EW

This trip into non-fiction territory is a learning experience. The whole structure is so different from fiction. I honestly keep thinking I’ll get nabbed for doing something hinky. It’s a really alien thought to do this proposal with the idea of selling a book I’ve not written yet. I’m getting it’s an industry standard of sorts. Selling on the strength of a good proposal seems like one of those late night info-mercial things. Too good to be true. Wait! What? Someone might pay me to write this book? Wow.

Now don’t get me wrong. There’s a buttload of work involved. And it’s good solid work too. It’s forcing me to flesh out the ideas into something solid and real. To take the work I’ve been doing for years, the experience from classes and individual work, and roll it out into something coherent and useful. The urge to just sit down and write it grabs me by the scruff and shakes me at times. I’m excited about this book! This great wave of change we’re seeing is affecting us all. Working with dreams is an amazing expression of personal change, and I can’t help but feel that this is the time for me to get it out there. People are looking for change, ready for it. My urgency is partially driven by the idea of not missing this energetic wave. I want to get out there before it crests. The more people I can reach, the more potential for others to find their answers and get whole. The more of us that are awake and working pro-actively - the better world we’ll be building.

I’m working at the chapter breakdown, taking my rough notes on an outline, and trying to solidify them into defined chapters. I’m learning a lot about how this first dreamwork book will look in the end. How I want it to look, and feel. Familiarizing myself with non-fiction publishing has been a necessity, of course. Agent, no agent…straight to the editor? The myriad of details that can decide whether or not your book sees the light of day often make writing a book seem simple in comparison. Who knew???

Every time I think the too-good-to-be-true police are going to smack me back into reality. I remind myself, that regardless of my passionate belief in this subject. My gut-level knowing that this information could help people. There’s still a ridiculously small chance that any submission I send out will make it past the first circular file. I know. Morose at best. But it helps keep me even. I KNOW this will be published-somewhere-somehow. I have to write this. To DO this. But I’m trying to keep my expectations at least somewhat in line with publishing reality. That way once I get that acceptance letter, that contract, I’ll be able to dance around like a meth-addicted squirrel without worrying that the too-good police are coming to haul my butt away.

I spend a great deal of time in my classes reminding everyone to follow their own information and symbols. That they are, both waking and sleeping, laying a trail of symbolic breadcrumbs toward their goals. I believe this wholeheartedly. I know this works. I also know that even as I teach it, I’m not always following my own advice.

This past couple of week has been hectic. Nothing unusual with the three short people doing tandem sickness games atop of the normal rush.  Amidst the chaos I managed to note at least three separate instances when I got the distinct message about writing a dreamwork book. From the subtle, to a dream, to someone literally mentioning off-handedly that I should write down my experiences. It took the actual statement for me to take notice and connect the other instances together. I then spent several days debating and pondering the idea of a book. I’ve had the thought for years.  Ever since I realized that dreamwork actually…well - worked. The more classes I offer, the more I see people transforming themselves and their lives for the better, the more passionate I become. I KNOW that anyone willing to work, can use this information to better their lives, to be happier, healthier, and whole. I walk into the classroom every week excited to be doing what I’m doing, honored that the people keep returning to share their experiences with me and the others. And I walk out feeling alive, ecstatic and, quite frankly, blessed. So why the hesitation over putting it down on paper? If  i’m being honest with myself, it’s plan old self doubt.

I don’t have a string of letters after my name, proclaiming me as some kind of authority. I’m not famous, or even terribly important. I’m just me. So who is going to listen to me? Stupid, self-defeatist, fear driven thoughts. We all get them. This is part of MY dream life. Teaching, helping people heal their spirits, giving them the tools to lead the lives they’ve always wanted to lead. I can’t imagine a better way to spend my energies. I have the dream of taking my class across the country, even the world. Taking my family with me as I travel. Writing both non-fiction and fiction, teaching, travelling… So why is it so much easier for me to encourage my students to follow their dreams with determination and belief in their place in the Universe, and I can’t manage to push past my own fear/inertia to start a book proposal? The easy answer is I’m an idiot.

