Writers in the Storm

by Lori Freeland

Writers are unique and diverse creatures. We’re mysterious and unpredictable and original. That’s part of what makes us . . . us. And that’s a good thing. There are as many types of authors out there as there are genres to write in.

We can be introverts, extroverts, or a mix of both. We can be organized planners, chaotic pansters, or fall somewhere in between. We can be inspired by waking up to the energy of the sun or by winding down to the stillness of the moon. Some of us prefer to write alone while others feed off sharing a workspace.

But it’s not the differences between us that matter, it’s what makes us all the same—our crazy obsession to create. No matter how or where or when we work best, there are five things we all need to feed that drive to write.  

1. Passion for the project.

“No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader.”

-Robert Frost

Despite the number of writing skills we’ve mastered, if we’re not excited about the story we’re telling, it’s going to show.

There are a lot of reasons why you may not be “feeling” your latest project. But bottom line, the “blah” you have toward your words and ideas will affect your reader. They may not be able to pinpoint what’s wrong, but they’ll pick up on your indifference or negativity.

Whatever’s not working, take the time to figure it out and fix it. If it’s worth your time and energy to write the book, it’s worth your time and energy to do it right. And if this statement isn’t true for you, consider moving on to a different project. Don’t beat yourself up trying to make something work if it’s just not right.

Side Note: If you’re a serial project skipper and find yourself always moving on to a new project, ask yourself why. Because that’s a whole other issue.

2. Confidence to spur you on.

“Get it down. Take chances. It may be bad, but it’s the only way you can do anything really good.”

-William Faulkner

All writers struggle with confidence no matter how many books they’ve churned out or how successful they’ve been.

Each new project can feel like a blank slate, a test of our skills, an opportunity to fail. If we’ve been successful in the past, the voices in our heads tell us, “That was a one off. You’ll never be able to live up to that again.” If we’ve fallen below our own or others’ expectations, the voices in our heads tell us, “Why bother? You’re never going to be any good.”

Lack of confidence will kill even the best book. Forget about the past. Start now in this moment. Duct tape those stupid voices and find a new one. One that says, “You can do this. You’re going to put in the work and make it happen.” Then do an honest evaluation. What are your strengths? Play those up. What are your weaknesses? Make solid goals to fix them. Take a class. Find a mentor. Join a writing group. Ask for help. That’s how we all learn.  

Side Note: A lack of writing confidence often bleeds over from a lack of confidence in other areas of our lives. That may be the deeper issue. And it may be worth looking into—even if it’s hard. No one likes being vulnerable. But sometimes that’s what it takes to find your confidence and your value. And when you find it, it’s so worth it.

3. Goals to light the way.

“What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals.”

-Zig Ziglar

Goals are what get us where we want to go. Without them, we have no plan, no map, no destination.

Sometimes writing feels like navigating an impossible maze in a deep, dark cave that has no exit. At best, stumbling around in the dark is a haphazard gamble that we’ll ever find our way into the light. At worst, it’s a confidence and career killer.

Set aside an entire day to make some goals. Push everything else aside to really think about what you want when it comes to writing. Don’t be afraid to dream big or start small. Make a list that’s just for you. Brainstorm whatever comes to mind, then go back and pick what’s most important, and create a step-by-step map of how you’ll reach each goal.

Side Note: Keep your goals manageable. If the big picture seems overwhelming, even an hourly goal pushes you one more step toward your destination.

4. Time and space to create.

“Close the door. Write with no one looking over your shoulder. Don’t try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It’s the one and only thing you have to offer.”

-Barbara Kingsolver

Everyone needs some kind of buffer to get into and stay into the headspace of their project. And that requires a set amount of time and your own space—unless you’re one of those writers who works better being near someone else. The good news is that the more we exercise our “writing muscles,” the quicker we can dive into our projects and get traction. 

Whether you prefer writing in Starbucks, in an office, on the couch, or in your bed (guilty!), having a place you’re comfortable in is crucial. You know what kind of space works for you. Claim your spot.

Being deliberate about writing time makes all the difference in your productivity. You can think about wanting to write, talk about it, set goals to do it (also guilty!), but until you put your booty in that chair, you’re going nowhere. If all you have is your lunch hour, take it and use it the best you can. I’ve found the more “free” time I have, the less of it I spend writing. There’s something about being forced to fit writing into my day that kicks me in the butt to get it done. 

Side Note: If your space isn’t working, don’t be afraid to change it up and try something new. If you can’t find the time to write, make a list of how you spend your day and cut something out.

5. A squad to cheer us on.

“Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: ‘What! You Too? I thought I was the only one.’”

-C.S. Lewis

Behind every _______ (insert one or all: successful, working, productive, confident, goal-focused, passionate, creative) writer is a _________ (insert one or all: writer bff, critique group, accountability partner, cheerleading crew, supportive spouse, writing family).

