Remember Who the Enemy Is

We cross the room, but in the doorway, Haymitch's voice stops us. "Katniss, when you're in the arena," he begins. Then he pauses. He's scowling in a way that makes me sure I've already disappointed him.

"What?" I ask defensively. 

"You just remember who the enemy is," Haymitch tells me. "That's all. Now go on. Get out of here."

- Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins 

Chapter 18

I've been recalling this scene a lot lately. It's a moment through the rest of the book Katniss has to keep reminding herself of and she doesn't completely understand it while she's in the arena for the second time. I think it's advice we all need to remember from time to time.

Our society has been in an uproar over so many things lately. Racism, sex scandals, terrorism, religion... need I go on? We've been trying to process all of these events happening, figuring out why, getting defensive, and we point fingers at why and who's fault it is. The witch from Into the Woods voice rings in my head "Of course what matters is to blame. Somebody to blame. If that's what you enjoy placing the blame if that's the aim give me the blame."

I know I've done it. In the heat of the moment you get angry and type things or say things because you're trying to sort through it all and then end up saying things you might not mean. Attacking somsone out of our pain and our anger thinking "if only they get justice!" or "we need to get rid of this person or this thing" and it will make it all okay again.

We forget who the enemy is.

Not long ago on Tumblr I saw a post comparing riots to The Hunger Games and how we should support those causing the riots. Which, maybe we should, or maybe we shouldn't. I don't know. But, a lot of people forget how in the Hunger Games books, Katniss still had compassion for the citizens of the Capitol. Because they weren't the enemy. 

Those who shoot others, who riot, who destroy, who uprise, who hurt, who abuse, are just people. Not that there shouldn't be justice or anything like that - of course there should be. But it's easy to dehumanize them isn't it? They're still people.

Hank Green made a video a few weeks ago about his favorite feelings. He mentioned how one of them wasn't seeing other people fail, even if they deserve it or you don't like them. You think it'll make you feel good, but it doesn't. It's just sad. (You really should watch the video, he says it way better than I do. Click here.) Because they're people.

They aren't the enemy. 

Who is the enemy? Who do we blame then? 

Racicm. Ignorence. Hate. Being narrow minded. Corruption. 

And dare I say it? Satan.

I'm not one to talk about Satan and such a whole lot. Bob Goff explains it best in his book Love Does. "When I think about satan, my thoughts go to how Jesus interacted with him in the desert. Jesus spoke with him for just a few seconds and then sent him away. Satan was a manipulator who wanted to control God, but Jesus had a relationship with God that satan didn't understand, and Jesus had no problem telling him off and getting rid of him. I think we should do the same. That's all I have to say about satan. He gets too much airtime already." 

But ultimately, he's the enemy. 

I'm not saying we can't get angry and justice shouldn't be served when people do terrible things. We people can do awful things.

But we're all still people. 

A NaNoWriMo Week One Pep Talk

It's day 8 of NaNoWriMo. We have officially been at this for an entire week!

Give yourselves a pat on the back. If you're not doing NaNoWriMo, go congratulate someone who is because if they're anything like me, they might need some encouragement right about now.

By the end of today (November 8) if you are keeping on schedule with writing 1,1667 words each day, you should be hitting 13,333 words. As of last night I was at 12,057.

If you're ahead of the curve - that's awesome! You keep going! Sometimes it can be easy to think "I can take a break, I'm ahead" but DON'T DO IT! At some point down the road this month, you'll probably not write as much and you're going to need that word count cushion. Also, you can't stop the momentum it gets going. There have been times I'll get crazy ahead and then I'll just randomly stop writing for a week or two. It'll start with one day where I get too confident in my word count, and soon it turns into two days, a week, two weeks. Yikes! I've been able to catch up every time I have done this, but it's stressful. Please learn from my mistakes and don't do this to yourself.

If you're behind on your word count goal - don't freak out! You can still catch up and keep going. It's only week one. You have three whole weeks to get your word count up. A ton of people are in the same boat as you and that's totally okay. In fact, I found out last night that Hank Green does NaNoWriMo. Yup, HANK GREEN. It kinda made my life.

Well.. other than that Pip Ballentine, a co-author of The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences, one of my favorite Steampunk series, just followed me on Twitter. SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! AN ACTUAL AUTHOR IS FOLLOWING ME ON TWITTER. And not just any author- an author who writes one of my favorite book series!!!!!! Please celebrate with me my doing the Kermit Flail.

Wait... what was I talking about? Oh yeah. NaNoWriMo. Hank Green. I'm back on track now, I promise.

Anyways. Hank Green tweeted this last night:

Woo! 10k! Still behind where I should be, but good enough! http://t.co/H6aRITm8n9
— Hank Green (@hankgreen) November 8, 2014

He's behind. HANK GREEN is behind on NaNoWriMo. Is he freaking out? Nope. If that's not encouragement for you, I don't know what is.

We all work at our own pace and that's totally okay.

But if you're like me... you're still worried.

I know I'm not crazy behind. Not yet. But to be completely honest, I've never struggled so much with a novel this early in the game. When I first thought of this idea, I was so excited. There was so much potential! If done right, I could turn it into a stage production. It was going to be personal, unique, heartfelt, funny, all of the things a good novel should be. But whenever I start writing nothing turns out the way I thought it would. Maybe it's because I haven't gotten to the scenes I'm the most excited about. I'm not sure. But I spend so much time just staring at my computer screen instead of typing. I want to fix it but I don't know how.

That doesn't mean I'm going to quit though.

Here are a few things I've learned this week about struggling with a novel... all things other people have told me in my frustration.