I say easy because more self abuse just adds to the inertia and allows me to stay stuck. It’s the victim’s way out.

I’m no victim. I spent years learning how to NOT be one, that there are no victims. So I started the groundwork. Which, dorkily enough for me consists of some research on how the entire non-fiction gig works. And no, I am not abandoning the novel. I’m going to do both. I figure if I’m creating the dream life, why not really go for it. I love both fantasy and dreamwork. I can do both. And actually this might be just the thing for my goldfish brain to settle into something more productive. Two projects.

Now that I’ve caught you up, I should get back to my outlining.  Building a dream life isn’t just about the dreaming….this stuff takes work.

In my return to active book duty,  I’ve learned a few things about how I work. Not all of them thrilling.

The first is that I am not one of those ” I locked myself in a room for two weeks and walked out with a novel” people. And I think I’ve been laboring under the misconception that I SHOULD be. That somehow my need for outlines, lists, hell…even excel spreadsheets, more lists, post it notes everywhere, and yet more lists, somehow made my process less artistic. That by needing structure, or a methodology, I was less of a writer. I’ve read the books, the interviews where the bulk of authors whose works I love, and admire have said the real truth is there are no shortcuts. You need to read, and write a lot. Bottom line. If you want to be a writer, write.  But on that deep level where all self-doubt and unrealistic expectations live, I really believed it should work the other way for me. That writing should be this mystical, otherworldly experience, and since it wasn’t I was surely failing somewhere.

Then I realized, life interruptions, children, illnesses, surgeries, and all those other pesky wee things that trip me up aside, this book wasn’t going to just land in my lap a completed masterpiece. There’s actual work here. And that entire 1% inspiration - 99% perspiration  idea I’d been balking at for so long, is actually a hell of a lot more true than I’d allowed. Don’t get me wrong. I expected to work for it. I just thought it would be a whole lot less like…well…work.

So I took a long hard look at the parts of my life in which I consider myself, if not successful, at least competent. And there it was. I love a good list. I always have a plan, even if the plan is to just see what happens - in my head that’s still a plan. And all this time I’ve been waiting for that flash of inspirational flow to hit, the book has been languishing, undone and providing me with enough guilt and shame to fuel my own religion. I think I’ve been here before. This realization that this would be work, but I don’t think I ever bothered to break it down into the manageable pieces of a real, doable project. This time…I’m armed to the teeth…let fly the spreadsheets of doom! And I’m learning to take whatever progress I made gladly, without that voice in my head harping it’s not enough, At this point, anything is better than what I’ve been doing. Above all, my new mantra is I will finish this book, if I have to drag my bloody limbless corpse through a field of literary landmines. There is a very real fear, that if I don’t finish this, I’ll continue with starting but never finishing anything. And that…would suck.

Second, I have a touch of goldfish brain. It usually only asserts itself when doing research. I honestly love research, it’s a place I can lose hours in a blink. Tracking down those obscure details that will make things more real, richer. It’s exciting to me to uncover new facts. But frequently what ends up happening, is I’ll find myself following an information trail, enthralled, enthused….and completely off topic. Well - perhaps parallel to topic is more accurate. It’s like the fish swimming along, on course toward its dinner who suddenly sees something shiny off to the side and just HAS to dart off to investigate. That would be me. The fish that is, not the shiny thing. Sometimes I don’t even catch it till I realize I’m crafting a new story idea based on the trail I’m toddling down, and by then it could be minutes, even hours later. I’m still working on this one. Now, I will usually make a note for myself and save it in my ideas file. But I still kill a lot of time this way.

There’s more, but small stuff, even -I- think I’ll figure out.

Time to go follow another trail of info crumbs deep into the woods of history. YAY me!