3 Tips for Taking Action

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

Have you ever had a stunningly brilliant, once-in-a-lifetime, on-fire idea that you were pretty sure was going to win you the Nobel prize or an Academy Award or something else of equal significance.

And then you just . . . never acted on it.

Ever?

You meant to. You had it all planned out in your head, did hours of research, maybe even told your friends and family about it and acquired some much-needed support and enthusiasm. After all, it was a brilliant idea. Of course everyone you told loved it.

But after that . . . it just . . . petered out. Got put on a shelf somewhere. Gathered dust. Stuck waiting for that perfect moment. You know the one. When planets align and the stars begin to sing and the universe decides that it’s your turn for that one spark of success that has been passed around through humanity since the beginning.

When you’re ready, in other words. When it’s time.

I have never, in all my life, experienced that moment.

I’m going to guess that you haven’t either. Nor, realistically, are you expecting to—not really. But taking that first step on a new project or idea—especially if that first step could result in criticism—is tough. It’s easier to let the idea remain just that—an idea, with nothing concrete to dislike or criticize.

Unfortunately, ideas only go so far. The book has to be written to be worth anything. So, here are my three favorite tips for taking action when it feels impossible.

1) Let Go of the Vision
I know, this one seems counterintuitive, but bear with me. You had this great idea. It’s been building up in your head for weeks or months or even years. You know exactly what you want it to look like, down to the last detail.

Only it’s not going to match your vision once you start. First drafts—of anything—never do. They’re awkward and stilted and ugly and they very rarely, if ever, match the vision in your head of what you wanted to produce. But, they’re a step beyond an idea, and however the project shifts and changes with the execution, it will be better for it.

Eventually.

2) Know Your Why
Why did you latch onto this particular idea? Why does it matter to you? Where do you want it to lead you down the road? Big projects—writing or otherwise—take a lot of time and energy to bring to realization, and getting started isn’t the only place people get stuck. Some of the projects that I’ve worked on seem to get stuck every other chapter, and the effort it takes to get unstuck feels exhausting.

But, I know why it’s important. I know why I don’t give up, and haven’t in the last ten years of being a writer. That ‘why’ pulls me through the bad days, and helps me take action when it’s hard.

3) Map it Out
Sometimes, failure to take action is connected to a lack of clarity. You don’t know where to start, so you never do. After all, ‘Write a book’ is a pretty tall order, especially if you’ve never done it. Instead, give yourself some steps that don’t feel like climbing the entire mountain in one leap.

Write one chapter.

Flesh out an outline.

Read a book on story structure.

Write for ten minutes before bed every night.

Whatever your list of small steps is, take the first one. And the second. Commit to yourself, your idea, and the vision of the future that this idea spurred. No matter how hard taking action is, I can guarantee it won’t be more difficult than watching that awesome idea you had wither to ash because your ‘moment’ never came.

Job VS Career

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

As many of you know, I left my full-time job in March of last year to start my own business.
It was something of a daunting transition. Lots of panicky moments. I came up with a business name, we bought an airplane hanger, I packed up my desk.

It was a whole thing.

But since then, I’ve been thinking a lot about the concept of a job vs a career. See, having a full-time, nine-to-five job is very comfortable. You have benefits, your paycheck lands in your bank account every other week, other people tell you what to do and when to do it . . . it’s comfortable. There’s security.

But—and this took me years to finally admit about myself—I am a fiercely ambitious person. I have plans. Plans that don’t involve a nine-to-five or paychecks that land in my bank account every two weeks. Plans that live outside of the nine-to-five. Plans for books and TV shows and projects that are mine instead of someone else’s. Even when I was working my nine-to-five, I was coming home and spending several more hours working on my books or this blog or whatever other projects I felt were necessary to what I was doing at the time. Sometimes that meant editing, or finishing the design on a book cover, or posting on social media.

You wear a lot of hats, when you have your own business.

