The Secret to Writer’s Block: Nature Post 3

Writing in a Winter Wonderland: 

 

Inspiration from the Winter Season to Help Focus the Purpose of Your Story

I live in Jacksonville, Florida where we basically have two seasons: insanely hot and not so hot. The not so hot lasts for about four weeks and is usually interspersed by other insanely hot days. There is no gradual trend to cool and maybe a day or two of actual cold. Now, Floridians will say that it gets cold and I will admit that my blood has thinned since living down here, but it’s nothing like an actual cold winter day.

While I now live in Florida, I was actually born in Maine. I have also lived in even colder places than Maine including Alaska, North Dakota and Iceland. Anyone that has seen the sequel to the movie Mighty Ducks…you know the one with the bash brothers where the home team plays Iceland for the championship…remembers the saying about “Greenland is covered in ice and Iceland is very nice”. While it is true that Greenland is covered in ice and that Iceland is a gorgeous island with really wonderful people, it is hands down the coldest place that I have ever lived. We used to have to hide in cement block bus stops when waiting to be picked up because the wind was so cold and so strong that it didn’t matter how much you bundled up, you would get frostbite. The point is, if you choose to go outside in an environment like that or in the dead of winter in any of those places, you better have a clear purpose in mind.

And that leads me to the point of this post. When writing, you need to keep in mind your purpose. Not just the purpose of you wanting to get words on to paper, but the purpose of your story, your scene, or what you are trying to communicate with your characters or to your audience. Sometimes you get so engrossed in just writing that you may lose focus on what your actual purpose of writing is.

Here’s an example. A while back, my husband (boyfriend at the time) made the trip to Maine with me to visit my family for Christmas. It was his first time visiting anywhere north of Virginia and his first time seeing snow. Needless to say, that December in Maine was his first experience with winter weather. We were staying at my mom’s house and she went to work for the last day before her holiday break. One of my brothers was also home with us for the holidays. The three of us had the bright idea to walk a quarter mile down the road to a restaurant with the most amazing and giant sandwiches that I have ever had: Big G’s Deli. If you happen to be visiting Waterville Maine, look it up!: https://big-g-s-deli.com/

Anyway, so we bundled up and decided to trudge through the snow. It was just a quarter of a mile and we were in our twenties. How hard could it be? Let’s just say that it was awful. My husband still says that he thought that we were going to freeze to death on the side of the road that day. But as we were walking, we all kept repeating the same thing over and over as we stepped. Left foot…Big…right foot…G’s. We kept our eyes on the prize and made it to the deli. We arrived exhausted, freezing and sweating at the same time. As we walked through the parking lot, a car slipped on some ice and slide into an already parked car. My husband was horrified, but we had made it and then enjoyed the most delicious sandwiches.

The point is, we kept our purpose in mind in order to achieve our goal. It’s like that with writing too. Recently, I was working on my new novel as part of NaNoWriMo and I became so obsessed with just writing words and ideas in search of my 50000 goal, that I lost sight of my actual purpose. During one point in my writing, I got completely off track and ended up having to re-write a couple of chapters because I lost sight of the purpose of the novel. This can be frustrating, especially when you are facing deadlines, but it’s important to make sure that your main purpose shines throughout your story.

Keeping a clear purpose in mind when writing your story is one of the most important and challenging aspects of writing. As authors, sometimes we become sidetracked with writing things that we enjoy instead of maintaining a focus on the novel’s purpose.

So next time you experience writer’s block when focusing on your novel’s purpose, break through with a little inspiration from the winter season!

I hope that these ideas help you to break through! 

Found a great source of inspiration that worked for you? Let me know!

Still getting writer’s block?  Tell me how I can help!

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