Tag Archives: Manuscript

Keeping Time

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Last week we had our final guest blogger for ‘The Write Life’ series, and now it’s my turn to put in the last word. From herding cats to occupational quandaries of writing, there’s been much wisdom shared over the past two months. I hope you’ve enjoyed the contributions of our guests as much as I have. Many thanks again to all contributors! (Rita, Jo, Lynne, Meredith, Paula, Jeanette, Anusha, Sandra and Nola.) I encourage all my readers to follow up these fantastic authors and explore their work. You’ll be pleased you did.

WatchPicMy ‘Write Life’ lessons are many, but there is a simple one I constantly return to. Timing. Numerous times I’ve sent off a manuscript or short work, only to have my submissions rejected. Repeatedly. This can be frustrating, even discouraging, but eventually it becomes apparent that the works aren’t ready. It either wasn’t their time and/or they needed further development.

Our goals and dreams in life can be much like those submissions. At times potential opportunities repeatedly end with the equivalent of a rejection letter. Desires ranging from publishing a novel to finding that perfect job – or even a life partner – may seem unreachable, allowing frustration and discouragement to take root. We can question many things about our circumstances, or even give up those hopes entirely. Sadly, we can forget that each day spent waiting is another day to flourish in our ‘now’ and be better prepared for whatever the future holds.

Just like a manuscript, time spent reworking and waiting is never wasted. How tempting it can be to try and hurry those processes along. But there might be a much better ending than we could ever imagine, if we just wait for the right opportunity instead of forging ahead with our own plans, no matter what.

Perhaps our hopes are for a dear one to make better life choices. This is one area where I can grow quite impatient, especially when I can see those choices taking someone I love down a road that will guarantee a tonne of hurt and regret to work through later. It can be tempting to lecture and demand, ‘Why can’t you see?’ Yet, we’ve all taken unnecessary turns in life and have to walk our own path. It takes time to develop maturity and perspective. Including our own. It can also be difficult to see our own faults in these situations – a lot like the flaws in a beloved manuscript we’ve penned. Perspective requires much wisdom and grace.

A willingness to live and grow in the right time often yields imperfect yet inspiring stories of hope out of journeys through shadowed valleys of uncertainty. We might have our own ideas on the time frames in which we expect things to happen, but my experience constantly reminds me that life’s a long haul. And timing is everything.

In Position

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For nearly two months now I’ve been trying to jot down blog posts, only to end up with numerous half-done pieces that seemed to be going nowhere. The background to this apparent blogging block began late in February. I was at the stage of awaiting manuscript edits and figured that in the interim, I should set myself a goal to ensure I remained productive. With visions of NaNoWriMo, I began my own personal novel writing month in March.

While plugging towards my goal word count, a submission opportunity arose with a criteria into which the in-progress manuscript fitted nicely. No more personal goal ‘just because’. I had a definite due date and I had to harness every writing chance that I could!

Now it is May. I submitted two days ago, and after a hectic few weeks at work, thought that this might warrant an evening off… Then, bing! The blog ideas started to flow!

I scribbled down thoughts, amused at how I’d had nothing for so long only for it to change in an instant. Self-reflection hinted that perhaps this could have been because my focus was needed elsewhere.

This made me think of a recent netball match I played. A member of the opposition injured their ankle, stopping play. As a current first aider, my instinct was to go to the player to assist, then run for ice. It then dawned on me that there were already people assisting and my attention was required elsewhere. There were two teams relying on me holding my position.

As the player was subbed out and play resumed, I saw that one of their off court team members had already begun applying appropriate first aid. In that instance I could have run off to get ice and assist the player, but it probably would have been a bit annoying for the other players when the umpire whistled for play to continue, only to find a WD missing. It wasn’t that I didn’t have the ability to assist – others were doing that.

I had to position myself in the place I needed to be at that time.

In life there are moments, even seasons, like this. There are numerous examples where we have to prioritise a particular role or activity over another: study; rearing young children; working a less-than-ideal job to pay the mortgage; reducing involvement in particular activities to enable more family time etc. This doesn’t mean that we can’t do other tasks; we just might be prioritising what is most important at that time. I guess it’s a little like driving a car on your side of the road. Sometimes you might get stuck behind a slow vehicle or have to navigate a windy, mountainous road. Though you could attempt to pass recklessly without appropriate caution, the wiser (and safer!) approach would be to wait until the oncoming lane, and our line of sight, is clear.

The reality is these seasons end. And as wisely observed by one of my friends, when stepping back from a particular role for a period to focus on something else, you can give others the opportunity to be involved in a position otherwise unavailable to them. Now I’ve just got to figure out how that works in the blogging application… 🙂