| Writing Tips (continued) | | Date Created: Jan 27, 2006, 07:16 AM |
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1. Work at giving yourself permission. And time.
Jesus Asked took more than 6 years to write. Jesus Asked took less than a year to write. What incredible arrogance -- how un-Jesus like -- for me to say no to projects or requests and lavish such time and energy on JA simply because it was something that I wanted to write. It stalled and faltered, hanging around in back corners of time, until Derek, my boss told me the third or fourth time to go for it. Finally I believed him.
And he offered a more practical way of changing my attitude. He encouraged me to bribe a student to read it -- one of the two best things that happened to Jesus Asked was Steve Moody. He was a former undergrad student, then an MA student. He was someone I didn't know very well but thought highly of. At Derek's suggestion, I offered to buy him lunch fortnightly in return for which he just had to read my stuff as I wrote it and tell me what worked for him and what didn't. Suddenly, there was someone besides me who -- however artificially -- was waiting for the stuff to be produced. (It seems to be important that the somebody was not close friend or family -- the main way that Steve and I related was through the book.) Suddenly I could write again. I wrote more of the book in the next two months than in the five years previous. Permission. Time.
Tomorrow, losing control. |
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