Tuesday, April 3, 2012

The Writing Life: Facing Challenges

by Pat Stoltey

I’m a pushover for challenges, at least the good kind. Right after my decision to cut back on blogging to give me more time for writing, I signed up for the Blogging from A to Z April Challenge 2012. Sorry if you didn’t get in on the action. The deadline for sign-ups was yesterday.

The A to Z Challenge is all about making new blogger friends. And that’s all about widening our circle of contacts to include folks who aren’t necessarily like us. By that, I mean the challenge is an opportunity to link up with bloggers who may live in other parts of the world, bloggers who don’t write the same things we write or who don’t write at all, and bloggers who focus on causes, whether they be health and welfare, religion, or politics. One of the things I enjoy most about this challenge is the people I’ve met who stayed in touch throughout the year—reaching out, supporting, sympathizing, and sometimes even conducting an interview or hosting a guest blog post.

I have another challenge for this week. I’ve dilly-dallied on writing the synopsis for my suspense manuscript, but I need to get that job done before I start the submission process. This task cannot be put off one more day. That's another reason my blog post this week is short and simple. I'm working so hard my computer is smoking.

Challenges for writers can be great or small, fun or traumatic. Most of us have experienced the good and the bad. What is the biggest writing challenge you face this week? How are you going to meet that challenge?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Pat - Writers have to be willing to face challenges. And they have to have the confidence that they can meet those challenges. My biggest challenge as a writer this week? Picking up the action in my story and moving smoothly to the next part of it without the pieces seeming too "glued together," if you know what I mean.

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Don't singe your circuits!
That's why I'm such a big believer in the Challenge - so many different bloggers coming together and all of the new friends.

Dean K Miller said...

Thinking I'll jump in next year for A-Z, with Aviation/ATC related posts...

Get that synopsis done and let the computer simmer down.

Jack Durish said...

I, too, was thinking about cutting back on the blogging to give me more time for writing. Then I got an idea. Repurpose my blog postings into a book. Since this idea occurred to me, I have developed some 30 blog posts spanning two months that I will bind with a common thread and publish.