Turning 25

I have been 25 for 3 days now and it is definitely living up to my low expectations. Friday night, the eve of my birthday, was great! I went to a special dinner with my sister and a good friend of ours and had a great time laughing and eating fondue! Our waiter looked like Justin Long and we did our best to make him feel uncomfortable every time he walked over due to our inability to control the laughter. Tears were running down our faces and sticking to glasses! That was a great way to spend my last night as a 24 year old.

Saturday I impulsively decided to do a 5k walk with my friend. The night before I had bought new shoes and was starting to get pumped to get outside and be active. Then at 4 a.m. I was pulled out of a dead sleep by a feeling comparable with someone sawing off my left leg. I had the worst charlie horse of my entire life. So when it was time to get up 3 hours later I was not well rested and still very sore. But my stubborn nature forced me out into the cold to prove something to myself. I limped and complained both silently and vocally for the first mile and a half. Then about the 2 mile marker I had forgotten the pain in my left leg (sometimes being replaced by pain in my right ankle) and was enjoying the walk through downtown Holly. When we crossed the finish line I was relieved to sit down and take more meds, but happy that I finished! (I rarely take meds for anything, but on my birthday I didn't want to try to work through the pain like I usually would.)

I went home, took a hot shower, and sat in bed watching a movie for an hour. When I got up to get ready for lunch with some friends, my feet hit the floor and then was shortly followed by the rest of me hitting the floor as my sore legs reminded me of their plight. Luckily my bed caught me and I was able to recover again before my second attempt. Lunch was a great time. I share a birthday with a new friend, so I went to her birthday celebration and we enjoyed it together.

For dinner I was planning to go to On the Border with some friends, not looking forward to their birthday tradition of standing on my chair and dancing in front of the entire restaurant with corona salt and pepper shaker bottles in hand. It seems like a lot of torture for a tiny bowl of ice cream! A few friends from very different corners of my life showed up and I enjoyed myself. I had a new friend from work, a roommate from college, a friend I met while I was in high school, a best friend I've known forever and a friend who I don't see very often from my time working at the church. It was fun to watch so many aspects of my life collide and interact! It was definitely awkward at times, but I think everyone enjoyed themselves. I obliged to dance for ice cream, but refused to stand on my chair. I'm not very shy, but I don't like to be the center of attention!

On Sunday I went to church and then to my parents, where I had to frost my own cake. It seems like as you get older, things are a lot less magical. You lose Santa, the Tooth fairy, birthday surprises and so much more that are replaced by doctor bills, and license renewal fees, and insurance, and frosting your own birthday cake. (a couple years ago I got so fed up with waiting for my family birthday celebration that I ended up making my own cake while home alone in mid-January. Well over a month after my actual birthday! It sucks getting older.) We decorated mom and dad's Christmas tree, and ordered pizza. My parents also try to be really nice and include people in everything, which is fine except on my birthday without asking me about it. So I was a bit annoyed. The pizza was wrong, so the 1 topping that I said I wanted was missing, and I got more annoyed. And then, because I'm an overly emotional girl at times, and because I am not loving being 25 and for so many other reasons, I cried at my birthday celebration. Maybe Lesley Gore could relate when she sang "It's my party and I'll cry if I want to."

Then my mom and I had a heart to heart. I expressed that this is not exactly where I would have guessed I would be at 25. Her words of wisdom to me were to join a bowling league, take a photography class or maybe a line dance class... Usually her advice is really insightful and hits home, but I have to admit that advice left me more confused than before. 

I'm going to try to be happier about my age and less cynical, but it's not looking likely today! I had very low expectations for this mile marker, and I have to say, so far it is pretty much what I expected. 

Ode to 25

I realize that people turn 25 every day, but I only turn 25 once, so let me revel in it for one blog post at least before I get the standard "Think about how old I feel" comments!


Oh, to the year I turn 25. I never thought I would be this old. In just 8 short days, the day of my birth will be upon us. It is sure to be interesting and full of adventure and maybe even a little love along the way. One quarter of a century, what a comforting thought.
Don't get me wrong, there are many things to celebrate about it: lower car insurance, a sense of independence at being in your mid-20s, as well as getting farther and farther from those awkward teen years that I, for one, would like to forget.

In 8 short days the comments will begin,

                "I was married and had 3 kids by 25"
                "I was working full time and owned my own home at your age"
                                      and
                "You aren't getting any younger"

These people may think they are helpful, they may even mean well in some way, but let me tell you these words make me imagine punching them in the throat! However, I am older and wiser, right? So instead of fantasizing about punching people in the windpipe, I will just smile and say, "Bless your heart" and walk away.

While it may be true that many people are married, with a mortgage and three kids by 25, I am not most people. My father was right when he said "You never do things the easy way do you?"

Every other birthday I've celebrated, people were happy for me and told me how good that year was to them and so on, but this year is different. I have been told by a variety of people in my life that 25 was their worst/hardest/most frustrating year of life... what wonderful words of encouragement to a young heart! I love these people dearly, and I am glad they are honest with me and not getting my hopes up, but I could use some encouragement this year. I already know it's going to be a rough year, you didn't have to tell me that. I am older than anyone in my immediate family was when they got married. In fact, my parents were married (to other people), divorced, and remarried before they hit this wonderful milestone.

Some of my non-church friends have said things like "I don't understand how you're still single, aren't there guys at that big church you go to?" And to that I say "Yeah there are plenty of guys, but there's a reason they're still on the market!"

So I will leave you with these parting words: if you know anyone turning 25 or who has recently turned 25, give them a hug. Chances are they need it!

Is it possible to run out of words?

Some days I feel like words just flow so freely from my fingertips as I type out dialogue and set up scenes and conflict, but those days are too few and too far between sometimes. Maybe it has something to do with my busy days and short nights to myself. Or maybe my word cup is only filled so full for a certain period of time and I can write and write and write, but when the cup dries up I must wait for something to fill it up again. I wish that I knew what filled up that cup. I wish that I could say "Super-size my cup please and fill it as full as it can go."

I think one of the biggest things that fills up my word cup is the proper amount of sleep. I get less than the recommended number of hours most nights, so that can dry up my words quicker than anything.
I also think that being too busy can suck the words out of my brain. It's not that I don't have a few spare minutes, even sometimes an hour, to write, but when I get a sizable chunk of time to sit at my computer and allow my mind to wander through the story and carefully unfold the plot as I go words tend to flow a lot faster and a lot more cohesively.
Being in public helps too. I can listen to real dialogue and remind myself that people don't talk the way that I write most of the time. And I can watch people interact with each other and their surroundings and try to understand how they navigate through life.
These things really do help my story develop from the feeble meanderings I come up with in my brain and make it into something that people might actually believe.

It's not hard to convince people to stretch their minds around new concepts and things that have never been seen before, after all just last night I was in a sold out theater watching a movie about a sparkly vampire, but if I don't base my story in some sound life models the story holds no weight.

How sweet it is...

... to meet goals!

