No matter what your feelings are toward current events in the US, we are all feeling something. Some are happy and hopeful, some distraught and scared of what will happen in the future. But the most important question is whether you are going to allow this to affect your writing.
Now, you may be saying, “What do you mean ‘allow’?!”
Many people are having a really hard time focusing so deeply are they feeling their emotions. People are thinking about what is going to happen—to them and to others; to the economy, hell, even to the world.
The problem is that you still have a book to write. You still have readers who need a book to read. You may have a deadline which you’d prefer to make and not just enjoy the sound it makes as it flies by (thank you Douglas Adams).
So, what are you going to do? How are you going to get yourself through this and focus your mind back to where it needs to be?
First of all, let me acknowledge that this is Not Easy. I too am feeling deep feelings. I too sat stunned on Wednesday morning not knowing what to think. Catastrophizing. Worrying and fearful. Exchanging thoughts of potential futures with family members. But then I had to get work. I had a romance to write. I had people who I had to make happy, whose lives I had to destroy and build back up again with the help of the other protagonist who was dealing with their own shit. I had a mystery to write as well—because my romances are always more than just two people falling in love—so I needed red herrings, clues, and investigations to write.
How in the world was I going to write people laughing and falling in love when I was sitting in front of my computer unable to think of anything but the future of the country I live in?
It wasn’t easy, but I pried off my concerned citizen hat and snuggled into the warm blanket of my fictional world. I had to completely shut off all thoughts of the real world and inhabit only the world of my own creation where there are beautiful gowns, balls, and laughing, happy people falling in love (as well as investigating their mystery and getting fooled by unreliable characters and information).
You can do this too, no matter what you write. You can and need to shut off the real world and go into your own special mental place where your characters reside and events are of your own (or your characters’) determination.
This is the beauty of being a writer of fiction. We can live in our own world where we are god. We don’t have to be ourselves living in the real world. We have an escape. And you need to take it.
How? Well, there are a number of ways:
- Sit somewhere comfortable and direct your thoughts to nothing but the world of your novel. Shove away any thoughts of the real world. They will come, and you have to stop them and then banish them. Re-focus on your world, your book. And keep doing so until you are there, in that fictional world and then get to work.
- Write all of your fears, your worries, your hopes, and your dreams. Get it all out until you’ve got nothing left to say. And then look at your plot or the last scene you wrote and allow yourself to let the real world take care of itself for now while you go back to work.
- Write where your characters in the story. Force yourself to write what you know needs to happen in your book. Write how your characters are feeling, where they are in their journey to their goal. Write what the antagonist is doing and how they’re going to thwart your protagonist.
Normally, to help writers get focused and back to writing I’ll suggest a walk. Not today. If you feel better if you exercise, go for a run until your mind is clear. Get onto the rowing machine and row yourself into your fictional world. Get on a treadmill and walk there as fast as you can. A slow meander through the real world, however, I fear would only keep you centered in the real world when what you need to do is get away from it. Exercise, yes, but in a gym or at home. If you go for a run outside, put on your headphones and let the world go by in a blur (just don’t forget to watch for oncoming traffic).
The world is moving chaos and will not get any better in the coming years. Only you can help yourself and others escape it. We’re going to need all the escapist literature we can get our hands on in order to deal with what’s out there. We need you and your books, please don’t let us down.