Keep Your Spark

At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.
Albert Schweitzer

On the advice of one of my betas, I sat down this weekend and attempted an outline for both Lorcan & Elaine, the next to stories to be told from the Blackbird series.  I am not by nature prone to detailed outlines.  I tend to be a pantser.   I don’t plot out where a book is going, but I decided to give it a go mostly because the two stories are likely to be very intertwined plot-wise.

I spent three hours trying to write the traditional sort of outline that we’re taught in school which incidentally is where my hatred of outlines comes from.

It wasn’t working.

I was getting frustrated.

I was accomplishing nothing.

So finally I decided to write the outline the way that worked for me since I’m the only one who is going to see it.  I certainly won’t be grading my performance on it.   Never been overly fond of failing. =)

The outline works for me however which is all that matters.   Instead of the standard outline form, I simply broke the chapters into sections and jotted down notes of what I wanted to happen within the chapter.  It led to a few startling revelations for both books.

And one very important realization which is why that quote is up there at the top of this post:

Surrounding yourself with people who think differently and critically is incredibly important for someone working in a creative field.

You need people in your life who will encourage you and challenge you.

Do you have people in  your life who spark your flame when you need it?