I have heard that advice given by so many people on YouTube lately....and just generally everywhere really. Though I am rather addicted to YouTube..... I really should work on that addiction, I could be doing lots of other good things with all the time I waste watching silly videos.. anyways I think living your dream (or doing what you love) is something people generally want in life.
I always wanted to be a writer, even though I despise commas, and I have a habit for run-on sentences. I somehow formed a habit of always creating a story in my head, sometimes those stories would make it onto paper and other times they would stay firmly on a book shelf in my imagination.
The thought of actually publishing a book seemed far too daunting of a task for me. I couldn't even finish writing a book. And then one day I made a goal ( those things really do work, who knew). I had finally decided that I was going to finish a book and the craziest thing happened, I actually finished it. I wrote an entire novel, thousands upon thousands of words long. Who knew I had it in me. So I thought my work was done.....nope.
This is when I learned that writing a book is the easy part..... then comes EDITING!!! DUN DUN DUN! Yep, that's right people I had to go back and fix all of my beautiful run-on sentences and insert commas here and there and then sometimes change entire chapters, but honestly it was actually fun. Somewhere along the journey I had become friends with the characters I had imagined. Which seems very weird to me but then again I have fallen in love with characters from other books, like who wouldn't want Harry Potter for their best friend?
Part of editing was letting other people read it. Up to this point in my life I hadn't really shared anything I had written unless it was for a class or blog spots. Sharing my book was terrifying, I had spent a very good portion of my life on it and I wanted people to love it as much as I did. It was downright scary but it helped a lot. My story is most certainly better now than it was before.
And then I did the scariest thing of all.....I sent it out to literary agents. I am now the proud owner of a couple of rejection letters and one very exciting letter from an agent wanting to read my book. Rejection hurts, but at the same time it makes success so much more rewarding. I couldn't keep my excitement in when that agent asked for my entire manuscript.
And now all I have to do is wait, which may be the hardest thing of all. I don't know what will happen, maybe this agent will love my book or utterly despise it, who knows. The one thing I do know is that I am chasing after my dreams and that's exhilarating. Maybe one day I will actually catch up to this dream.
Am I done after writing one book? No way Jose! What's that phrase... "After one rain drop comes the storm."... hmm I don't think that's quite right but you get the point... right? Maybe it's "One rain drop starts the flood".... yikes I don't think either of those are real sayings....Maybe I could start a trend? Oh goodness!
I love writing and creating new worlds... I always have and I think I always will. Now all I need to learn is how to stop my imagination from running wild all the time. Those poor imaginary dragons need a break ;)
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