Desperate Times...

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Could words come more slowly to me than they are today? I sure hope not. I am reading what I have for Friday's submission (which time dictates that I must finish by tomorrow morning at the very latest), and I just hate it. It needs something. Just like that soup that's been simmering all day and somehow turns out to be bland, this piece is so blah. So blah, blah, blah, that I can hardly stand the idea of sending it out. It doesn't even have an ending.

So I was really open to help today. Any source would do. I began with the brilliant chapter on deepening from Carol Bly's Beyond the Writer's Workshop. It's brief, so I didn't need to sit with it for too long -- the clock is ticking. She helped me reach the diagnosis. It's not about what she calls "literary fixes." It's much too soon in the process for that. It's about re-locating the first inspiration, protecting it from criticism, and allowing it to come through by deepening the draft. She suggests a process of empathetic questioning. Fine. I did some empathetic questioning about my motives, hopes, dreams, vision, and ... (help) feelings for the piece. I see that it lacks a soul, but frankly I don't want to have too high hopes about finding it between now and tomorrow morning. In theory though, I do like her suggestion and I will allow my subconscious to run with it while I forge ahead.

Then, on the advice of a friend, I signed up for a free newsletter called "The Power Writing Newsletter" by Daphne Gray-Grant, the publication coach. I get my first issue on Tuesday. Along with that I got a bonus gift about mind-mapping, and I have to say, this was a great thing to land on my desk. I spent half an hour mind-mapping this afternoon and I made some great breakthroughs. It's a technique that allows the free-association of ideas, all generated from a central idea, in a kind of visual form that makes it feel more fun and more fluid than a linear outline. I've got a very busy mind-map in front of me on my desk right now. If I can incorporate even some of what's there into the piece, I should be able to send it off without feeling too grim about what my (new) advisor (whom I'm hoping to impress at least a little) will think.

Okay: workout, shower, dinner, back to the computer.