Willpower (some patience required)

I’m a very busy person. So are you. So is just about everyone I know. We all have a million and three things on our plates at any given time and yet, this time of year, we all start thinking about what extra hobby, skill, or goal we can add to our heaping platters. Maybe we also start looking at what we can trim, but mostly when we talk about resolutions, we’re talking about what to add, what to do more of, what to become better at.

I’m a fan of goals. More than that, I’m a fan of achieving goals. I learned a long time ago that when I set a goal for myself, it’d better be achievable because I will race head-long toward it whether it’s realistic or not. If I’m going to have a prayer at hitting my target, then I need three things from my goals: they must be realistically achievable (meaning, within my power and not dependent on unpredictable external factors) goals, quantifiable goals, and goals I have some passion for. If any of these isn’t present, then I’m doomed from the start. Essentially, though, I like my goals to look a lot like self-fulfilling prophesies.

But there’s definitely something intrinsically exciting about setting a goal for yourself. There’s something exhilarating about setting your sights a little higher and telling yourself you’ll make it. It’s a little like making a wish and letting yourself believe it will come true.

At the start of week three of 2012, I’m betting some of us are starting to feel the strain. Some of us are starting to slip up and some of us are probably starting to wonder why we thought we could do any of this and begin abandoning all hopes of being the better person we thought, for one! shining! moment!, we could be. Bring on the hair shirt! I’m a loser, again.

But! This isn’t necessarily true. There’s a real possibility that you’re just tired.

At the beginning of the year, I was listing out my new projects to a good friend and my intentions toward each. This friend, who knows me Very Well, sent along this link to an NPR interview with Roy Baumeister, and it’s really changed how I approach new projects in general.

He proposes that our willpower, the thing that is the driving force behind any goal we make, is like any other muscle. You can use it, but it has a finite amount of juice and once you’ve tapped it out, that’s it. No more willpower for you. You might know that it would be better for you to get your butt in the chair and write another 500 or 1,000 words, but it’s just not gonna happen once that muscle's been exhausted.

Let’s highlight this thought: willpower is a finite resource.

We use our willpower a lot. We use it to get out of bed on time, to get to work, to get the kids to school, and to carry out everything we must do in a day. That leaves us with a diminished amount by the time we’ve found a spare minute to work toward achieving one of our many goals. In my world, this means that I need to take it easy on myself when at the end of the day, I choose an hour reading over an hour writing.

But, wait! There’s more! He also suggests that like any other muscle, willpower can be strengthened until it’s the THE HULK OF WILLPOWERS and you can DO ALL THE THINGS. --> slight exaggeration

To break this thought down a bit more, let's say you start your day with 100 willpower points. Getting yourself out of bed on time, presentable for work, and in your desk on time costs you 20 WP points. Doing your job at the level of awesome you require costs you 50 points. Running a few post-work errands costs you 15 points and getting yourself home and fed costs an additional 5.

That's a total of 90 willpower points spent just on living your daily grind! And now you've got 10 left over to attach to your many goals. What's a person to do? It looks like you're defeated before you've even begun, so why even bother?

But here's the trick. You apply those 10 willpower points to the project of your choice (maybe that's eating a healthy dinner every night, maybe it's putting in some creative time, maybe it's reading more) and make that a non-negotiable item in your daily willpower count. Let's say that cooking a divine meal costs you 15 willpower points. Don't get to the end of that meal and feel defeated that you have absolutely NO energy left for your other endeavors. Get to the end of that meal and consider that you've just exercised your will past it's point of exhaustion. Remember the points? That dinner took us to -5! FEEL THE BURN.

And, all things being equal, tomorrow will be easier.

This might be the coolest idea I’ve encountered in a while and if you’re like me and you use metaphor constantly in your understanding of the world around you, then you’re probably already creating a willpower exercise chart in your mind.

The other side of this idea is that it’s ultimately self-defeating to expect that simply because it seems possible to do all the things on your list of resolutions doesn’t mean that it is. At least not right away and perhaps not all at the same time. Trying to do too much (changing your diet and exercise habits on top of getting up at 5am to write a thousand words on top of resolving to read two books a week) can wear your willpower out lickety-split!

