You Can't Live a Dream

Being a writer has always been my dream. Guess what? I am a writer. I write nonfiction for my day job, and I write middle-grade fiction as a passion. I've even been published.

So why doesn't it feel like a dream come true?

Because you can't live a dream. You can only live real life.

There are dream-like moments -- getting an offer from an agent, a contract, an award, a bestseller (some of those remains dreams) -- but reality is much more mundane. Big contracts come with pressure and deadlines. So do small ones. So does self-publishing, only the people cracking the whip are readers who demand more.

Agents and editors and readers often don't have the same ideas as you do. They don't always like your latest work. There are reviews, returns, and unearned royalties along the way. There are disappointing sales and dropped contracts. There are empty book signings, readings that fall flat, endless blog posts, and internet controversies. Hopefully there is plenty of writing and more books along the way too.

Writing can be a good job or bad one. Well paid, poorly paid, or unpaid. It can be a very good life, and I'm grateful for the one I have. But it's always work.

So what about the other part of my dream -- a pot of dark-brewed coffee and a thousand words, a long walk on a crisp sunny fall day, another thousand words?

That's not real life. That's a writer's retreat.

I Dream of Genies

Dreams.

Much has been written about them, but they're still this magical, little-understood miracle in our lives. They can be deeply disturbing, simply shocking, or absolutely blissful. Sometimes they don't make a lick of sense. Other times, we get our stories from them, carefully crafted by someone other than our own conscious minds.

This is how Twilight was born.

I've read of other authors who use their dreams exclusively in writing their fiction. They've even learned to manipulate their dreams, follow different story lines, back up and start again when it veers off in the 'wrong' direction.

As for me, I am not in control of my dreams. Occasionally I have one that's too disturbing to continue and I wake up with a horrified gasp, slightly less dramatic than in the movies.

But most of all, I notice a spike in storylines in my dreams when I haven't written anything new in a while and my mind really wants me to start imagining again.

In the past month alone, I've dreamed of time travel, whodunit murder mystery on a cruise ship, a love triangle involving a seemingly ordinary girl and two brothers, animals that foretell the future in an ominously human voice, and explosions of major landmarks.

I find myself in the shower afterward trying to weave these separate points into one cohesive story. It's enough to make me laugh out loud at my own subconscious. Some elements shouldn't be combined into a single story, and the attempt is nothing short of hilarious.

You probably won't be reading my "Dr. Who meets Agatha Christie with talking animals" for young adult readers any time soon. But it's opened up my imagination a bit to contemplate the idea. And I never would have dreamed of combining those elements... if I hadn't dreamed them first.

What role do your dreams play in your writing life? 

Feeling Small

I just flew in from visiting my father last night, so I've still got a bit of jetlag. During my flights (I had to change planes), I sat next to the window. And as we took off and landed, I got to look out the window to the ground below. We passed over towns, and I saw houses the size of models. I saw cars and semi-trucks like little specs on the road. And I thought about how each of those cars carried someone driving them, and probably some passengers, too. And each of those houses held people. And every spec of light, when we were flying at night, belonged to a light source, maybe a house or a window.

In made me feel incredibly small.

For those times when we feel the world owes us, when we feel that we deserve respect. Just realize we are only one of millions of people. We are only another spec on the road to publication. And I don't say this to try and discourage anyone...because looking at it that way IS discouraging. I say it to ground those who believe they are the only special ones out there, that the industry OWES them. It owes you nothing.

Every person on that road below me was an individual, with their individual problems and individual ideas. Each spec on that road and each light, was someone with dreams.

So are your dreams more important than all of those people? Nope. Not really. The only person it is more important to...is you.

So how can we make OUR dreams rise above the millions? How can we make our dream into a reality? Well, some of those specs only THINK of their dreams; they never DO anything about it. So the fact you are reading this, brings you one step closer to your dream. And still, even some of those only do something for so long before they give up. In each step, we have obstacles. As each obstacle is set before us, we have the choice to become a spec once again or keep going. So consider each obstacle, each rejection, each failure.  How will you treat them? Will you be offended? Will you think the vast world owes you? Because, if you do, then all that happens is that you float back to the level of a spec, blending in with the masses of dream wishers. Instead, take it as a journey. Though millions of people want a dream, only a few persevere.

To rise above the millions of dream wishers, you have to climb.