Isolation is a real thing for writers and so are writing highs and lows. We need people who understand that to celebrate us in our “ups” and console us in our “downs.” Somehow, knowing we’re not struggling alone can make whatever we’re dealing with feel better.

Whether you join a writing group, meet a fellow writer for coffee, or start an accountability group on Zoom, make connections. Find your people. Only writers truly get other writers.

Side Note: Don’t feel bad about taking your time to put together your squad. The wrong people can hurt you as much as the right people can help you. For more on that, see The Up and Down Sides of Critique Groups: Is There Value in Finding Your Peeps?

Speaking of squads, we learn so much from each other, don’t we? Some of my “coolest” writing discoveries have come from comments, opinions, and suggestions on what I’ve written. So . . . let me know. Which of the five things writers need are most important to you? How do you make them happen? What doesn’t work for you? What other things do you need as a writer? And feel free to share your favorite encouraging quote down in the comments!   

About Lori

An encourager at heart, author, editor, and writing coach Lori Freeland believes everyone has a story to tell. She’s presented multiple workshops at writer’s conferences across the country and writes everything from non-fiction to short stories to novels—YA to adult. When she’s not curled up with her husband drinking too much coffee and worrying about her kids, she loves to mess with the lives of the imaginary people living in her head.

You can find her young adult and contemporary romance at lorifreeland.com and her inspirational blog and writing tips at lafreeland.com. Her latest release, The Accidental Boyfriend, is currently free on the Radish app. 

by Piper Bayard
of Bayard & Holmes

Writing espionage is a balancing act between being authentic and being so accurate that we embarrass political leaders, get people killed, and/or end up with some angry FBI Special Agents on our doorstep. As a general rule, while the non-violent embarrassment of political leaders who are asking for it can be rewarding, writers, like all smart and decent people, want to avoid harming any of our own people or having uncomfortable conversations with the FBI. My writing partner, “Jay Holmes,” is a 45-year veteran of intelligence field operations, and we are committed to helping writers walk that line of authenticity.

In my last article, Fiction Favorites of the Espionage Pros, inspired by questions during our recent RWA online workshop, we shared our espionage movie and TV recommendations, along with the recommendations of our friends in the Intelligence Community. Today, we want to share more of the questions and answers from that workshop with you.

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1. Do CIA officers carry firearms? If so, what specific firearm?

Most CIA officers and employees have no need for firearms and do not carry them. Most are analysts, scientists, geographers, language specialists, human relations, etc. Very few are actually in field operations, and even they might not carry a firearm if a firearm would be inconsistent with their cover. Others might carry firearms in the field with exactly no expectation of using them.

JACK RYAN is one example of this last. While analysts who are sent to the field are minimally trained in firearms, they are not expected to use them. In fact, one legendary analyst is known for putting four holes in himself with only one bullet during training. In real life, in the event that an analyst is sent to the field, they are surrounded by Marines or other serious muscle, and it’s said that if an analyst ever actually has to use their weapon, something has gone terribly wrong.

For a long time, Sig Sauer was the preferred weapon, as Sig Sauer makes outstanding firearms. Glock, however, has an outstanding marketing department. It also has a cheaper firearm. So now CIA officers train on Glocks. Thanks to the Glock marketing program rather than the merits of Glocks, Glocks are currently the most popular weapons for training and use. However, some field officers are allowed to take the firearm of their choice with them, and they sometimes carry things larger than handguns.

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2. Do CIA officers receive monthly paychecks and a government pension?

CIA officers and employees of other IC organizations receive bi-weekly paychecks, as long as the Finance doesn’t screw them up. They also have to file expense reports and keep receipts where it wouldn’t blow their cover to do so. As with any bureaucracy, Finance is notoriously stingy, and the reimbursement process is tedious.

Pay is the base government pay scale adjusted for cost of living depending on location. There is also extra pay for those in the science and technology fields and per diem for people overseas.

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3. If you are a CIA officer, does your family know?

The CIA currently requires employees to tell spouses. It has not always been that way, and that, like most things, can change in time.

Those under diplomatic cover inserted in embassies abroad might even have their spouses help them out with identifying and developing assets. Many, however, do not tell their parents, children, or extended family. The more people who know, the more limited job assignments will be.

People in other parts of the Intelligence Community may not be able to tell their spouses any particulars at all about their employer or their work. That’s for two reasons. First, because the divorce rates are high in some career fields, and a disgruntled spouse could blow entire programs and get people killed. Second, because if our enemies know spouses are never told anything, they will not be kidnapped and tortured for information.

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4. Is the concept of a safe house for officers real?

Yes, safe houses are real, but that’s not usually where officers live. Safe houses are usually used for meeting with assets or for stashing or hiding assets.

Safe houses need to be located someplace where they don’t stand out. They will not be near any foreign intelligence services or in quiet neighborhoods where people would notice strangers.

