As I wake up this morning it feels wonderful to be back on my writing schedule. It feels right to warm up. I am dressed comfortably. I am sitting at my desk cup of ginger tea in toe. It is quite cold so warming the body feels right. As I wake up this morning I am thinking a lot about THE NEXT BIG DREAM! I am thinking about where I come from and where I am headed. What the future looks like and why we mustn’t just wing it! We must nudge the universe… shake the branches of the trees… and move swiftly like the wind in the direction of that thing.
What is that thing we most want?
The dream I most want is around writing… to continue to create beautiful art… to study and grow into myself as a writer… the learning is constant. I dream of building up my writing practice (increasing the amount of time I sit at my desk). My dream is to complete my historical fiction novel. The dream I most want is to teach writing on the college level. My dream today is to be accepted into a wonderful writer’s residency where I can get lost in the woods and “souly” (yes I made that word up)… I want to be souly connected and lost in the heart of my story, with no disruptions or distractions. I want to be alone… just me and this world I am creating.
I can see it…
I can see the dream that I want as more than a dream… I can see what I want for my life and my family. I am thinking about the young girls I work with. Yesterday we had a wonderful conversation about their futures and the thing they mentioned they wanted most was to be able to provide for their families. They also mentioned taking care of the homeless and donating to causes such as cancer. They told me that if they had a million dollars they would buy homes for all their loved ones and they affirmed going to college. They shared with me the perceptions and stereotypes they hear about where they live, where they’re from, and the people from their “hoods” or about the projects. They shouted out words like; “ghetto, ratchet, illiterate, lazy, drug dealers, prostitution, murderers, liars, thieves, poverty and pregnancy.”
I wondered if they saw themselves this way. I wondered quietly and will definitely bring it up next week, what the positive images are that girls are receiving when they are being told, “people like you… where you come from girls can’t possibly make it…” or they hear comments like, “the chances of you actually making it… you are one of the success stories!!!”
How can they hold onto hope and believe in themselves … believe in their dreams when the world doesn’t believe they can have it or that they deserve it? How can they dream of success when they are oftentimes set up for failure?
My intention for today is about hope our hopes and dreams, but mostly it is about really looking at why hoping isn’t enough. Hoping is like making a wish and blowing out the birthday candle for something we hope to have… versus actually believing the dream can actually be yours. The kind of hope I am talking about here is about not only calling it forth but moving towards that dream every single day. And so it is.
May all your hopes and dreams come true.
And so it is. Namaste. Aché
With all my love,
Alicia
Today’s prompts:
As I wake up this morning… (Set timer for 5 minutes)
The dream I most want… (Set timer for 5 minutes)
The life that I want… (Set timer for 5 minutes)
My intention for today… (Set timer for 5 minutes)
BREATHE
10 minutes: Brainstorming – for a specific scene in the ending where our character is met with a challenge and loses all hope. As we think about the scenes that are in this section and really explore how your character be tested. In the ending where our character may be struggling met with some challenges… how will our character/s be tested? Just list them and really free write around these tests and obstacles. BEGIN
BREATHE / STRETCH
30 minutes: Writing in scene – by now you should know or be close to knowing how the story ends. In great stories there is always this anxiety… this tension… this nervousness that we the reader experiences when we are left worrying about the character and whether or not their goal will be achieved… we are not sure if our character is going to make it. For the next 30 minutes really look at the scene and look at the challenges and obstacles. Be as descriptive as possible, use imagery and metaphors. Let’s get lost in this moment.
Prompts: I remember…
Or
She was afraid she might…
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© 2014 Alicia Anabel Santos. All Rights Reserved.
The Writer and The Story 