Wish I’d known that back when I first started.

Someone’s gotta do the taxes and keep track of business documents. And guess what? It’s gonna be me.

Every single time.

But, in the last year as I have been settling into my new role as a business owner, I have discovered the benefits of attaching myself to a dream, not a company or a job or even a project, in fact. Over the years, I have reached the point with projects where they were no longer driving me forward, and I’ve learned to let them go and be thankful for what they’ve taught me, rather than allowing them to hold me back for any longer. The same goes for companies, jobs, and even genres.

In other words, I am allowing for growth. Rather than being discouraged that I no longer have the security of the nine-to-five, I am looking at my career as a collage of projects and seasons, jobs and commissions that will grow into something far larger—and more diverse—than a single nine-to-five is able to offer.

And that, I’m finding, is far more lasting and resilient than a nine-to-five.

Do you have plans that feel too big or too uncomfortable for you? Tell me about them in the comments!

Here’s To Embarrassment

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

Writing professionally is not for the faint of heart.

It’s true. Unfortunately, by its very nature, writing is a vulnerable business. Your stories are pieces of yourself, and putting them out to potential ridicule or even well-meaning critique is a difficult thing to do.

But there’s more to it than that, and I’ve spent a lot of time in the last few years thinking about what makes starting out as a writer feel so hard—especially as my own career has gained a footing and is moving toward something like a real beginning.

This quote by Ed Latimore, a former heavyweight boxer and a full-time writer, sums up what I’ve discovered amazingly well.

“Embarrassment is the cost of entry. If you aren’t willing to look like a foolish beginner, you’ll never become a graceful master.”

Ed Latimore


Beginning any new skill, especially in a professional environment, is a difficult thing to do, whether you’re writing, have your first job straight out of college, or simply were asked to light the bonfire for the first time. You run the risk of failure, awkward mistakes, and breaches in etiquette that will hang around as a standby joke for meetings at the water cooler for years.

Okay, probably not for years. But that’s what it feels like.

I, unfortunately, am very easily embarrassed. I like to show my best face to people, and I always like to go above and beyond expectations wherever possible.

And, realistically, that’s not always possible.

Starting a new skill and beginning a career requires fumbles. It requires mistakes and failures and awkward, stilted first attempts and most of all . . . embarrassment. If you haven’t been failing, especially as a writer, then you haven’t been trying. Your work can’t grow and your career can’t grow, because you can’t grow. As much as I would like to think that my career is built on the things I’ve done right over the years, I know that it’s not. It’s built on the moments that I got hit in the stomach with a massive dose of embarrassment, swallowed my pride, corrected my mistake . . . and learned from it.

Because embarrassment might be a harsh teacher, but my goodness, do you learn from it.


What are some ways you’ve learned to work through embarrassment in your life? Tell me about them in the comments!

A Day In The Life

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

I am a full-time writer. I’ve mentioned that about a million times on this blog, along with noting that I run my own business as a freelancer. But today, I’d like to dive a little deeper into what that looks like on a daily basis.I’ll give you a hint.

I don’t actually spend my entire day writing.

Nor, strangely enough, do I spend my whole day in my pajamas, although I work from home and generally spend the majority of my time with my kitty and my newly acquired puppy. No boss checking that I’m meeting dress code here! Except for me, and I have my own policies about that. But, we’ll get into that. In short, this is what a typically day as a freelance scriptwriter looks like.

5:30 – 7 AM: My alarm goes off stupidly early. My husband sets it for me every night, usually because I’m already buried in my blankets and stick my head out to ask if he will. He’s a good sport. I like to get up before the sunrise to get a start on my day before the rest of the world is awake and jostling for my attention. It gives me some space. Now that we have a puppy in the house, I take her out on her leash to use the bathroom, then walk over to my parents’ house to jump on their rebound mini trampoline.

