WIP – Summer Writing Project
(Courtesy of Flickr – No this isn’t me but it could be!)
One marketing suggestion I read recently was to blog about your current Work in Progress – WIP. Include the highs and lows, triumphs and failures, frustrations and despair. I’ve never done this. Usually I try to protect my WIP like a card shark playing his cards close to his chest or a mother protecting her baby from the world. I don’t want anyone breathing germs on my evolving idea lest I lose focus, get discouraged or distracted, and give up before I start. I also don’t want to give away the plot. I like the idea of waiting until the bidding has ended then displaying a Royal Flush to the amazement of all! (Am I mixing metaphors here?!)
(Courtesy of Flickr, poker photos. The Royal Flush is the highest poker hand – always wins!)
During the formative months or years of an idea, they can be so fragile and vulnerable. Some ideas are best left behind before pen hits paper, others need time to develop. I don’t like to invite anyone into that process. In the past I would wait until I had finished and felt I had a somewhat polished piece of writing to present before letting anyone offer a critique. Even then I was reluctant to have others read my writing lest they criticize my “precious.”
The passage of time and the process of putting my writing out there for others to review have helped me get beyond this. I also think my years in ministry, especially my fourteen years as a pastor, have helped me develop the strength to deal with criticism and even attacks without being devastated. Time and God have taught me, “This too shall pass.” And, thanks to CPE – Clinical Pastoral Education – I’m better able to take what is helpful in anyone’s comments and disregard the rest.
So, I’m going to let you in on my writing progress this summer. I already have the general outline of the book in my head after months of letting it gestate. Now I just have to get it on paper. I don’t want to give away plot details, but I will let you know what happens each week: whether I make progress or not; what inner demons surface as I struggle to put pen to paper.
So join me! I hope you enjoy the journey.
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