How do you eat an entire elephant? You eat an entire elephant the same way you eat a bon bon. You eat it one step at a time. Remember that. There will be a quiz by the loin cloth wearing cabana boys at the end of this post.
Now, you may wonder what elephant eating and novel writing have to do with one another. It’s very simple—you succeed at them in the exact same way. When I got the call on my first novel it had been a super secret project. My family knew I was going into my office every night to write but they had never seen the manuscript. Other than that the only people who knew I was writing was the people at Savvy Authors and the people on my RWA loops. And those people can’t pick me out of a lineup to save their lives. Okay, now some of them can but not back then. So for me, they didn’t count. No one knew. Especially not the people at my old job.
So, when the call came in of course it came in while I was at work. In a staff meeting. With 50 other people. So I excuse myself, step outside and take the call. Then scream at the top of my lungs because WTF someone just bought that super secret book I never thought was going anywhere. Everyone is not surprisingly shocked.
But the next day things were different. Suddenly people wanted to know how I did it. And very rarely were they happy with the answers. Because the thing is people see writing a book as one of those great, esoteric things that those super smart people over there do. Those author people. Real people don’t write books and if they do they don’t get published. But I was a real person. I sat in the cubicle next to them, I cracked jokes about the ugly ass clothes my boss thought made her look 25 instead of 50, ect. So everyone wanted to know how I did it. Then they were disappointed with the truth.
Why? Because the truth is this: Every night, once my kids were in bed I went into my home office, turned my computer on, put my fingers on the keys and I wrote. And I wrote and I wrote and I wrote. I didn’t turn on the television. I didn’t watch American Idol. I didn’t play WOW. I wrote. Every day. That’s how I got the sequel out to. And the first half of another contemporary novel that’s currently in revisions. Every night I sat down and wrote.
And now that I’m one of those rarified full time authors? Guess what I do. Every day, after dropping the oldest off at school and taking the time to go to the gym to work off the butt being an author has given me, I sit down and I write. Then when the kids go to bed I sit down and I write again. Every day. No exceptions. No excuses. No ifs ands or buts about it. I sit down at my temporary kitchen table in my temporary apartment and I put my fingers to the keys and write.
Because that’s the super secret initiation into becoming an author. It’s not magical dreams that come to you of two kids staring at each other in a field. It’s not flipping between the news and reality television shows. It’s not getting high and seeing the story play out in front of you. All of those are great if they work for coming up with an idea (personally I’d avoid the getting high one but that’s just me). But when it comes time to differentiate the people with a great idea for a book from the people who have written a book that super secret difference is this – the people who wrote a book sat down and put their fingers to the keys. The End.
So when you get discouraged about your writing. Or your writer’s block or not selling. Or whatever it may be that happens in your writing career here’s the thing to keep in mind. The greatest difference between the authors you love and that annoying guy at the grocery store who always wants to tell you his novel ideas while he’s bagging your eggs is this: The writers sat down and wrote.
Now back to the loin cloth cabana boys pop quiz: How are eating an elephant and writing a novel the same?
Answer: You do it one tiny bite at a time.
For those of you who remembered from the beginning the cabana boys shall all be coming to visit you shortly. Please have margarita mix and suntan oil waiting.
PS: For those of you who’ve followed from the beginning the current world domination equation looks something like this:
F(cabana boys to writer)= 2.5*(|temperature|-25 degrees Farenheit)+(1*#of children writer has)+(3*number of projects under deadline that are not within 30 days of turn in date)+(5*number of projects that are within 30 days of turn in date)+(10*number of overdue projects)+3
If you’d like an explanation of the cabana boy formula or would like to suggest additions or modifications please comment and we can discuss.
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