People always laugh at me for the jumping thing. They can’t seem to figure out why I do it, and it weirds them out. Simply put, this is my time. I stick my headphones in, and I work on my books. Stories don’t just show up, you know. You have to plan them. You have to make space for dreaming and talking with characters and imagination, and this is my space. If I don’t have this time, I don’t have books. Period. You might say this is one of the most important parts of my day as a writer.

7 – 8 AM: When I get home, I clean. Obsessively. I find it very hard to be creative if the dishes aren’t done or the floor isn’t swept, so before my day really gets started, I make sure that all the little chores are well and truly finished. This is also when I get dressed—no pajamas here. I’ve learned through a bit of trial and error that I feel 100% better if I’m dressed for work and have done my hair and makeup. It’s the little things.

8 – 9 AM: I study Spanish with Duolingo. This is one of my weirder habits—it has nothing to do with my career, probably won’t be relevant to my daily life anytime soon, and as much as I enjoy it, I probably will never become a fluent—or even competent—Spanish speaker. But it’s something new and different for my brain to do, and it keeps me sharp.

9 – 12 AM: This is my first big ‘chunk of work’ for the day. I generally have meetings during this time to discuss scripts, casting, story problems, or just provide updates for deadlines and revisions that need to happen. When I’m not in meetings, I’m writing. Depending on the day, I might be throwing together an outline for the team to approve for a script, or drafting a chapter for one of my two books in progress, or writing dialogue for a script. This is all usually accompanied by a cup of tea, trips outside with the puppy, and my kitty attempting to crawl into my lap to get the love and attention she deserves.

12 – 2 PM: Lunch, another trip outside with the puppy, and maybe if I have time, I’ll walk over to my parents house to see actual human people and jump. Another brainstorm session helps get me back in the game for an afternoon of writing.

2 – 4 PM: More writing. Afternoons are hard, y’all. This is when I start falling asleep. Music generally helps, and sprints with my writers’ group over text. When we’re all working, it always encourages me to get more words in. If I’m working on books that particular day, this is also where I will switch projects. 1000 words in the morning for one book, 1000 words in the afternoon for another. We don’t always hit that, but we try.

4 – 6 PM: I’m prepping dinner, listening to crime podcasts or an audio book, and taking the puppy out for a good romp before the husband gets home and we eat together.

6 – 9 PM: This is supposed to be free time. It really, really is. But if I’ve got a tight deadline on a script that I’m trying to meet, or if I happen to be feeling particularly inspired, I’ll curl up on my couch with my computer and get in a few hundred extra words. My cat usually sits on top of me, and my husband plays video games next to me, so it’s all very cozy. Or, if my writers’ group is up for it, we’ll toss out a few prompts through text and free write for a while—which is always good for creativity and opens up dozens of interesting doors.


There you have it! This is what a typical day as a freelance writer looks like—at least in my neck of the woods. This was an enormously long post, but if you’ve ever wondered what a writer actually does in a day, now you know!

Writing Free

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

My writing habits are changing.

I like to think that they always are, actually. As a writer, I like to go with what works and change things up when something begins to feel stale. If I don’t, things get stuck.

Actually, I get stuck.

Being stuck is my least favorite state of being. I stare at the computer. My will to move drains away. The words refuse to come. I consider chucking this whole author thing and becoming a goat farmer.

I could be a goat farmer, you know. I would be a really good goat farmer. I know a lot about goats.

Probably more than I should, actually.

Goat slobber is a thing, y’all. And it is way stickier than you think.

Yuck.

Since I’m not quite ready to go back to being a goat farmer and enduring the bruises and slobber that accompany that job, I’ve learned to change my writing habits when necessary. And now that I’m freelancing instead of working for a company and punching a clock, writing free has become a lot easier. I still like to keep to my routines when I can, so I have a certain time every morning when I sit down to write and a certain time—most days— that I finish up and close things down.

Routines are great. For normal writing days.

Some days, sitting down to write at the normal time just is not going to work for me.