Earlier this week I was texting one of my NaNoWriMo friends in Missouri. Last year we spent hours and hours together at Starbucks and on my living room couch drinking coffee (and other things...), watching Boy Meets World, and helping each other plot our stories. I texted her expressing how frustrated I was. I felt like my story was boring and cliche and awful. She told me this:

"The point is writing it. You can't edit what's not there."

Yes, it's entirely possible your NaNoWriMo draft is completely terrible and not worth reading. But at least it's written down. When it's done and written down, that's when you can look at it and say "Okay, this is bad. How can I make it better?" If you never write down the terrible stories, you'll never get the good ones either. Most great stories have had several drafts, not just one. You can't get to the good one until the bad one is written. 

I also got a lot of inspiration from the NaNoWriMo pep talk from Veronica Roth (she wrote the Divergent trilogy) and the web chat with Scott Westerfeld. (He wrote the Uglies series and I just finished his newest book, Afterworlds, which is about a girl who published her NaNoWriMo project. So awesome!) They both seemed to have the same mindset about writing:

If you don't know everything as you're writing, it's okay!

As in, if you don't know your ending right away - that's okay.

If you don't know your characters favorite color - that's okay.

If your usual writing plan and process isn't working- that's okay. Try something new.

Scott Westerfeld talked about how sometimes he doesn't know his ending until he's about 2/3 of the way through his novel. Or that his characters tend to develop themselves as he writes. 

Veronica Roth said in her pep talk: "What is important, far more than the definitions we cling to, is that we finish the stories we are burning to tell." 

She also said: "Don’t be a plotter or a pantser, a strict butt-in-chair person or an exercise-doer, a beginning-to-end-er or a time jumper—don’t be anything other than whatever you need to be to keep climbing."

You do what you need to do to keep writing. Keep telling your story. It will get there. Good or bad, your story will get there. Fast or slow, your story will get there.

Also, today (November 8) is "Double Up Your Novel Day." Which means you should double something. Double your word count or your daily writing goal. Double your donations. Double your characters. Double SOMETHING that has to do with NaNoWriMo. The weekend is a great day to catch up and to get a nice word count cushion for when you fall behind later.

Now get back to writing. 

This Blog is Emma Approved

This week is going to be/is stressful for me. There's a lot going on at work and it's basically been stressing me out. When it's all over I'll explain... but for the time being just keep me in your prayers.

So when I saw that Emma Approved premiered on YouTube on Monday....

MY DAY GOT SO MUCH BETTER!

I saw Legally Blonde the musical this weekend... so everything comes back to that show.

What is Emma Approved you ask?

Do you all remember when The Lizzie Bennett Diaries (YouTube's version of Pride and Prejudice) was on YouTube and it was amazing? Now they're doing Emma!!!!!

Emma's Twitter Logo

The moment I saw the link I shared it with one of my best friends and we watched ti at the same time and squealed like the crazy girls we are. I then fan-girled all over the internet. I might watch it over and over again.

At last... Mondays and Thursdays will be good again. 

If you are a fan of Jane Austen, you HAVE to watch these videos. The Lizzie Bennett Diaries were phenomenal, and I have high hopes for Emma Approved.

If you aren't familiar with Jane Austen's books, this is the perfect way to get started! I know of a lot of people who had never read or seen Pride and Prejudice and the LBD were what got them hooked. 

I'll embed the video in this blog post if you want to watch it. Or you can click this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeeXkf8LZ_8

So... are you fan-girling just like I am? Did this news make your week SO MUCH BETTER THAN BEFORE? Were you a fan of The Lizzie Bennett Diaries? Will you watch Emma Approved? What did you think of the first episode? 

Tell me all in the comments!

Hi New Friends!

Happy Friday everyone!

I don't know about you, but I'm super excited that it's Friday. Last weekend I was on a retreat with a kazillion Jr. Highers, and coming back to work and sitting in the office was a drag. So the weekend is a welcome change of pace. A friend of mine might be visiting and I have an audition for a play tomorrow! (Speaking of... I need to track down my old copy of Romeo and Juliet so I can study...)

Anyways. Now for something completely different.

I'm sponsoring the blog The Life of Bon this month! (Commence happy dance and cheering.) I find it pretty exciting because she's one of those "cool" bloggers. You know, blog every day, has more than three digits in her follower count, and is generally awesome in every way. She's a high school English teacher - which is awesome because we can swap teenager stories and talk abotu books. She also hosts a book club every month. This month we're reading The Great Gatsby if you want to join us.

Anyways.

I Can Carry You

Why is it that the end of the month always comes so quickly? I feel like every single month I'm always surprised a new one is coming.

A couple of things before we go onto our "usual programming."

1) Pardon me all day today while I flail about due to today's Lizzie Bennett Diaries. Feel free to ignore those tweets and Facebook posts.

2) Today I joined BlogHer - and I'M SO CONFUSED. If anyone is on that site, add me (is that what you do?) and explain to me how it works. Thanks

3) I'm considering bringing back sponsor swaps and guest posts (maybe not a monthly theme though?). Thoughts?

The Green Brothers Make Funny Faces When The YouTube is Slow

I'm coming to the conclusion that YouTube hates me.

When I upload videos, it sometimes takes two or more hours to upload to the site.

Then when I try to watch videos, it is constantly stopping on me. No matter where I am, home, work, Starbucks, etc. it takes me at least fifteen minutes (if not more) to watch a three minute video.

COME ON YOUTUBE! I want to overdose on the VlogBrothers and Lizzie Bennett Diaries. My goodness. While at lunch today, I was trying to watch John Green's latest video but for at least five minutes it would freeze at various points making me stare at crazy screen shots like this: