Yesterday, while waiting for Daisy to finish up with her groomer, I went to Starbucks and found this on my cup:
Improvisers don’t look at change as an obstacle; we look at it as fuel. We know that the next great idea lies just on the other side of the change. We are constantly asking of ourselves, “What can I do to incite change?” (attributed to a Mr. John Sweeney)
Not a bad sentiment, especially for a writer—if one thinks of change in terms of story, as opposed to anything on a global, personal, scale. And no, I’m not thinking of bucking trends, either (although I suppose one could derive that from the quote above). Simply put, when you’re writing, it’s not such a bad thing to improvise, to stray from the beaten path inside your mind. Go with the flow. Take advantage of dead ends to make something new. Don’t be afraid to go wild if you’ve got an idea that takes you in the opposite direction you thought you wanted to go. Be brave, be bold. Shout those words. Love change. Make something new, that is unequivocally you.