My brain says no. So does my creativity. I stare at the blank page for a long, long time. I distract myself. I write terrible sentences in the hopes that some useful ones will get dragged out behind them.

It doesn’t work.

When you’re punching a clock, you gotta be in the chair. It’s kind of a rule. But when you’re writing free, like I am learning to, it’s okay to shut the computer and walk away. Go outside. Take a walk. Hang out with people and play a board game. Make homemade tortillas.

For me, all of those things wind up being miles more productive than staring at a blank screen. And when I come back, I don’t have to open the computer. I can snag a notebook and curl up on my bed to handwrite a few pages until the block has disappeared.

I may not get us much done as I would on a normal day, but I’ll get pages more than I would have if I hadn’t been up for changing my habits a bit.

How do you free yourself up when you’re stuck on a project? Tell me about it in the comments!

Rituals

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

I’ve officially been working from home for a year now.

Since I am now a freelancer, working from home should be a pretty permanent thing now. (Fingers crossed.) And, since I’m no longer logging hours or focusing solely on one project, my schedule has changed significantly in the last few weeks.

Which means that my rituals have had to change too.

I am, at the very core of my being, a creature of habit. I function best when most of my tasks are on autopilot. Cleaning the bathroom on Tuesday mornings, working out before breakfast, listening to podcasts while I clean my house before work. You get the idea. My mundane tasks are scheduled to the degree that they have become instinctive. I get up in the morning and never have to decide what to do first, because I already know and can start when I’m half asleep and groggy.

You would not believe how much I can get done before I am fully aware of my life. Usually I’m halfway out the door, already dressed in my workout gear before I really know what’s happening.

No going back after that.

Rituals, especially in the morning, free up so much of my brain for the creative work that I spend most of my day on. Writing—especially writing creatively—is one of those things that you can’t do on autopilot. My brain has to be fully engaged, otherwise what comes out won’t be any good.

That gets exhausting.

So when my mundane, kind of boring tasks get done without having to think or plan out what needs to happen ahead of time—it makes things easier.

A lot easier.

Unfortunately, since I switched over from full-time to freelancing, some of my rituals have gone straight out the window.

Things change. Life changes. And setting up new rituals to make into autopilot habits is hard.

Thankfully, I’ve managed to preserve a few things. The important bits that will make my day a success whether I’m freelancing or working on the clock. Things like my morning workout, or the way I plan out my day before I sit down at my computer. I still clean my bathroom on Tuesdays, and my favorite podcasts are still saved on my phone. But I’ve been doing some editing. Timed breaks have gone out the window, and my day is tracked more through progress on a project instead of hours worked. I’ve taken some time to step back and decide which of my rituals are helpful and which have run their course. Some are getting cut. A few are getting added here and there.

Making habits out of a ritual takes time, and I’m definitely looking forward to when my brain can put a few tasks on autopilot again.

I could use the brain space.

What rituals do you have in your life? Tell me about them in the comments!

Learning to Swim

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

I haven’t posted in two months.

Is that crazy or what? This may be the longest break I’ve taken since I started this blog.

Okay, it’s probably not the longest.

It feels like the longest, though.

I have a good reason for keeping my head down as long as I have. Things have been happening. Big things. Important things.

Basically, these last two months have been a whirlwind of transition, and I’ve been strapped in and holding on for dear life as my whole life has gotten turned upside down and shaken up.

Okay, not my whole life.

My cat’s still around. So is my husband.

They’re very loyal.

Last month marked the end of my nearly-two year long apprenticeship at Focus on the Family. I’ve been working as a scriptwriter for a children’s radio program and learning the ropes as a professional writer under some of the best in the business.

It’s been very educational.

But, as I said, my apprenticeship reached the close at the end of March, and rather than showing me the door and sending me off with a goodbye card and my box of stuff, they asked if I might like to stick around for a little while as a freelancer. I, naturally, said yes, please, and got my home office officially set up for freelancing.

