Keeping the Faith – Creating Little Inspirational Books of Writery Hope

Keeping the faith can be difficult times, and especially presently whilst the world in in chaos and we are all in lockdown, looking at the same four walls, and inspiration being hard to come by. 

I think most writers and illustrators, who are pre-published, get low points even when the world is normal (or as normal as it gets anyway). We have the moments of despair when our confidence dips, and we wonder; will I ever catch a break? Am I good enough? Will I EVER get PUBLISHED! Is there any point?

It normal to have these times, after all we’re in a business where there a whole lot of NO. NO’s are always hard, no matter how experienced you may be at rejection.

I often take great comfort from quotes. Things people have said or stories about writers who resilience has paid off. Often on social media other writers share these inspirational quotes, I print them off and stick them to my notice board.

However a few months ago the whole of critique group were all having trouble with keep up the faith. So I decided to share with them all the little inspirational quotes that help encourage me. I made a book full of these quotes, for each member of the group (and one for me too). 

It was simple and inexpensive to do; I found some notepads, and printed out all the quotes, and cut them and glued them in to create a little positive book of writer good cheer, encouragement and inspiration, that we can all refer to when we need a dose of reassurance. 

I’ve also left pages, so when we each find more inspirational quotes or article, we can share them and add them to our books. 

  

Maybe it’s a little sill, or even just another form of procrastination. But if it is, it is a bit of silly positive procrastination, and in these times, that is no bad thing!

Surviving Lockdown - What Fresh new Procrastination is This?

So everyone’s facing the third week of compulsory Lockdown, and the signs of personal or family meltdowns are probably starting to show.

Unlike my husband and children who still have their structure – still working and schooling just from home, all my structure has gone. As my structure was all based around the school runs and getting the children to various after school clubs -  and fitting my writing and business work around them -has disappeared. So it's me who's getting the cabin fever.

I’m lucky, we are all healthy and my kids are older and more independent, and they don’t need me to home-educate and entertain them, and we’re also very fortunate to have space that we are not in each other’s faces the whole time. But I still have no structure and being at home all apart from one hour of exercise a day is a lot of time to fill.

I have been writing, but we have the issue of not enough computers to go around, my husband has his work laptop, my daughter on her school laptop- it has left my son working on the family PC, so writing all hours is tricky. I do write long hand and try and type it up when my son is on is lunch break, but isn’t exactly perfect.

So in short; long days + little structure + limited access to a computer has resulted in me getting cabin fever.

The one thing that has really helped me combat cabin fever and keep me sane, is the one thing that is usually the enemy of any creatives that work from home: Procrastination. And of course following lots of kid lit folks on social media have meant there has been lot of fresh new procrastination projects to keep me busy and stop my mind for spiralling into dark palaces.

So far I spent a few hours rearranging and photographing my book shelves for fellow Gold Egg, Becky Hamilton’s call out for ‘SHELFIES’ for an exhibition she’s organising for the Bath Fringe festival.

As a family we spent an afternoon, packing up the Easter Craft stuff that my son has brought to do fundraising for his expedition (now cancelled sue to corona virus), in to packages, and then randomly delivering them to neighbours houses that have children to help entertain during the lockdown. 

I spent a good twenty minutes taking photographs of the art that’s displayed around the house for Chitra Soundar’s #ARTonWalls over on twitter. 

A whole morning has been spent finding suitable reading material and photographing our sizeable menagerie after Paula Harrison nominated me to participate in Gareth P Jones #PetsGetReading . 

We are also taking part in the #NationalBearHunt, setting up changing scenes of teddies in our front window for the local children to spot when they are on their hours exercise. 

I know all these things may sound mundane, and daft, but taking part in these ever more creative Procrastination Projects, has really helped me combat cabin fever and stay sane, by breaking up the monotony of long structure-less days.


So thanks to everyone's inspires fresh new procrastination projects for they have really been keeping me sane!

Writing; the lonely Art – Part Two – a Solution of Sorts

Back in November I wrote a post, Writing; the lonely Art, about how writing: unlike all the other artistic disciplines, isn’t one that can be displayed, exhibited, or performed for quick and easy consumption, and therefore how it can be difficult for the non-writery folks in your life, to comprehend how you’re doing or see your progress. 

Obviously this is why having writer friends around you that help support you and vice versa is so imperative, but sometimes you still want to show/explain to a non-writery friends or relatives when they’re interested.

So after a lot of thinking I came up with a solution of sorts. A way of visually displaying and recording my writer’s journey in a way that can be easily shared. Making the most of the pre-Christmas photo printing website sales, I designed a photobook of my writing journey from 2010 until 2019.

In the book I’ve put photos of competition long-listings, short-listing’s, honorary mentions and wins, either certificates, web-site announcements, screen shots from twitter, to show my small achievements. I’ve also put in photos’ of my volunteering for SCBWI, work in Book Shops and time with Book Bound and The Golden Egg Academy. Along with photos of the many friends I’ve made along the way. 

It’s not quite a ‘record of achievement’ nor is it a ‘portfolio’, it is more of a record of my journey to share with people who are interested and for me to look through in those times where rejections are coming in thick and fast and I start to doubt my ability and progress. A small thing to reminding me how far I’ve come, and that although I may not be published, that I have had small successes and that I have gained a wealth of writery friends.