I recently went through a bunch of boxes of old papers and what not (and you have no idea how pleasant it is to do something like that for someone who has been focused solely on her deadline, and slightly OCD to boot) and discovered an old New Year’s Resolution list.
I couldn’t tell you the year of it, but by my handwriting, I’m going to say late high school/college. Among other mundane items that would never be completed (lose 15 lbs! Write a movie!) is, in the boldest possible hand, the simplest of instructions: Be Brave.
Now, I can’t remember why I wrote this. I don’t remember myself as an overly-reticent teenager. May be New Years caught me at a somewhat melancholy time, when I had not shown enough gumption with a boy or in a class. But for some reason, I felt the need to remind myself to step outside my comfort zone. To take a leap.
Bravery has to be taken into account when writing. Now one wants to read about a comfortable person in their comfortable life. The thing that scares you is also the most compelling, and the most difficult to explore. The great themes — love, death, passion, pain – are not, repeat, not experienced by the wallflowers. And as a writer, I have a tendency to keep things light. I like the fluffy. It feels comfortable.
Light and fluffy makes a nice cupcake, but not drama.
I try to keep that in mind now, as I gear up to start my next story. It may only be a germ of an idea right now, but soon enough I won’t be conversing with myself in hypotheticals. Therefore, I cannot be missish now. I have to take a leap. I have to be brave.