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5. The CIA is an organization for overseas intelligence gathering. Under what circumstances would they actively be intelligence gathering in the US?

Never. Not even if the target is one of their own.

If surveillance or operations are required on US soil, the case should be turned over to the FBI or the DHS, depending on whether the surveillance is due to a counterintelligence threat, a counterterrorism threat, or both.

In other words, HOMELAND, in which CIA officers are spying on a returned American POW on American soil, would never happen. Even the infamous CIA traitor Aldrich Ames was only watched by his fellow employees until there was plausible reason to conduct official surveillance outside of Headquarters, and then his case was turned over to the FBI.

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6. What is nonofficial cover?

Employees with nonofficial cover are called “NOCs,” pronounced “knocks.” They are employees and contractors who are in foreign countries without official recognition on the part of governments. In other words, they do not hang out at embassies. That’s really all we can say about that.

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7. It’s day one of being an officer. Do you have a training officer? Do you get a briefcase with gadgets and fake passports?

Trust me, everyone wishes they did. However, the VAST majority of employees, regardless of what department they are in, spend day one like anyone in the corporate world—filling out paperwork and getting their computers and software straightened out. In fact, this part takes at least the entire first week.

Then comes the Sensitivity Workshop, the Signing Up for Benefits Workshop, the Where to Find the Defibrillator Workshop, etc., that accompany any government job. It has been rumored that some operations folks finagle their way out of the Human Relations hoop-jumping, and that one man in particular has avoided HR orientations since 1985, but I can neither confirm nor deny that.

What espionage or other questions do you have for us? We love taking the fiction out of fiction.

About Bayard and Holmes

Piper Bayard and Jay Holmes of Bayard & Holmes are the authors of espionage fiction and nonfiction. Please visit Piper and Jay at their site to learn more about their books. For notices of their upcoming releases, subscribe to the Bayard and Holmes Covert Briefing. You can also contact Bayard & Holmes at their Contact page, on Twitter or Facebook, or at their email.

Spycraft: Essentials takes the fiction out of spy fiction, covering the functions and jurisdictions of the main US intelligence organizations, the espionage personality and character, recruitment, tradecraft techniques, surveillance, firearms, the most common foibles of spy fiction, and much more. Available in digital format and print. See Bayard & Holmes Nonfiction for more books like this one.

by Colleen M. Story

If you want to start the New Year off with a bang, there’s one thing you have to have: hope.

Hope that next year will be a great year for your writing. Hope that you’ll be able to accomplish more than you did this year. Hope that you’ll become a better writer and find even more fulfillment in your writing life.

But after a tough year (like this one!), hope can be a little hard to find. Most of us are feeling tired, wrung out, stressed, and unsure about what the future might bring.

I would encourage you to take some time, perhaps over the coming weekend, to inspire your sense of hope. It could be the key to a successful year to come.

But first, let’s see if your supply of this critical emotion might be running a little low.

Signs You’re Running Low on Hope for Your Writing Life

What is hope, anyway? The dictionary describes it as a “feeling of expectation and desire for something to happen.” When you hope for something, you expect “with confidence,” Merriam Webster states. You have trust in your expected outcome.

Hope is critical to your writing success because it creates that positive state of mind you need to accomplish your goals. You may hope to publish a book next year, become an Amazon best-seller, or expand your newsletter subscribers by 500. Hope helps you look forward to this outcome with excitement, which fuels your efforts.

Hope also helps make any of your current struggles or challenges easier to bear, because you have hope that things will get better in the future.

Hopelessness, on the other hand, is a lack of hope, and leads to all sorts of negative outcomes. Writers who feel hopeless lose interest in their writing, are likely to lack the inspiration they used to have to write, and may feel powerless to change those feelings.

Ask yourself if any of these statements sound familiar:

• Your writing no longer "sparks joy" for you. It feels more like a chore you must complete than something you look forward to.
• You’ve let several of your writing projects slide, and you’re not worried about it.
• When you think of next year, you can’t think of any writing goals you want to pursue.
• You’ve gotten cynical—you don’t take your writing seriously and you often speak about your progress sarcastically.
• You don’t feel well, physically. You’re not really sick, but neither do you feel energetic or vibrant.
• You suffered a string of disappointments this year, and they’ve worn away your motivation.
• You feel deficient somehow, like you don't have "what it takes" to become the writer you want to be.

If you recognize yourself in any of these statements—or if you’re just not all that excited about writing this year—it’s time to spark some hope in your spirit.

5 Ways to Nurture Hope In Your Writing Spirit

Choose one of the following activities, give it a try, and see if you notice hope returning. You’ll be able to tell—it feels bubbly and sparkly.

1. Review This Year with Rose-Colored Glasses

Take an hour to list all the good things that happened in your writing life this year. “Like what?” you may ask. Put on your rose-colored glasses. You’re looking only for the good stuff, and you’re going to treat yourself like your best friend. Write down every single little accomplishment you had.

These could be as simple as completing a draft of a book, even if it’s terrible. Maybe you wrote at least three times a week most weeks, or you blogged more consistently than last year. Maybe you put together a plan for your next book launch, or you outlined your next nonfiction book.

Maybe all you did was complete two short stories or update your website. Whatever it was, write it down. Just thinking about it isn’t enough. Make a list.

Once you finish, look it over. Pin it to the wall or refrigerator if you like. This can help you realize that even in a bad year, you got some stuff done. That can give you hope that next year will be at least as good, and most likely better.

2. Write Something to Lift Someone Else Up

Hopelessness walks hand in hand with isolation. You can inspire new hope inside yourself by using your writing strengths to benefit someone else.

Your job: Come up with a writing project that will make someone else's life better. Write a hand-written thank you note to someone who deserves it, create a blog or guest post that uplifts readers, or host a writing contest and give away a small prize.

Write a poem for someone you care about, or put your writing skills to work for a project you care about (grant writing?). There are all sorts of possibilities.

A few months ago, for instance, my young nephew asked me for help with his research paper. It felt really good to use the skills I’ve developed to help him, and it inspired me at the same time. (Teaching always does that, right?)

Use your imagination, then follow through and complete the assignment. See how you feel.

3. Go Flying High and Draw

It's easy to lose hope when you're stuck in your small little world, so hop onto your imaginary plane and get some altitude. Imagine yourself high in the sky looking down on yourself and your life. Fly so high that you can see yourself five, ten, even twenty years ago.

Now plot a line chart of where you were then, where writing is concerned, and track your progress to where you are now. Write down your key writing accomplishments for each year.

This sort of overview can help you see that the year you’ve just completed—long as it’s seemed—is just a blip on the radar. Your new point of view diminishes the challenges of one year and accentuates your accomplishments over a lifetime.

If you focus on the progress you’ve made long-term, the challenges of this year fade away into the distance, leaving you with renewed hope for next year.

4. Tune Into What Inspires You

What inspires you? You have a few weeks before the year is over to read your most inspiring books, listen to your most inspiring interviews, watch your most inspiring movies, visit your most inspiring locations, and visit your most uplifting friends.

Write down a list, and then make a point to schedule at least two inspiring activities per week (more is better) until the year has come to a close.

Get a print of your favorite painting for yourself for Christmas. Put on your most inspiring music and listen to it at least once a day. Schedule a family home movie night and put on the ones that rev you up—preferably those that show characters overcoming great odds to win. (“Rocky” is a great option.)

This isn't an indulgence—it's hope therapy. Write down your list, adjust your schedule, and enjoy. You should be feeling more hopeful by the end of the year.

5. Explore the Possibilities

Right now, you may not be thinking too much about what may be possible in your writing life next year. Yet hope is found in possibilities.

Using your journal or pad and paper, write down your answer to this question: What is one possible improvement you can make to your writing life next year?

Just one. That’s all you need. One possible improvement. It can be as small or as large as you like.

Once you have your answer down, answer this question: What writing project could you possibly complete next year?

Could be any project. A short story, novel, poem, nonfiction book, new website, new blog, book launch, new course…your choice. Any project at all.

Now for your last question: What would you like to do next year in your writing life that you think is impossible?

Go ahead—what do you dream of doing as a writer but that right now, seems impossible?

What is it? Write it down…

Ah, there’s magic in that answer, because it’s those things we think are impossible that often inspire us the most. Some examples: get an agent, sign a traditional publishing contract, become a bestseller, win a contest, start a podcast, speak at a writer’s conference, or have a sold-out book signing.

Once you’ve answered all three of these questions, you should begin to see the possibilities for next year—which is often inspiring and can give you hope. On top of that, it’s just fun.

“Hopefully” one of these exercises will help get you excited about your writing future. If not, don’t give up. Keep looking for that new inspiration you need. Odds are once you start seeking it out, you’ll find it.

Do you have ways to nurture feelings of hope? Do you want to share any of your answers to the questions above? We'd love to hear about it down in the comments!

Get help setting inspiring goals this year with Colleen’s FREE “Start the Year Off Right” bundle, available here!

About Colleen

Colleen M. Story inspires writers to overcome modern-day challenges and find creative fulfillment in their work. Her latest release, Writer Get Noticed!, was a gold-medal winner in the 2019 Reader’s Favorite Book Awards, a 1st-place winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards, and Book By Book Publicity’s best writing/publishing book of 2019. Colleen frequently serves as a workshop leader and motivational speaker, where she helps attendees remove mental and emotional blocks and tap into their unique creative powers. Find more at her motivational site, Writing and Wellness, and on her author website, or connect with her on Twitter.