We can build up to being superhuman, but it’s probably important to remember that creating change takes sustained effort and, most often, a little slack and a few stumbling blocks. I, for one, am going to stop reading low points as failures, but as the moments I spent all my willpower points on other things in a day. No beating myself up. Instead, I’ll resolve to add a few more reps to my willpower set the next day.

This year, I’m going to stretch my linguistic skills and learn German. Also, boxing. I plan to become an expert on aquifers and water systems, give myself an overview of cutting edge physics, and learn how shotgun rounds are made. I also plan to draft at least one novel this year and to continue playing the cello. It’s a tall order and a mix of old and new things, but they’re all within the realm of the possible.

Assuming I can create the willpower to sustain it.

Rules are over-rated (mostly)

Anytime you try a new recipe or pattern or piece of music, the rule is the same: stick to the words on the page. The general wisdom is that you may want to change things the next time through, but on your maiden voyage, you DO NOT DEVIATE unless you want DISASTEROUS THINGS TO HAPPEN.

I’m really bad with rules.

Not the big ones. I’m good with stoplights and airport security. But when it comes to creative endeavors, I always, always deviate from the plan. I have an inability to trust that the person who put the pattern or recipe together, or who made interpretive changes to the sheet of music I’m about to try knew what they were doing. Or, maybe they knew what they were doing, but they didn’t know me. So, instead of following these things to a T, I look them over a few times, hold the idea of the thing in my head, and trundle forth into some state of semi-disaster or moderate success.

I make changes to and substitutions in recipes. I only refer to a pattern if I can no longer see through my tears. And I don’t have time to worry about crescendos and perfect trills in music.

Of course, it’s never perfect the first time through, because that’s when I’m learning. Perfection only gets in the way.

Turns out, I write the same way I do all of these other things. The difference in writing is that I have to make up the pattern I intend to deviate from. You might think that this means I’m more likely to stick to it, but that’s just not true. Apparently, I don’t trust myself to know the ins and outs of a story any more than I trust the folks at Vogue to know what I need in a jacket pattern (my shoulders are not Vogue shoulders).

At one point, I was afraid that writing multiple drafts of the same story meant I was doing it wrong. Friends shudder every time I tell them I’ve started over or that I’ve tossed another 20k into the “bits and bobs” file. But I think I’m going to start using different words for this process. I think it might be better to say that I’ve started again and that drafts are rehearsals for the real thing.

It’s good to have a plan or a guide or an outline. I like having the shape of the thing in mind before I begin, but I also like taking off into the unknown. It’s in the telling of it that the story is born. At least, that’s true for me.

So! It’s the New Year and that sounds like a fine time to pick up a new project. I’ve got two vying for dominance, both with very loud voices. I don’t know which to dive into first. So, if I were to tell you that one of these ideas looked like this….



And that the other looked like this...



Which would you vote for? Tryptic 1 or 2?

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All photos found via Flickr Creative Commons.

Two Plunges: Tumblr & Guest Posts

I've resisted Tumblr for a long while. The same way I resisted Twitter until everyone in the known universe had an account except for me (there may be exceptions to this; please, allow me my hyperbole). But the time has come. A name too perfect to pass up arose from an exchange between Tessa and myself and therefore, my Tumblr was born. Once something has a name, it exists, you know.

If you're curious to see what I'll Tumble (and believe me, I am), you can find me here: Obviously Parker.

The other new experience was a guest post that went up about a week ago over at the Adventures in YA & Children's Publishing blog.  This is a fantastic blog, run by people engaged with the publishing work at every level. It is full of excellent resources and advice for writers. In addition every month, they run a workshop on the 1st 5 pages of works in progress. This is one of the best (not to mention generous!) ongoing workshop offers I've seen. Find more details by clicking here.

My guest post is here: The Anatomy of a Good Hook. In which, I use fishing hooks to talk about writing.

Hope you're all off to a grand start this 2012!

Queries and Cappuccinos

There's something about winter that makes a cappuccino at any hour of the day sound like a good idea. (Okay, in all honesty, there's also something about any month ending in y that makes cappuccinos sound good, but that's beside the point. Winter is the point.) I find winter drinks irresistibly cozy. Triple-y so if I'm traveling. Which means that I've spent most of December Highly Caffeinated. Also, at zero risk for developing a calcium deficiency anytime soon. This is a good thing as I've also spent a good portion of December doing revisions and critiquing three full manuscripts.