I'll admit, I didn't think I had it in me last night. I had writing to do, reading to do, coffee to drink and food to eat. And above all else, no inspiration. I was stuck in my plot. There was a conflict brewing and the resolutions were not looking promising. One was a repeat of something that happened earlier in the story, and the other option was way too simple. I hate stories when a conflict arises and in less than a chapter it's tied up in a neat little bow and hand delivered straight to the reader. As a reader, I beg for intrigue, surprise and maybe a little bit of dragging the villains name through the muddied waters of the plot.

As is the case for many writers, my characters come to life as I type. They show me who they are and what they are all about, far above anything I might have planned for them. The characters take hold of their own lives and force me to let them live it the way they see fit, and usually that change is better than anything I could have come up with.

So last night, I sat down at my computer at one of my favorite little cafes and quietly asked my group of characters, "What would you do in this situation?" And they came through like I couldn't have imagined. And before I knew it my word count went from 11,011 or 13,108! My goal by Thursday was 13,000, so that put me over by 108 words 2 days before my deadline! My prize? DESSERT!!!

I will continue to write this week. I'm not giving up just yet. Maybe I'll set another goal and push myself to meet it. Small goals are where it's at!

The unproductive weekend

The weekend has come and gone and I am left at the same word count I was at on Friday afternoon. I enjoy being busy, but sometimes my need of entertainment and multi-tasking can seriously deprive me of any time to focus on writing something, anything really. I get distracted so easily. Even in the short time that I have been writing this I have checked facebook and looked around multiple times to find out who people are and what they are doing around me. It is a struggle to hold my attention to anything for any length of time.

And there I go again, getting distracted. I need some more coffee or something to hold my attention for more than 5 minutes.

Word count goals

Here's the break down of how many words the goal of National Novel Writing Month is on a total basis. The goal is to write 1,667 words a day.

November

1: 1,667

2: 3,334

3: 5,001

4: 6,668

5: 8,335

6: 10,002

7: 11,669

8: 13,336 This is where I'm at and I am shamefully short of that word goal! I will remedy this tonight.

9: 15,003

10: 16,670

11: 18,337

12: 20,004

13: 21,671

14: 23,338

15: 25,005

16: 26,672

17: 28,339

18: 30,006

19: 31,673

20: 33,340

21: 35,007

22: 36,674

23: 38,341

24: 40,008

25: 41,675

26: 43,342

27: 45,009

28: 46,676

29: 48,343

30: 50,010

National Novel Writing Month inspirations: Nov. 7

I am really getting into "NaNoWriMo" so far and loving it! As of the end of the day yesterday I should be at the 10,000 word mark. I am a little short of that mark, but making huge strides to make up for lost time! I am at just over 7,000 words.

Here is a funny antic-dote for your enjoyment from my writing time yesterday:

I went to Starbucks to sit and write yesterday. I love the atmosphere of coffee shops, and they always seem to give me some great inspiration and writing enthusiasm that I don't get as much at home alone. I was there for almost 3 hours. So I was chugging along through some seriously good inspiration, writing some good dialogue, ignoring the people around me when I realized I was making facial expressions that my characters would make while saying the things I was writing! I'm sure my fellow patrons were highly entertained by my looks of confusion, excitement, discomfort and shock as I wrote some intense dialogue between two of my characters!

Am I the only person who visualizes what their characters would look like as they interact with each other or is this something most writers do? Sometimes I feel like a freak for the way I get into what I'm writing. My heart starts to race for them, my stomach drops, and my brain and fingers struggle to keep up with the rapid movement of the characters who come alive in my imagination.

I would love some input from anyone on something. There is a character that I am struggling to name and visualize. She is a harsh, abrupt girl, with a sharp, sarcastic tongue and little regard for the feelings of others. She is calloused and very rough around the edges. She will likely end up either ostracized from a group or she will come to her senses and change. I haven't decided her end yet. What does a girl like that look like to you, and what do you think her name should be? I have her noted as Caroline, but not planning on sticking with that name.

Progress

Here is an update about how I am doing so far with National Novel Writing Month.

I missed the 1st day, wrote like a mad woman the 2nd day, and haven't written since.

Story of my life...

But, the day I wrote like a mad woman was extremely productive. I am at just over 4,000 words!

Occasionally I will put bits and pieces up here, but probably not often. I am constantly editing in my head and that is not the point of writing a novel in a month. Writers are asked to just write and write and write and not look back. I am NOT good at that at all. If I were to put much of my work here I would be constantly be reading and rereading it and editing and obsessing and driving myself crazy over every little thing. I have a problem. Is there an Anonymous group for constant editors and critics of one's own work? I need a 12 step program here people!

So I can use all the encouragement and coffee that I can get to make it through this month of writing like crazy. I do my best writing in one of 2 places. Sitting in a semi-busy coffee shop with headphones in and moody music playing in my ears where I can watch people interact but not be expected to participate, or in my bedroom, some British movie playing in the background. And there has to be coffee. My mind likes to get sluggish and drowsy when I sit down to write, but coffee cures any of that in a jiffy!

Day 1&2 because I am constantly playing catch up

I started this journey to write a novel in a month. Yesterday was day 1. I was excited because Thursdays are usually one of my least busy days. Little did I know life had a different plan for me. I knew I was meeting with someone at 4 and figured it should only last about an hour or 2. A last minute phone call changed that 4 o'clock meeting to a 7 o'clock ministry event and possibly dinner after. The meeting is for a college ministry that I am getting involved in. I soon realized that I am not in college anymore and I am feeling a bit old! But as it turns out it was great! I met lots of people and am even more excited about this opportunity than I was before.

So because of that I got absolutely no writing done yesterday. The 1,667 daily word challenge has now become a 3,334 challenge for day 2. Lucky for me I will have the house to myself tonight! I plan on running an errand or 2 after work, getting take out and having date night with my laptop and Downton Abbey. Some people listen to music while they write, I listen to late 19th and early 20th century British dramas. To each his own I guess!

I wanted to create a short map of where my story starts and where I hope to have it end, with a few ups and downs along the way. As I have learned through my past writing experience, my characters tend to come alive in my mind somewhere along the way and they rarely follow my script! They prefer to laugh at my plans and promptly make their own way through the story, often ending up at a completely different spot than I intended for them.

I quite prefer my characters to play by their own rules. The stories that I come up with are rarely genius by any means and often sound lame even to me. When the characters take control of their own fictitious lives I am released from the pressure of moving the story along. I can allow them to take credit for success or failure, and that is okay by me!

Novel ideas revisited

I sort of began this journey in February and then life got a little more hectic and my priorities were shaken up a bit and things that had been on my "to do list" were slowly but surely scratched out and forgotten.

Here is a little review of things that I wrote way back when and have long since forgotten but plan to revisit.

Characters:
Melissa
Sadie
Shayla
Jenny
Joan
Tabitha
Callie
Jiuliana
Korey
Paul

Short synopsis:
All the ladies are part of a group that meets weekly. The premise is that they are constantly at each others' throats and there is quite a bit of underlying tension surrounding so many things within the group that Melissa, a newcomer, doesn't quite understand yet but is quickly picking up on. Little does she know she is more connected to the drama than she realizes, having been the reason a certain man broke a certain girl's heart. Though this happened long before Mel was ever around, once she realizes the connection she understands that if it gets out there will be hell to pay and will mean certain social death.

I will be victorious

The day after tomorrow, while children across the country are still buzzing from the sugar high that is about to hit them after they have collected their loot and sorted it out on living room rugs in homes all over the US, I will be buzzing for a whole different reason. I decided to participate in National Novel Writing Month. I feel as though I am a glutton for punishment. I work, I volunteer, I am involved in a lot of things that take up a lot of my time, and I have a social life. All of these things could easily stand in my way of finishing a 50k+ word novel. I have been wanting to write a novel for years, but something always gets in the way. That something is usually my own insecurities and the constant editor whispering lies and less than helpful words into my head. But this year I will do my best to cross the finish line victorious!

I will try to share my progress and even throw out some suggestions and ask for opinions and maybe even some feedback along the way. So stay tuned for updates as this creative sprint begins November 1st.

Also, any tips, tricks or ideas/inspiration are always welcome! Please feel free to direct them my way!

Inspiration for today

I love Pinterest. It gives me easy access to some awesome quotes. I have always loved quotes as well! So here are some quotes via Pinterest that I found that I wanted to share. There is some great meaning within them that I hope you can appreciate.

Random musings

A coworker of mine is moving to The Big Apple and made a list of things that she will and will not miss about living in Michigan. That got me thinking about what I would and would not miss about my life here. So I decided to do something that I do best and make a list!

Would miss:

~~ My family
I have always been really close to my family. Even when I went away to school I made the 2 hour drive home almost every weekend. And now that my niece and nephew are at fun ages {almost 4 and 7 going on 16} I would miss the time I get to spend just being silly with them and tucking them in some nights. And the way my niece loves me and my nephew tries to avoid goodnight kisses and then runs after me to kiss me when I walk away. They love me and I love them to the moon and back, because the moon is really far away!

~~ My church
As much as the people there drive me batty sometimes, I love it! I have never found a place where I felt more welcome and at home than The River Church in Holly. Nevermind the shameless plug!

~~ My friends
I have always been a bit of a loner, but I have collected a random assortment of close friends in my travels through life that I love dearly. Some I have known most of my days, and others I have met recently, but all of them are so valuable to me and I don't know what I would do being so far away and having to collect more friends in a new place.

~~ Up North
No matter where you live in Michigan's lower peninsula, there is always an "up north" whether it's Bay City or Mackinac there is a place to escape. Michigan has some of the most beautiful scenes that I have ever seen and I would miss them. From the great lakes we are known for to the quiet country towns that no one  has ever heard of there is somewhere beautiful just a couple hours drive away.

~~ Being able to use my hand to show where I live
I've been made fun of for answer the "Where are you from?" question by holding up my right hand and pointing to a place a little west of my thumb, but it comes in handy and I love it!

~~ Kid Rock
While I am not the biggest fan of his music, it's kind of cool to be able to say that I live in the same city as someone that famous! Sightings of him in my area are so common now that he rarely gets mobbed by fans. It's pretty likely that if you frequent a couple select restaurants/bars that you'll see him quite often.

~~ Driving
If I moved to a big city I think I would lose my mind not being able to drive. Driving is my therapy sometimes. It is only when I get behind the wheel and let the wind play with my hair on a dark country road that I can truly let go and talk things through just me and Jesus!


Would not miss:

~~ Snow
Driving in it, walking in it, looking at it, knowing that it's falling outside. All of the above. I really don't like snow! Spring comes too late and Fall is too short for me to enjoy winter. I would be content to have snow on Christmas day and have it gone by Dec. 26. End of story.

~~ "The Look"
The look is what people give me when I say I'm from Detroit. {I'm not actually from Detroit but if I said I grew up in Davisburg even many people in Oakland County would have no clue where that is!} The look describes their thoughts of "but she looks like a sweet middle class white girl, how can she be from Detroit?" And that look is further heightened when I say I live half way between Detroit and Flint, both cities ranked in the top 10 {maybe even top 5} most dangerous cities in the country! Again I am a classy, small town, white girl who probably wouldn't last one night in the D or flint for that matter.

~~ Ohio
Driving out of Michigan almost always requires a drive through Ohio, a.k.a. the armpit of America! It's a long, boring drive with nothing to look at except "touchdown Jesus" which burned to the ground 2 years ago. I'm not sad it's gone because it was an awkward site, even for Christians, but it at least gave you something to look at and talk about on a boring drive through the armpit of America!

~~ The UP
I am proud to be a born and bred Michigander, but there are just some things I don't understand! One of those is why the UP is even part of Michigan in the first place. It isn't actually connected and it's closer to Canada and Wisconsin than to us. But nevertheless, it is a part of my home state and I have learned to accept it.

~~ The economy
For obvious reasons.

Sanity lost along with the stocks page

I never thought my life would revolve around a stock page. You know the page most of us had to look at for a high school assignment about finances and then never looked at again. The one that is tucked in the paper behind the Money page (that also rarely gets the love it deserves) and has the teensiest font known to man. That page that no one under the age of 65 or anyone with a computer and a basic knowledge of this recent phenomenon known as the world wide web ever have to sift through.

But, alas, this week my life and mental health have hinged on that very page. People are never happy. I think I always knew that, but this week it has become very apparent. I answer the phones at a local newspaper (along with a barrage of other task that mean nothing to you) and people are never happy.

What is it about people that make them prevalent to drama? Why do we live in a constant state of dramatic scenes throughout most of our lives? The cameras aren't rolling people! We are not on a reality show! We don't have to blow everything out of proportion, because guess what? People don't care!

I am the friendly voice that will sooth your fears and quiet your doubts about this whole situation, but inside I wonder about you. Is your life full of people and activities? Or just the newspaper and stock market? Are you a financial analyst or trader? Or are you someone who eagerly pulls open the newspaper and begins the search for that one special page that will make or break your whole day?

I don't think I will ever understand you. But I will do my best to make you feel like you have been heard. So I say to you, "I'm sorry and we will try harder tomorrow."

Today is not my day

I work in customer service and most days it's not too bad. I can answer an angry phone call and make them love me by the end of the conversation. But today, for some reason, that gift has left, taking my compassion with it. Maybe it's still in bed, snuggled under the covers with its head on my pillow. Oh how I wish I could still be there with it. Mondays are always rough, but a Monday after a less than great weekend is even worse.
Usually I can handle the angry or frustrated caller with a polite response and a helpful answer. But this morning, when I was cussed out at 9 am I wanted so badly to hang up on him. It could be my way of teaching him a lesson on how to be polite to the sweet sounding girl on the other end of the phone. Some kind of renegade justice or something. At least in my mind that's how it would be. The result, however would be more like stabbing a sleeping bear. It would just result in an even angrier phone call with a screaming customer on the other end, instead of just an angry one who said a few choice words.
It's times like these that make me cherish the sweet older ladies that call every once in a while. The ones that ask about my day and really want to hear all about it. The ones who send me thank you notes for being so helpful and kind, when really I didn't do anything outside of my job description. The ones who hear the stressed edge of my voice and ask if there is any way they can be praying for me. Not knowing where I stand on God or prayer. The ones that say, "God bless" or "Merry Christmas honey" and then giggle thinking we're being so sneaky when I say it back to them.

It is also a rough morning because I am awaiting 2 emails both with equal parts anticipation and dread. One from a friend that may not have appreciated my honesty, and one from an opportunity that I want but don't want at the same time! I know that my emotions tend to play tricks on me and cause me to second guess everything, so I'm sure that's a big part of it too. 

1 negative vs. 9 positive: which would you believe?

Imagine you are walking down the street and 10 people are walking toward you. 9 of them say such sweet and positive things to you and 1 says something nasty. Which are you going to remember? Chances are the 1 negative will become a booming voice that shouts over the voices of the 9 others. So this is why we must choose if we will build someone up or break them down. And also, surround ourselves with people that will build us up instead of breaking up down.

I like this quote on the back of a Starbucks cup:

How many times have you been told you couldn't do something, and then said "I'll show you" and done it anyway? Not many of us have the courage to continue in a course of action when we have felt defeated so many times before.
One thing that I find most difficult to do is to sing in front of people. I love to sing! Especially singing to praise Jesus, but I have a hard time actually being on stage.
A former worship leader kind of ruined my confidence in that department. He probably didn't do it on purpose, but his actions spoke louder than his words and told me that I was not good enough. So I believed it, even though so many people have told me different. I've had multiple people compliment me, from sweet ladies in front of my in church that lean back and whisper "Honey your voice is so beautiful" to friends that tell me "You should be up there" every time a new female vocalist is brought on stage to sing.
I just smile and thank them for their kindness, but it doesn't go much farther. It's like there is something blocking their compliments from truly sinking in. Like that worship leader's actions are standing guard at the pass between my brain and my heart, not allowing anything positive to pass.
I'm not mad at anyone, just making an observation.
So badly I would like to get up on stage and sing like I know that I can. But when presented with the opportunity, it never seems to go according to plan. My nerves and that guy's actions get the better of me and I forget how to sing!

What would you like to do, but have allowed someone's negativity to get the better of you? Tell me that I am not alone in this!

All I've seen of nature

All I've seen of nature

Lends to the belief

That whether plant or creature

All will suffer grief.

Mankind no better creation

Than any God did make

But we all have the option

To succeed or break.

It is not our lot in life

That determines who we'll be

Whether it is joy or strife

The choice is up to me.

I wrote this a few months back, but I am hoping it helps to spark something in my creative process!

I have to write like my life depends on it

I've heard it said {thank you Jen} that writers write, everyday. Looking back over my days, I write a lot, but how often do I write things for me? How often do I let my imagination take the wheel and drive me wherever it wants to take me? When was the last time that I wrote something and thought, "Wow that was really good!"? It has been way too long. The most I write is for work, and that is usually just copying someone else's words into a different format. That is not writing. That is copying. Or cheating. Depending on how you look at it. 
I like to tell myself that I don't write a lot because I am busy and that I'll make time for writing when I'm not as busy. But in reality, I am only going to get busier from here. In the next few years I will likely {and hopefully!} get married and maybe have a couple kids. Will that make me any less busy? I highly doubt it!
I love being busy. I live from one distraction to another. Maybe it has something to do with me being {basically} an only child after my sister, 10 when I was born, got married and moved out when I was 12 and her 22. Or maybe it has something to do with this technology-driven world we live in.
I realized that I have such a hard time focusing on one thing at a time. I constantly find myself watching TV and on facebook on my phone, and trying to write something. No wonder nothing happens! 

Maybe the characters of my imagination have gone on strike until I give them the undivided attention they deserve. They have written picket signs that say "No attention, No inspiration" and are marching around the creative section of my brain not allowing me to cross the picket lines to access it.

So to appease the little muses in my brain, I am going to do my best to write for me, and them, as much as possible. Maybe not always on this blog, but somewhere. Even if it ends up being words scribbled onto napkins and in the margins of books, I vow to write as much as my brain can spew out through my fingers in the days to come.

What am I passionate about?

I read an article recently that gave 7 questions to help figure out what we are passionate about. They are:
1. What puts a smile on your face?
2. What do you find easy?
3. What sparks your creativity?
4. What would you do for free?
5. What do you like to talk about?
6. What makes you unafraid of failure?
7. What would you regret not having tried?

Do these questions help you with finding your true passion?

If I'm being honest, these questions didn't help me at all because my honest answers led me to hanging out in coffee shops, writing, talking to people, and sleeping in! That isn't exactly a career listed in the classifieds!

1. Writing puts a smile on my face
2. Sleeping in is something I find easy!
3. Sitting in a coffee shop with a good book or a great story idea sparks my creativity
4. I am always writing for free
5. I like to talk about Jesus, and books, and life
6. I'm usually afraid of failure in everything, so I don't think this is a valid question for me
7. I would regret not having tried to live for Christ {but what does that mean for my career goals really?}

So where do I go from here?

It's something that has been plaguing my mind a lot lately. What am I passionate about? I will be 25 in 2 months and I have no idea what the answer to that question is. To those of you reading this who know me, I would gladly welcome your input! As well as some real life careers that you think I would be best suited for! 

Overview/timeline/layout

One-sentence summary: A young woman realizes her similarities to a famous literary character and finds her life is more like the novel than she imagined.

One-paragraph summary: {3 disasters + an ending}{1st disaster from outside circumstances, 2nd and 3rd from protagonist trying to fix things} A young woman from suburban Michigan begins to notices the similarities between herself and the famous literary character Elizabeth Bennett. As she begins to explore this more she realizes that her life, and those in it, are more like the Jane Austen novel than she could have imagined.

Disaster #1: Goes on a date with her "Mr. Collins" and is forced on a 2nd date with him by her mother. He tries to kiss her and her reaction is less than gracious, resulting in her mother lecturing her about the kind of man she needs vs. the kind of man she wants.

Disaster #2: She meets her "Mr. Darcy" and due to some preconceived notions she is not interested and makes that known to him.

Disaster #3: She realizes that she is actually interested in him and that the notion she had about him originally is false. From there she is too embarrassed to try to fix things, so she tries to avoid him.
Eventually he catches up with her and convinces her that he wants to be with her and that he is the right man for her. The book ends at their wedding ceremony. The last words are "I now pronounce you man and wife" and they kiss.

She has no sisters, but her friends serve as the sisters in the original Jane Austen novel. There is a Jane, a Mary, a Kitty, and a Lydia, along with a Charlotte and a Caroline.

The sub-story happening is that "Jane" falls in love with "Mr. Darcy"'s younger brother. Through some mix ups he doesn't realize that she is in love with him and starts dating another girl. But they end up together as well.


snowflake resource

Step 10

Step 10) At this point, just sit down and start pounding out the real first draft of the novel. You will be astounded at how fast the story flies out of your fingers at this stage. I have seen writers triple their fiction writing speed overnight, while producing better quality first drafts than they usually produce on a third draft.
You might think that all the creativity is chewed out of the story by this time. Well, no, not unless you overdid your analysis when you wrote your Snowflake. This is supposed to be the fun part, because there are many small-scale logic problems to work out here. How does Hero get out of that tree surrounded by alligators and rescue Heroine who's in the burning rowboat? This is the time to figure it out! But it's fun because you already know that the large-scale structure of the novel works. So you only have to solve a limited set of problems, and so you can write relatively fast.
This stage is incredibly fun and exciting. I have heard many fiction writers complain about how hard the first draft is. Invariably, that's because they have no clue what's coming next. Good grief! Life is too short to write like that! There is no reason to spend 500 hours writing a wandering first draft of your novel when you can write a solid one in 150. Counting the 100 hours it takes to do the design documents, you come out way ahead in time.
About midway through a first draft, I usually take a breather and fix all the broken parts of my design documents. Yes, the design documents are not perfect. That's okay. The design documents are not fixed in concrete, they are a living set of documents that grows as you develop your novel. If you are doing your job right, at the end of the first draft you will laugh at what an amateurish piece of junk your original design documents were. And you'll be thrilled at how deep your story has become.

Step 9

Step 9) (Optional. I don't do this step anymore.) Switch back to your word processor and begin writing a narrative description of the story. Take each line of the spreadsheet and expand it to a multi-paragraph description of the scene. Put in any cool lines of dialogue you think of, and sketch out the essential conflict of that scene. If there's no conflict, you'll know it here and you should either add conflict or scrub the scene.
I used to write either one or two pages per chapter, and I started each chapter on a new page. Then I just printed it all out and put it in a loose-leaf notebook, so I could easily swap chapters around later or revise chapters without messing up the others. This process usually took me a week and the end result was a massive 50-page printed document that I would revise in red ink as I wrote the first draft. All my good ideas when I woke up in the morning got hand-written in the margins of this document. This, by the way, is a rather painless way of writing that dreaded detailed synopsis that all writers seem to hate. But it's actually fun to develop, if you have done steps (1) through (8) first. When I did this step, I never showed this synopsis to anyone, least of all to an editor -- it was for me alone. I liked to think of it as the prototype first draft. Imagine writing a first draft in a week! Yes, you can do it and it's well worth the time. But I'll be honest, I don't feel like I need this step anymore, so I don't do it now.

Step 7

Step 7) Take another week and expand your character descriptions into full-fledged character charts detailing everything there is to know about each character. The standard stuff such as birthdate, description, history, motivation, goal, etc. Most importantly, how will this character change by the end of the novel? This is an expansion of your work in step (3), and it will teach you a lot about your characters. You will probably go back and revise steps (1-6) as your characters become "real" to you and begin making petulant demands on the story. This is good -- great fiction is character-driven. Take as much time as you need to do this, because you're just saving time downstream. When you have finished this process, (and it may take a full month of solid effort to get here), you have most of what you need to write a proposal. If you are a published novelist, then you can write a proposal now and sell your novel before you write it. If you're not yet published, then you'll need to write your entire novel first before you can sell it. No, that's not fair, but life isn't fair and the world of fiction writing is especially unfair.

Step 8

Step 8) You may or may not take a hiatus here, waiting for the book to sell. At some point, you've got to actually write the novel. Before you do that, there are a couple of things you can do to make that traumatic first draft easier. The first thing to do is to take that four-page synopsis and make a list of all the scenes that you'll need to turn the story into a novel. And the easiest way to make that list is . . . with a spreadsheet.
For some reason, this is scary to a lot of writers. Oh the horror. Deal with it. You learned to use a word-processor. Spreadsheets are easier. You need to make a list of scenes, and spreadsheets were invented for making lists. If you need some tutoring, buy a book. There are a thousand out there, and one of them will work for you. It should take you less than a day to learn the itty bit you need. It'll be the most valuable day you ever spent. Do it.
Make a spreadsheet detailing the scenes that emerge from your four-page plot outline. Make just one line for each scene. In one column, list the POV character. In another (wide) column, tell what happens. If you want to get fancy, add more columns that tell you how many pages you expect to write for the scene. A spreadsheet is ideal, because you can see the whole storyline at a glance, and it's easy to move scenes around to reorder things.
My spreadsheets usually wind up being over 100 lines long, one line for each scene of the novel. As I develop the story, I make new versions of my story spreadsheet. This is incredibly valuable for analyzing a story. It can take a week to make a good spreadsheet. When you are done, you can add a new column for chapter numbers and assign a chapter to each scene.

Step 6

Step 6) By now, you have a solid story and several story-threads, one for each character. Now take a week and expand the one-page plot synopsis of the novel to a four-page synopsis. Basically, you will again be expanding each paragraph from step (4) into a full page. This is a lot of fun, because you are figuring out the high-level logic of the story and making strategic decisions. Here, you will definitely want to cycle back and fix things in the earlier steps as you gain insight into the story and new ideas whack you in the face.

Step 5

Step 5) Take a day or two and write up a one-page description of each major character and a half-page description of the other important characters. These "character synopses" should tell the story from the point of view of each character. As always, feel free to cycle back to the earlier steps and make revisions as you learn cool stuff about your characters. I usually enjoy this step the most and lately, I have been putting the resulting "character synopses" into my proposals instead of a plot-based synopsis. Editors love character synopses, because editors love character-based fiction.

Step 4

Step 4) By this stage, you should have a good idea of the large-scale structure of your novel, and you have only spent a day or two. Well, truthfully, you may have spent as much as a week, but it doesn't matter. If the story is broken, you know it now, rather than after investing 500 hours in a rambling first draft. So now just keep growing the story. Take several hours and expand each sentence of your summary paragraph into a full paragraph. All but the last paragraph should end in a disaster. The final paragraph should tell how the book ends.
This is a lot of fun, and at the end of the exercise, you have a pretty decent one-page skeleton of your novel. It's okay if you can't get it all onto one single-spaced page. What matters is that you are growing the ideas that will go into your story. You are expanding the conflict. You should now have a synopsis suitable for a proposal, although there is a better alternative for proposals . . .

Step 3

Step 3) The above gives you a high-level view of your novel. Now you need something similar for the storylines of each of your characters. Characters are the most important part of any novel, and the time you invest in designing them up front will pay off ten-fold when you start writing. For each of your major characters, take an hour and write a one-page summary sheet that tells:

• The character's name
• A one-sentence summary of the character's storyline
• The character's motivation (what does he/she want abstractly?)
• The character's goal (what does he/she want concretely?)
• The character's conflict (what prevents him/her from reaching this goal?)
• The character's epiphany (what will he/she learn, how will he/she change?
• A one-paragraph summary of the character's storyline

An important point: You may find that you need to go back and revise your one-sentence summary and/or your one-paragraph summary. Go ahead! This is good--it means your characters are teaching you things about your story. It's always okay at any stage of the design process to go back and revise earlier stages. In fact, it's not just okay--it's inevitable. And it's good. Any revisions you make now are revisions you won't need to make later on to a clunky 400 page manuscript.
Another important point: It doesn't have to be perfect. The purpose of each step in the design process is to advance you to the next step. Keep your forward momentum! You can always come back later and fix it when you understand the story better. You will do this too, unless you're a lot smarter than I am.

Step 2

Step 2) Take another hour and expand that sentence to a full paragraph describing the story setup, major disasters, and ending of the novel. This is the analog of the second stage of the snowflake. I like to structure a story as "three disasters plus an ending". Each of the disasters takes a quarter of the book to develop and the ending takes the final quarter. I don't know if this is the ideal structure, it's just my personal taste.
If you believe in the Three-Act structure, then the first disaster corresponds to the end of Act 1. The second disaster is the mid-point of Act 2. The third disaster is the end of Act 2, and forces Act 3 which wraps things up. It is OK to have the first disaster be caused by external circumstances, but I think that the second and third disasters should be caused by the protagonist's attempts to "fix things". Things just get worse and worse.
You can also use this paragraph in your proposal. Ideally, your paragraph will have about five sentences. One sentence to give me the backdrop and story setup. Then one sentence each for your three disasters. Then one more sentence to tell the ending. If this sounds suspiciously like back-cover copy, it's because . . . that's what it is and that's where it's going to appear someday.

Step 1

The Snowflake Method:

Step 1) Take an hour and write a one-sentence summary of your novel. Something like this: "A rogue physicist travels back in time to kill the apostle Paul." (This is the summary for my first novel, Transgression.) The sentence will serve you forever as a ten-second selling tool. This is the big picture, the analog of that big starting triangle in the snowflake picture.
When you later write your book proposal, this sentence should appear very early in the proposal. It's the hook that will sell your book to your editor, to your committee, to the sales force, to bookstore owners, and ultimately to readers. So make the best one you can!
Some hints on what makes a good sentence:

• Shorter is better. Try for fewer than 15 words.
• No character names, please! Better to say "a handicapped trapeze artist" than "Jane Doe".
• Tie together the big picture and the personal picture. Which character has the most to lose in this story? Now tell me what he or she wants to win.
• Read the one-line blurbs on the New York Times Bestseller list to learn how to do this. Writing a one-sentence description is an art form.

Like Elizabeth

"Maybe I am more like Elizabeth Bennett than I realized," Mel thought as she lay in bed one night, Pride and Prejudice still playing somewhere in the distance as she drifted to sleep. It had been a trying day of work and watching the neighbors kids for three hours until their single mom made it home from work and then some more organizing and decorating of the newly redesigned house. The neighbor had 2 very rambunctious boys ages 5 and 4 who loved to wrestle and rough house and give Mel that anxious feeling that one would tackle the other and land on their heads and she would be responsible for them breaking their necks. She loved babysitting for boys because they were so much less work on her part. They would play with their toy cars or sword fight through the living room, and she could just sit back and watch. Girls were different. Girls wanted constant attention and a life sized, living doll they could dress up and do her hair and make up. And that always resulted in Mel wearing a coconut bra and grass skirt with her hair in knots and lipstick as eye shadow. It was exhausting.

But now laying in bed, she was able to process the events of her life with a more critical eye. When her neighbor, Mrs. Slotski, got home and took over guard duties of her energized wrestle maniacs Mel slowly walked the short distance home between their yards. The houses on their street were small, and so were the lots, set in a small town, middle of nowhere feeling neighborhood just outside a larger suburb of Detroit. As was her normal routine, as soon as Mel walked in the door and made her way to her bedroom, she turned on the TV to find the DVD of Pride and Prejudice picking up right where she had left off last night. It was by far her favorite movie. It was just getting to the scene where Elizabeth Bennett tells Mr. Darcy off for his interference in the marriage of her elder sister Jane and his friend Mr. Bingley. That was one of Mel's favorite parts of the movie. She loved the sassiness of Elizabeth, especially because of the social constraints of the time period.

That night Mel had some interesting dreams. All of them had something to do with weddings. The first dream had her in a back room of an unfamiliar church getting ready to walk down the aisle. Her bouquet was made of wildflowers that she had apparently picked herself, and her dress was simple and lace. As she walked out of the room and turned the corner to walk down the aisle to her groom she woke up. It was always the same thing, she would wake up just before she saw her groom's face, just before she found out who she was marrying. It was frustrating! It felt like a cruel joke that her subconscious was playing on her.

The next dream was similar. She was standing outside a large white tent in a field waiting to go in and be announced as Mr. & Mrs. Somebody. Her dress is art deco inspired. Looking down at her hands she notices the lace gloves and a gold bracelet with dangling, gold charms that were her great grandmother's, along with a beautiful diamond ring on her left hand. In her dream she felt the happiest she ever had. As she looked up at her groom standing next to her, the only things she noticed about him before the dream ended abruptly were that he had a lean torso and broad shoulders. Mel woke up feeling increasingly anxious to know who this mystery man was.

It has been awhile and I apologize!

I know it has been forever since I have written anything in here. Life has been crazy lately, but that's not an adequate reason to not do something that I love. I am constantly starting things and never finishing them and it drives me batty! I have been that way my entire life and I want that to stop NOW. So here we go again. I have been thinking a lot about this book lately, no writing but lots of thinking and planning, and I have come up with a few minor changes in my viewpoint for the characters. They are not necessarily changing, I just want them to go in a different direction than I wanted them to go in before. You may not even notice it, it may all be in my head, but I want to back into it from a different angle and start from where I left off. So don't mind me while I free write for a while and try to figure out how to get these beloved characters of mine from point A {where I left them hanging} and point Q where I think I want to take them next! I never have gone about things in an orderly fashion!!!

3.15

The next Monday night Mel drove out to Tabbi's house for The Collective meeting, knowing she was going to get questioned about where she had been the week before and why she wasn't there. She was still trying to figure out how she was going to play it. Should she tell them the truth and see who reacts in a way that would tip her off to who knew Paul, or should she only tell them half the story? Or maybe she should just lie through her teeth about everything, make up something that sounded convincing enough and leave it at that?
As she pulled up to the house she had almost made up her mind to completely lie, but she wasn't sure what to tell them yet. Before she could formulate a good enough story a set of headlights flashed in her rear view mirror and she knew she was out of time. She could just see Sadie's innocent eyes as she piled her purse and coat into her arms and opened the door. Mel did likewise and they walked in a comfortable silence to the front door. Since the night that Sadie had thrown up all over Tabbi's house and spent the night at Mel's to avoid a run-in with her parents, Mel and Sadie had a better understanding and respect for each other. They could talk easily or sit in silence and be comfortable in each others' company.
That night the two girls had sat on the giant couch in Mel's living room sharing a pot of coffee and getting to know each other. Sadie talked more freely about her breakup with Keith in a way that Mel had never realized had hurt her so deeply. Mel could easily see why it seemed to be the only thing Sadie talked about.
"I thought we were going to get married," Sadie said as a single tear sat perched in the corner of her eye threatening to run down her full cheekbone. "He always said that I was the only girl he had ever felt that way about. That I had everything on his list."
"His list?" Mel said inquisitively.
"Yeah, like a list of things that you're looking for and things that you aren't willing to compromise on. We've talked about it at The Collective before. Don't you remember?"
"Yeah I remember that, but I've never met a guy who had a list like that," Mel corrected.
"But I guess being everything on that list doesn't make up for one thing," Sadie said with obvious disgust layered in pain.
"What do you mean by that? You're great," Mel said, trying to make her feel better about herself.

3.12

After saying good-bye, Mel watched Paul walk down the hall to his apartment for just a moment before turning the knob and slipping quietly into her own apartment. She routinely walked to her bedroom, put on comfortable clothes and went to sit on her balcony in the cool evening air.

On her way out she grabbed the pack of Camel's tucked into a vase of fake sunflowers. She rarely smoked anymore. It had been something she had picked up in college but she knew her parents would not approve of her polluting her lungs so she had all but stopped when she moved back home. However, now that she was living on her own, she thought it was okay to sneak a cigarette every once in a while.

Lounging in a patio chair she placed the small stick between her lips and lit it. That first puff was always the best. She sat reflecting on the evening for a while. She wasn't sure what had possessed her to accept the dinner invitation from a man that she had just met. And who was it that he knew at The Collective? That was something she was so curious about. Her mind lingered on that for some time, trying to figure out who he knew and how he knew them. Many of them grew up around here, maybe from childhood or a family friend. But why did he react that way when she questioned it? It was a mystery to her. She didn't know all these girls' stories well enough to be able to guess where they could have met. She didn't remember a guy named Paul coming up in any of their conversations, so maybe he was long since forgotten by the girl and he was still hanging on to something from a time long past.

3.9

She wasn't sure if she should follow her gut and slip her hand out of his grasp, or just go with it. The last time she just went with it ended with her waking up alone in her apartment expecting to be in the company of the guy who accompanied her home the night before. That led to hurt and destruction, but this guy seemed different for some reason. He seemed to sincerely like her. There was something in the steady way he held her gaze and the soothing feeling that his hand was bringing to her hand that traveled to the rest of her body.
She had just made up her mind to pull her hand away when Paul realized what he was doing and quickly pulled his hand away and it disappeared under the table. Mel was relieved to have her hand back, but her skin was itching to have the warmth of his grasp back.
"So what do you do in your spare time?" she asks, trying to steer the conversation back to common ground.
"My family is really important to me, so I try to go back home as much as possible. But other than that I am a pretty laid back, hang out and watch movies on the couch with friends kind of person," he said. As if on cue, as soon as he finished his sentence their food was being placed on the table in front of them. "That looks really good," he said, looking at her plate of chicken and pasta drizzled with pesto sauce.
"It's delicious. Actually I get it every time I come here," she said, realizing how lame her life was. She had always been a creature of habit. She ordered the same dishes at all of her familiar restaurants, stuck pretty close to her usual daily routine, she even had everything in the shower exactly in the same place. It had gotten worse since she lived by herself, where she could control what was moved. "Do you want to try some?" she asked.
"Sure!" he said, "Wow! That is really good. I understand why you get it every time now."

3.8

This one may not totally fit in with what I have already written but I had a stroke of possible genius last night and figured I would see where it takes me! So bare with me while I explore this idea. Same basic story, just might be a little different.

The apartment was clean, the bright colored trinkets laid out on the reclaimed wood coffee table, the teal accent pillows neatly placed in the crevice of the charcoal gray couch and Mel was showered, dressed and heading out the door headed for The Collective. It had been a very productive day and she was in a great mood. As she closed the oak door and clicked the deadbolt into place she heard someone walking past the many doors to other apartments in the building. She felt herself tense up a bit. Having never felt threatened or afraid in the years she had lived here, her reaction was curious to her. But there was no time to dissect her feelings now.
"Hey, how's it going?" a deep, clearly male voice said, close to her now.
She turned only to find a scruffy but handsome face about 6 inches above her own. His brown eyes were kind and she saw no threat in them. Racking her brain for any kind of recognition of who he was, Mel came up empty. Maybe he was new to the building.
"Hi," she said with a smile, "Where did you come from?" she asked and then mentally yelled at herself for how cheesy that sounded.
"Well originally I'm from West Virginia, then I moved to North Carolina, then I lived in Alaska for a while but just now I came from my new apartment at the end of the hall," he said with a smile. "I'm Paul."
"Wow! That's a very impressive resume. I'm Melissa, but you can call me Mel. Why all the moving?" she replied, grateful that he just went with it.
"I grew up in West Virginia and was stationed in North Carolina and Alaska while I was in the army," he said, sounding a little smug about it, probably knowing what a man in uniform does to girls. Little did he know, that didn't really do much for Mel. Her dad had been a fireman most of her life and she saw what it did to him. She never wanted to marry someone who had the kinds of issues her dad and his colleagues had developed from the high stress career. Military was even worse in Mel's mind. She was so proud of the men and no one would call her unpatriotic, but it was not something she wanted to be a part of any longer.
"Well that's impressive. When did you move here?"
"I moved to Evansville about 2 years ago and just moved into this building 3 weeks ago. I haven't been out and about much lately though. I work from home now, so I don't have much reason to leave the house most days," he said. "I'm just on my way out to grab something to eat. Would you be interested in going with me so I don't look like a loner alone in a restaurant?"
"Well, you're forward!" she exclaimed taken aback by his boldness.
"I'm sorry. I'm just trying to get to know my neighbors. If you're not okay with it I'll leave you to whatever you were headed out to do," he said with a touch of apology in his voice.
"I'm sorry. Actually dinner sounds great," she said, seizing the opportunity to get to know a guy in her building. Who knows when you might need a handy man around after all.
"Great! Where would you like to go?"
"Um, I don't care. You can choose," she replied.

Soon she was seated comfortably in a lush booth at McPhran's across from Paul and his chocolate brown eyes and lean, muscular body, all thought of The Collective gone. He was a kind and patient man, not even flinching when Mel sent the waiter away twice before finally settling on what she wanted to eat. They talked easily about family and friends and work. Turns out his job is to set up school visits for Army recruiters to speak to high school students about joining the military and other PR type avenues for the Army.
"Were you deployed while you were on active duty?" she asked, not being able to place why she was so curious about his past life as a killing machine for the country.
"Only once actually, to a small base in Turkey for a year. It wasn't too bad. Mostly just patrolled like a police officer would and monitored terrorist activity in the area. Nothing too exciting," he said, judging by her facial expressions that he hadn't lost "cool points" in her eyes. "So what do you do for fun?"
"I like to run, and I actually just started going to this woman's group through my church. But it's not really a church thing, technically. It's hard to  explain. It's called The Collective and really we just hang out and talk and eat," she said, knowing that she was on the verge of babbling on and on out of discomfort. And her discomfort only deepened when Paul suddenly sat back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest, avoiding eye contact. "Is everything okay?" she asked concerned.
"Oh, yeah I'm fine. I just know someone who used to go to that. She doesn't really like me too much."
"Who is it?" I ask trying not to seem too interested in his answer. If curiosity killed the cat, I'm glad I'm not a cat because I would be beyond dead right now.
"I would rather not say if that's okay with you. I am trying to distance myself from the whole thing and move on," he said, still avoiding Mel's interested gaze.
"Yeah no problem. Consider it dropped," she said, trying to make him feel more comfortable again. Instinctively, she reached across the table toward him, resting her hand a few inches above his silverware still wrapped in a napkin. "Hey, what else do you want to talk about?" she asked, trying desperately to salvage the conversation she felt like she had a hand in destroying. Suddenly he sat forward and put his hand on top of hers. Mel was so startled she should have pulled her hand away, but something kept her hand glued to the table, warm under his large hand.
"There's something different about you from other girls I know," he said, his eyes locked on hers making it impossible for her to look away.
"How so?"
"I don't know exactly. Most girls would be hounding me trying to figure out who of their friends I know and how I know her and trying every way they know to get more information out of me. But you just except it and move on," he said.
"I mean, don't get me wrong I want to know, but I know there are things in my past that I wouldn't want to talk about so I wouldn't do the same thing to others. I'm not really anything impressive," she said, trying hard to pull her eyes away from his in vain. His hand is still pressing hers lightly into the table.

writing prompts 3.5

Re-imagine a real event
Think of something that happened to you, or someone you know, or someone in a news story, and ask yourself, "What if?"
What if you had picked up that hitch-hiker, and she turned out to be a psychopath? What if you decided to get revenge on your evil coworker? What if your neighbor is really living a double life?
Come up with an interesting situation and try to imagine as realistically as possible how it would play out.
Break it down
Here's an exercise that will help you generate your own story starters.

1. Think of a strong emotion (for example: rage).
2. Quickly write a list of ten situations which would inspire that emotion (for example: when someone harms a family member).
3. Choose some of those situations and make them more specific. Come up with several scenarios for each one. (Using the example of someone harming a family member, one version might be that someone mugs the character's grandmother. Another version might be that the character's mother is unfairly fired from her job).
4. Now, take some of these scenarios, and make them even more specific. (Using the example of the character's mother getting fired: Maybe it is a case of sexual harassment. Or maybe an envious coworker is telling lies about her...)
5. Keep going, getting more and more specific, until you find a story you want to write.

Tell it out loud Having trouble writing? Fine. Don't. (For a while).
Instead, try this. Go get a voice recording device (your cell phone might have this function) and just talk to it. Describe the scene you wanted to write. Pretend you're talking to a friend, and record what you say.
Next, transcribe the recording. Just play the recording and write or type your words.
Now you no longer have to face a blank page. You have a written text that you can use as a starting point. Read what you have and decide what to add, to cut, to rearrange. Start building it into a draft of a story.
Build on a name
Go to a phone book, and pick a name at random. If you don't have a phone book handy, you can make up a name, or feel free use one of these: Hank Jenkins, Trevor Smythe-Hewitt, Tatiana Zeleny, Margaret Wintergreen, Mimi Howard, Jasper Krupp.
Try to picture how someone with this name might look. I imagine Tatiana Zeleny as in her early twenties with long dyed black hair, a round pasty face, ice blue eyes, crooked teeth, and elaborate silver jewelry. There is no right or wrong to this -- just try to form a mental image of a person.
Ask yourself more questions about this person. Does he/she have a job? A family or relationship? What are his/her dreams and fears? You can use our character questionnaire to develop a fictional character.
Present this character with a terrible problem. How will the character react? Start turning this into a story.
People-watch
Go to a public place like a coffeehouse or a mall, and watch the people around you. Imagine what their lives might be like. Everyone has secrets -- guess at the secrets of the stranger you see. You can turn some of these people into characters for a story.
An added bonus: this exercise gets you away from your desk for a while. A change of scene may be just what you need to inject new energy into your writing.
Keep a journal
Keep a journal, where you describe the people, places, and events from your day. Describe the details of how things look, sound, smell, and feel. Try to capture the details that you couldn't have imagined if you hadn't observed them for yourself. If you use them in your fiction later, they will give it a texture of reality.
Whenever you're stuck for creative writing ideas, you'll be able to mine your journal for material.

Writing prompts

Here is an interesting site about writing prompts. My favorite one (and one I will probably use in my novel is "Sometimes the ones we love can't come back"


http://www.nanowrimo.org/en/forums/word-wars-prompts-sprints/threads/960?page=1

Korey

Known to the girls as the jerk who broke Sadie's already fragile heart. Collectively, they don't know much else about him. Melissa knows more about him than she lets on because it would mean bad things for her relationships. They went to high school together and reconnected later.
Jiuliana had the hots for him for a long time, knows him from a camp they both worked at one summer years ago. He never really knew she existed.
Korey may be anti drinking completely who fell off the wagon once (the night of the incident with Mel) and knows that Sadie has issues with alcohol so that is part of why he broke up with her.

Jiuliana

Jiuliana: (judgmental) Never had a boyfriend, but had a crush on Korey for a long time before Sadie came around. Resents Sadie for her constant babble about Korey and their relationship. She pretends that she is happy being on her own, but is secretly so lonely and terrified this is a permanent state.

Callie

Callie: (gossip) The know-it-all of the group. She is constantly in everyone’s business and has to know what is going on at all times. She is deceptive about pumping the other girls for information, covering it up with “love” and “care”. Possibly the antagonist. Mel has to repeatedly put her in her place and seems to be the only one that will do it. Everyone else is blind to her manipulative ways.

Sadie

Sadie: (alcohol dependency) Recent break up with Korey always seems to talk about the break up during small group. Everyone secretly thinks she needs to get over it and stop obsessing about it, but no one will say anything. The alcohol that she uses to self-medicate from the pain of the breakup is gin of any kind. She usually carries a flask of it in her purse buried beneath the feminine products so no one will find it. Mel finds it at some point, maybe Sadie has passed out for some unknown reason and why the others are busy caring for her, Mel sneaks away to find her purse to see if she can find out what happened. She digs around and feels the metal flask through the lining of the pocket and discovers it. She decides not to tell the other girls, instead she waits to talk to Sadie about it one on one to save her from embarrassment.

Full name: Sadie Grace Bush
Birthday: March 9, 1990s
Appearance:
Archetype: child
Favorite color: lilac purple and light pink
Faults:
Strengths: kind person, love for people, helpful
Phobias: snakes and spiders
Living situation: lives with parents and older half-brother
Married or single: single
Children: none
Socio-economic status: upper middle class, never wanted for anything, but didn't have money lying around either
Strong memories:  Breaking up with Korey

getting started now

Here is an overview of what the story is about (excuse the free writing style of this brainstorming blog!):

A group of young women all meet once a week to talk about life. It started as a book club, but they have long since forgotten to pick a new book. They are very welcoming and want to help everyone's problems. But it is a cover because they don't want anyone to realize that they each have a secret to keep.

1 year after Sadie and Korey broke up, Sadie is a mess because of the anniversary and no one can calm her down or talk sense into her. The girls never actually get into the study of the night because Sadie continues to burst into tears at random intervals. Jiuliana thinks that it is for attention and keeps trying to ignore it and get others to ignore it, hoping it will make her stop. Jo knows the whole story behind why they broke up and why she is so upset about the 1-year anniversary. Tabitha wants to hear all about the issue because it makes her feel young again. Callie doesn’t know the whole story and it bothers her, so she is trying to keep Sadie talking to get all the information. The whole thing terrifies Shawna because she is afraid Matt will leave her when he finds out she had a miscarriage. Jessie is trying to stay out of the whole issue. Melissa is quickly getting annoyed by the whole thing and wishes she wasn’t there.

            “Hey ladies. How is everyone doing tonight?” Tabitha says, as everyone filters into the living room carrying their small white plates of snacks and coffee cups.

            A collective sigh swept over the girls. All of them knew exactly what today marked, the 1-year anniversary of Korey breaking Sadie’s heart.