Well, yes, it’s August and I am in Texas so OF COURSE IT’S HOT HERE NOW!
Ahem, sorry about that. And don’t misunderstand: I’d much rather deal with this heat now than snow and ice in the middle of winter. I’m quite comfortable inside with air conditioning in a way that I’m not with heat when it’s cold outside. But....
It does mean I curtail activities outside and running errands, etc. On the other hand, it means I pretty much have to stay focused on the things I need to do inside. Like write. Make my coaching calls. Evaluate manuscripts. Plan for what I want to do next as I wait to hear on a manuscript I have out to an editor who asked to see it.
That’s the difficult part—to decide exactly what I want to do next and I suspect it’s something many writers face. How do you decide what’s right for you to do next?
Of course, in some cases, it’s a no brainer. There’s a book you really, really want to write or you’re at a level in your career where you pretty much can’t not keep doing what you’ve been doing.
But sometimes we’re in a position where we can make choices—about our writing and about our lives. If we write romance novels, that’s a fundamental tenet of our stories—that one can overcome challenges, make changes, grow as a person, be true to ourselves—and yes, find love and someone who will support our dreams.
Many of you know that a few years ago I set off across country not knowing where I would end up and finding a place with a pink refrigerator. If so, you also know that when the time came, I had no hesitation picking up and moving again, this time to Texas where I expect to be for a very long time.
I believe in stopping and asking ourselves, from time to time, if what we’re doing makes us happy and if there are changes we want to make in what we are doing, maybe finding an approach that works better for us, for our lives and for our writing. I believe that asking these questions makes us better writers. Even if we keep writing what we’ve written in the past, it’s good to look for new dimensions to what we’re writing or maybe target new, additional markets or find new ways to promote our work or....whatever it may be.
So as it gets hotter and hotter here, I’m staying inside in the air conditioning and planning out what I do next.