(As an aside, I found the most amazing cappuccino I've ever tasted/seen while in Merida, Mexico. DO YOU SEE THE FOAM? HAVE YOU EVER SEEN ANYTHING SO DIVINE? There was no other way to drink this than to sacrifice all dignity and give yourself over to a cinnamon face-plant. I, for one, didn't hesitate to toss my dignity out the front door.)

I'm approximately seven cappuccinos away from finishing this round of revision. It's timely, I think, to be wrapping up at the new year. I've seen a number of people in the writing community doing similar things like brushing up queries and pitches and since I probably didn't get you anything for the holidays, I'm going to give away a few query crits. This isn't totally selfless. I'll treat myself to one cappuccino per query I crit, so really, I'm enabling myself to stay caffeinated.

Okay! So! Have a query? Want my eyes? Here are the rules:

1.  Your query should look like a cappuccino! By which I mean, in the subject line of your email to nataliecparker AT gmail DOT com, please include: CAPPUCCINO QUERY!  
2. Your query should taste like a cappuccino! By which I mean, it should include the component pieces of any query: the intro, the pitch, the closing remarks. It should be polished and pretty!
3. Your query should smell like a cappuccino! ... /metaphor Please copy and paste your query into the body of your email. No attachements. 

That's it. First five emails to hit my inbox get my eyes. 

Happy winter, everyone. I hope you'll treat yourself to a cappuccino (or bubble tea.....I don't really know what tea drinkers do for a treat) and feel a little extra cozy.    

UPDATE - I've got my 5 queries, so this offer is closed. Give me another few months, though, and there'll be another.

A town called Campeche

For most of our trip, we stayed in a town called Campeche. It's south of Merida and a good middle point for exploring mangroves and petenes, but I could have spent days just walking through the colorful streets of this city.

And by colorful, I mean this place has ALL of the colors. This was what I saw when I stepped through the doors of my hotel:


We were told that it was a real "Pirates of the Caribbean" type town (and it has all the Renaissance Festival style pirate themed pubs, restaurants, and knick-knacks to prove it). Back in the days of yore, the place was so put upon by pirates that they protected themselves from invasion by surrounding the bulk of the town in battlements. Many of these battlements still stand tall, which gave the town a very European feel - castles and churros are a delightful combination, I tell you.



Campeche is also something of an uneven city. The ground wasn't scaled when the buildings went up, which seemed to be a point of frustration to those who built the sidewalks. They, at least, are level, which was a sometimes a challenge...


From the top of the battlements we could also see that many of these lovely buildings were not all that they seemed to be. They hide a wilderness inside....I wanted to explore them.


There was a secret place inside one of the battlements with recreation musket rifles and halberds. So, of course, this happened:


And finally, Campeche is home to a cathedral I could not capture well enough with my lens. On our first night in the city, I watched a group of women bless and carry a tall statue of Our Lady of Guadalupe around the square and into the church. She was dressed in blue and waiting inside to receive the many pilgrimaging Guadalupanos.

Uxmal Ruins

I've been a horrible blogger during this trip to Mexico. Not because what I'm doing isn't blog-worthy, but I've been critiquing manuscripts and writing for and getting lost in the week long celebration that is the Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe. But tonight, it's raining and the festivities are quiet.

I'm staying in an 1800 barracks-turned-hotel in Campeche, Mexico, a World Heritage site. We're leaving tomorrow and I'll be sad to see it go, but I'm looking forward to exploring Merida.

But to backtrack a bit. Here is a photo-essay of my first full day in Mexico, exploring the ruins of Uxmal, a Mayan complex built beginning in 850AD.






Are you kidding? OF COURSE I crawled through that hole. What would Indian Jones do? (PS - There were lots of iguanas in there. Heads poking out of walls four feet above me. Watching me. Creepy is the word you're looking for.)





This is in Campeche, not Uxmal. About thirty yards from the front door of my hotel and no, it didn't look any more real standing right in front of it. 

When dogs listen

At some point this afternoon, Victoria Schwab posted the following video on Twitter:





And while we watched, we noticed Grendel doing this: