Quote of the Day: Brevity is the soul of wit. William Shakespeare

Today is another group posting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group! Time to release our fears to the world – or offer encouragement to those who are feeling neurotic. If you’d like to join us, click on the tab above and sign up. We post the first Wednesday of every month. You can also visit the founder Alex J. Cavanaugh for more info and links.

Question of the Month: Have you ever been conflicted about writing a story or adding a scene to a story? How did you decide to write it or not? 

I suppose I censor my writing a little. I don’t want to offend anyone or throw them under the bus. When you write personal essay or memoir, it’s tricky. Even blogposts can cause conflict in relationships. No specific examples come to mind, but I do remember a few conversations about the public life vs. the private life. One person on a bike trip made it clear. “Don’t blog me,” he said. 

I’ve put the novel on hold while working on shorter pieces. I wrote a short story (under 900 words) for a contest and shared it with my writing mentor group. They chuckled at the scenes and asked if it was real. That was high praise. Humor is hard, and so subjective, but I love it. My 10-minute play was fun to write. I agonized over it a bit, and cringed over some harsh criticism, but in the end I felt good about it. It was not accepted into the festival. Better luck next time. I think the short story has a chance! And, we’ve been assigned to write another short story, with a longer word count (1500-6000 words), for next month. I’ve already started taking notes. Shorter work can be quite satisfying. Novel writing is hard because of the delayed gratification. All that work and it takes YEARS to complete, revise, and get feedback. 

Go. Create. Inspire!

Journaling Prompt: How are you doing on your creative journey? Do you prefer short or long form, or mixing it up?