Writing—it’s what I do.

Photo: Lyn Ayre February 2021

It seems I’m always writing. Dreaming is a part of writing. Observing the life around me is a part of writing. Thinking it’s a part of writing. I’m always doing those three things. As a result, I’m always emailing myself my ideas, sentences and paragraphs that go flying through the airwaves. I’m never not writing.

Even when I’m painting, I’ll have to stop and email myself an idea. Same goes for when I’m cooking, watching television, playing with my cat Bella, it just comes in and I have to get it down immediately or I’ll forget it. Anyone else like that? LOL Inspiration can come from anywhere.

When I do schedule time to sit and simply write, I have all these ideas, sentences and paragraphs to word process. I’ve written entire books this way. Now that I think about it, that’s how I write all of my books.

I began with poetry when I was eight. I moved on to song writing in my teens. I found a way to live a spiritually based life and wrote about that. I wrote my memoir, then three books for children. Now I’m writing murder mystery romances.

I’ve never been able to force myself to write. It doesn’t come that way for me. And, since I’m a human being, I suspect it doesn’t come that way for some others either. We have devised a more eclectic style rather than a disciplined one. I’ve written forty-two books, so I don’t feel too badly about doing it my way. It works for me.

I belong to two writing groups and two associations. I also take online courses that pique my interest. I try out the many tips and keep the ones that work for me.

Being with people of like mind and who may have struggled with the same things I am helps me to feel like I’m not alone. They can let me know that there is light at the end of the tunnel and share how they got there. I can do the same for other writers. Writing can be a very solitary activity, but I don’t have to be alone in it. I bounce ideas off my friends and my groups. We all critique each others’ work and do the edits required to polish it up. It takes a village.

Growing, learning, stretching, and becoming the best writer I can be—it’s all a part of the great tapestry of my life.

Creating friendships and socializing with people of like mind as well as with people whose opinions are completely different from mine gives me the impetus I need to go further than the boundaries I set for myself. Varying points of view fill in the blank spaces within my psyche. I grow. It’s all good.

Doing other things aside from writing is important, too. Rounding out my day with cooking, playing, laughing, crying, laundry, music, lunch with friends, painting, chores, pet care, grocery shopping, medical, and banking rounds out me. I’m put in the way of various types of people when I’m out and about. I’m the one in the grocery store line up who starts conversations with other people and the cashier just for fun. Just to socialize. Just to be with others.

And then somebody might say something and I think, what a good line. So, I speak it into my phone notes and away I go home. Inspired.

I’m always writing. It’s what I do.

Love Lyn

30Aug2021