Something happened when it came time to send The Things We Crave into the world. I froze. I couldn’t pull the trigger. “The book needs a rewrite,” I told my friends, smiling like a goon. “It needs revision…”

The revision lasted several months. During this period I reworked scenes, then entire chapters. I paced about my apartment and acted out dialogue, as confident as a long haired cat in a room full of rocking chairs. I didn’t know it at the time, but a Dream Eater had me by the throat; and I was the Dream Eater.

Your best friend and worst enemy is the guy or gal in the mirror. This is true for writers, especially when it’s time to share their work with the world. It’s one thing to write a story and show it to you friend and quite another to put a book into the hands of strangers. But writing is about sharing your work. It’s what Ariel Gore means when she says, “Nourish the world with your words. Yo.” What good is a manuscript on a hard drive? On that note, what good is that writer?

Publishing your work is proclaiming to the world, “This is the best I can do. It’s the best book I can write and it’s worthy of your time and money because I say so.” That’s frightening because it goes without saying that somebody is going to disagree. Hell, maybe a lot of somebodys will disagree. And if too many somebodys disagree it’s going to hurt. It’s that fear that the internal Dream Eater feeds upon. The paralysis will keep your words hidden away while someone else’s earn an Amazon ranking.

The fact is The Things We Crave is the best book I can write at this time. Will it be the best book I can write next year? No way, next year I’ll be better. Did it benefit from months of revision? Not really. Will some people like it? Yup. Will some hate it? Definitely. Does it matter? You know the answer. 

What I know for sure is that one particular Dream Eater is dead. I’ve got my sock clad feet propped on his sorry, dead ass right now. ”Rest in peace, mother fucker.” Good riddance to him. And now that he’s down the world’s gonna hear a lot more from me.

The world needs you to do what you love; and because you have to eat and pay the mortgage, you need to get paid for it – this is at the core of Zero Hour Work Week, the latest free eBook from Jonathan Mead. All of Jonathan’s work at IlluminatedMind.net centers on personal development, the belief that one can escape the drudgery of a tedious job and replace it with a meaningful existence. Zero Hour Work Week is inspirational in nature, but provides specific tactics and a solid foundation to begin the transition.

Important aside – what we’re talking about here is Lifestyle Design. The concept of work as part of a quality life rather than a painful chore one must do to survive seems to be more acceptable to the younger generations than others. Even members of Gen X cling to the idea of retirement. Lifestyle Design, on the other hand, is the process art of creating a fulfilling life before you’re submitting application to the old folk’s home. More and more people appreciate the value of living this way. Jonathan Mead takes it a step further and calls it, “Your birthright.” He’s a bold guy, that one. No wonder I’m a fan.

What does all this mean for writers and how does Zero Hour Work Week fit in? The fact is writers are already worlds ahead of most people in terms of knowing what their passion is. We write. It keeps us up at night. It makes us turn the phone off and ignore the tweet deck’s chirping. It makes us drink too much coffee and ignore social engagements. If we could do it for a living, we surely would. We already know it’s what we want to do with our hours, days and years.

Well, we can. We simply have to find the sweet spot between our writing and adding value. We are like any other business owner. Okay, I take that back. We’re TONS cooler than most business owners, but the building blocks are the same for us. If we were broomstick makers we would first become the best broomstick maker around. We would then pack our brooms with benefits that make all the other brooms look shoddy. Finally, we’d answer the need people have for a floor that’s free of lint balls and dust. The business of writing is no different. First, we must become good writers. This means learning about story architecture, character development, theme, etc. The information is out there, believe me. We then pack our products with value – a page turning plot, a character to love, a story the readers tells all of her friends about. The value we provide is simple – vicarious living, a few evenings with a good read.

Jonathan Mead is right of course. If we all did the work we loved, we’d have the world’s greatest scientist, coaches, doctors, musicians, executives, engineers, teachers and writers. It sounds like a good place to me.

An author’s voice should be as unique as a country singer’s twang. Maybe that’s a bad analogy, but developing ones voice is crucial to being a pro writer. Voice is what makes you special. It’s what Larry Brooks of StoryFix calls the sixth core competency. Every famous writer has a distinct voice.

Suzannah Windsor Freeman of Write it Sideways has a compelling how-to article on this topic. It’s well worth the read. I especially like the advice on bending the rules. She refers to the English teacher adage, “Never start a sentence with ‘Or,’ ‘and,’ or ‘but’.” (In my English classes doing this was treated like a felony – I’m not kidding.) Suzannah explains that, “Writers bend these rules every day. The thing is, they bend them on purpose, not because they don’t know any better. They bend them as a stylistic choice which adds to their unique writing voice.”

And that’s exactly the way it should be.

Write it Sideways

I’ve been working on a lot of first drafts; and I’ve developed a love-hate relationship with them. I’m happy to drunk on creativity, when the words are flowing and writing fiction is as easy as talking. Then the voices start to speak. They say, “This is crap” and “This is way beyond your ability right now” and ask, “Have you lost your little mind?”

When we’re learning how to write fiction we must respectfully tip-our-hat (in my case it’s a top hat) at those voices and ignore them. The inner-critic, the doubter, the little Dream Eater that lives in all of us loves to gnaw at our confidence. Quite often, he speaks logically. The draft you’re working on may, in fact, be poorly written and above your current ability. So what?

It’s just a draft. If it doesn’t work out it can be stored away and finished later. If it does come together, we’ve grown as a writer. Like a guitar player learning a new lick, we’ve grown. Acknowledge the voices, then ignore them and keep writing.

Exercise: Write about an experience that was emotionally painful, something you remember to this day. It can be from childhood or yesterday. it can be something that took seconds or years. In either case, be as honest and detailed as you can be about it. Just write it down.

Learning how to write fiction take one consistent action – writing fiction. We cannot become writers by reading books about writing. We cannot listen to lecture. Granted, both of these are useful and reading good fiction weaves its way into our own work. But ultimately nothing will take the place of writing and Failing Miserably! That’s right – failure is part of the game.

Upon encountering this adversity, it’s important to remember the following:

1. No time spent writing is ever wasted. The project may be a dud, but the hours spent at the craft were still well spent.
2. Nobody dies when a piece of fiction doesn’t work. The writer might feel like it, but I assure you he or she will be okay.
3. Determining why the project failed is more important than bringing it back to life. Perhaps the writer thought “it would just come to me” and began writing… Or, maybe the plot was tight but the character lacked depth and passion? Whatever the reason, find it and make sure it doesn’t happen again.

Most of all, don’t sweat it. Move on to the next story, novel, screenplay, whatever. Dust yourself off, dry the tears and put the manuscript in a box. Then dive into the next one a wiser writer!