pro-Siberian husky nature of the character's mother, unless you as a writer are getting mega-product-placement-dollars to identify the smart phone your protagonist uses, shut up and move on. Give the reader what is needed and get back to the story.

That does not mean be cursory in your description. It means look deeper and

3. Seek the unexpected. When Boyd talks about the people we walk by everyday as being invisible, he refers to our tendency to discount or ignore what those people have to offer the world, often to our own disservice. As bad as that is for humans in real life, it is especially wrong for the deity (the writer) of your imaginary universe.

As stated twice now, in your story's world, you are God. You must know what qualities these people have. Or how to discover them. To accomplish this, as the story progresses, dig until you find what the characters are hiding. Reveal it. Relish it. Use it.

When you are thoroughly acquainted with their true selves,

4. Assure that your characters contribute. If you're going to introduce a person into the story, make sure they intensify the atmosphere, the conflict, the rising action, the resolution...SOMETHING. 

How? There are lots of ways.

Maybe the fry cook at the truck stop gives a million dollars to the construction of a new hospital. Maybe the town drunk saves a little girl who falls through the ice at the skating pond. Maybe the babysitter actually sits on babies. Let your characters do something besides simply exist. 

Finally, learn one of the greatest lessons in life:

5. Less is more. Architect Mies van der Rohe used this sentence to strip design of decoration and artifice in favor of function. His buildings are noted for their spare, clean lines, their simplicity. 

In literature, the adage can apply to the number of characters in your story as well. A few characters that the reader grows to know and love (or detest, depending on your purpose) is preferable to plethora of bodies that meld into a mind-numbing mass of bleh.

The key, then, is to promote your characters from the scenery to the foundation of your narrative. Take, for example, the person in the yellow box in the picture above. Let us know who he is, what he is, and why the heck he's in the yellow box in the first place. In other words, take him out of the tinted yellow box and expose him to the clear world you created for him.

Let him know, as Stephen Tyler did for Wayne and Garth, "You're worthy! You're worthy!" Both your characters and your readers will thank you for the assurance.

As an added bonus, you might discover, as Greg Boyd tells us, we all have "immeasurable worth." Kinda good news, don't you think?

Change for Thought

This week, Diane and I are on vacation...of sorts. Something/Some people are leading us to the conclusion that changes are in the wind. Write Wind or otherwise. Hence, I looked for an inspiring quote to further lead us. I found this oldie by excellent-ie from one of the most thoughtful people ever, Mahatma Ghandi.

The Crabby Curmudgeon: The Three Naps of Rumination Monday

It’s cold outside! -45ºF windchill.

I know. It’s winter in Minnesota. What would I expect?

Be that as it may, IT’S COLD OUTSIDE!

While some people think this is a normal state of affairs here, the things that make life different today is that the governor closed the schools, many stores and institutions                                                                                  have shut down, and traffic outside is virtually nonexistent. Stuck inside, I’m wondering what I should be doing.

I can hear you scream, “You should be writing,” but my main inclination is to hibernate by burrowing under a mountain of blankets and waiting for spring. But that wouldn’t accomplish anything.

Or would it? 

The Crabby Curmudgeon has an idea.

Video Transcript

Are you making fun of my hat? Really?

Well, let  me tell you something. I have to go out here and get the mail later and it’s cold enough to freeze a penguin’s…bill off. I’m just gearing up for the trip. Then it’s right back into the house for Rumination Monday.

“What the heck is Rumination Monday,” you ask?

It’s one of the most important writing activities any writer can partake in. Especially if the brain is locked or distracted… or frozen. It’s taking time to think.

I know. I know. You always think when you write.

But sometimes it pays to think before you write. That’s where a day away from the keyboard can help. And especially on a frigid Monday afternoon, you have a perfect excuse.

Now, the way I found that works the best is to divide your activity… and yes, thinking is an activity… into three segments that I like to call naps.

Hey! When you get to be old you’ll understand the whole concept of naps.

The three naps are called visualizing, synthesizing, and energizing.

 Okay. Now. The first nap visualizing is taking time to close your eyes and see. I know. It sounds contradictory, but it works. Believe me. You see your characters. You see the setting. You see their  situations. You see their reactions.

It’s difficult to do this before a computer screen. Now, what you can see with your eyes closed... much more accurate.

Also, because it’s a nap, you need to lie down. Seriously. A prone position allows the sights, sounds, and smells to flow, unimpeded by transferring a thought from mind to the keyboard. Yeah,

Now, when you’ve got a passel of images running through your head, it’s time to get up, eat a sandwich and maybe some chocolate, and regroup.

On returning to the couch or the bed or the bare floor, lie on your back, and with your eyes open, though barely focused, you synthesize the images you saw earlier. Okay. What did you learn about the people and settings that you didn’t know before? What will influence the story? What is that hanging on the ceiling?

Okay. You may want to close your eyes until you can concentrate a little better. I'm a little distracted by the cold.

Anyway...Maybe before lunch, maybe some more lunch, a cold run to the mailbox, or an extended potty break 'cause when you gotta go, you gotta...go....Well, anyway...

The final nap of the day usually doesn’t include any somnambulant activity at all. And that’s okay. That is energizing. This features the fiction writer’s most important tool, the big question “What if…”

With your new knowledge of people, places and things in your story, become the troublemaker and ask yourself “What if so-and-so did such and such?” “What if this happened?” “What if this didn’t happen?”

You really do need to lie down for this part because for some reason, in the upright “awake” position, the internal censor tends to show up and rebel against your thoughts, yelling, “NO! NO! That can’t happen. Be reasonable.”

In a dream state or a near dream state or physical position, the writer can more easily ignore the censor and let the characters and plot grow. With all this new stuff, you’ll be a writing machine when you get up.

Best of all, with a a creative fire burning inside you, you’ll forget how cold it is outside.

Something to ruminate about.

I’m the Crabby Curmudgeon. Talk to you later.