This included starting a business and registering it with the state of Colorado.

I am now the proud owner of Story Nook Productions Ltd.

Emphasis on the ‘proud’ part.

Ahem.

Freelancing, especially with actual clients and several doors that flew open the minute I began the process, is the start of a whole new season for me, and one that I am wildly excited to explore. Registering an actual business and setting myself up as an actual professional adult writer has been very intimidating, and I can tell I am definitely out of my depth.

But, if I’m honest, I’ve out of my depth for a good long time now. So long, in fact, that I am learning pretty quickly to swim.

What’s better than that?

What’s been going on with you since I’ve been away? Tell me about it in the comments!

Messy Writing

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

I have a new book in the works.

Exciting, right?

My life has been a little crazy lately, what with work and being married and working through lessons on MasterClass and possibly even working on design ideas for a new house. (Gasp.)

But, in the midst of it all, I have my own work to get done. My personal projects. The ones that, just now, matter to nobody but me. This blog is one of them, and another, very special one, is the new book I’ve been working on.

I’m wildly excited about it. It’s a middle-grade novel about monsters and kidnapped children and courage and fierce little girls and vegan toast and greasy lawyers. I have much too much fun writing it.

Since I work full time and try to be a fully functioning wife and human being part of the time, it doesn’t get as much attention as it should. Mostly just an hour every weekday, in that short squeak of time after work and before my husband gets home.

And occasionally on weekends.

And holidays, if I can sneak away long enough to pull my computer out for an hour or so.

This particular book has been coming together in bits and pieces, and it has been a solid lesson in humility for me. See, I’ve been a writer for about eight years now. I’ve written at least ten books. I get paid to write.

And yet, a first draft will always be a first draft, no matter how much experience you have or how much time you can put into it.

In other words, it’s a trash fire.

The story makes no sense. The characters refuse to do what I want them to do. The setting is rather gray and lumpy and not at all what I wanted it to be. And don’t even get me started about the theme, because the thought-provoking and inspirational idea I started out with has refused to show up entirely, and there’s a gaping hole where it is meant to be.

And yet, every day, I sit down to write a little more. And I remind myself that a first draft is a first draft, and its entire job just now is to exist. Not to be pretty, not to be complete, not even to make sense. It just has to be.

Because I find my books in the writing. I can plan and outline and think things through all I want, but once I sit down to actually write it, quite a different story emerges. The story that was meant to be. The one that is needed.

And the first draft is the first—rather messy—step to something I can be proud of.

What are you working on just now? Tell me about it in the comments!

Investing

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

Does anyone else ever get a weird urge to completely reinvent themselves and focus all their time and energy on a new hobby until you’ve perfected it?

Yeah, me too.

This week, it was drawing.

I can’t actually draw, of course. But I would like to someday. I would like to be able to draw and dance and sing and paint. I want to be a photographer and a fashion designer and a yoga master and a private chef and a master gardener. If I indulged every interest of mine with concentrated practice the way I wanted to, I would use every second of every day. I would have a new obsession every week, and I would never reach even basic proficiency within my obsessions.

So, I don’t indulge the impulse. I’m not an artist or a chef. I paint occasionally—and produce terrible work that I enjoyed doing—I cook for myself and my husband and sometimes a few friends, and I practice yoga in the mornings to keep myself in shape.

But I invest in my writing.

I take classes. I analyze scripts and books and stories that others have written to understand how they were created and what makes them powerful. I study humor and prose and story structure until I can’t sit down to a favorite show or movie without dissecting the plot, the jokes, and the motivation of each of the characters within the story. I practice daily, and focus my energy on becoming the best storyteller I can be.

Writing has always been my obsession. But obsessions, especially for me, are a dime a dozen. I can pick up anything and make it an obsession of mine. Obsession is easy.

And fleeting.

It never lasts.

So I invest when I don’t feel like it. When a shiny new obsession is beckoning, I’ve learned to ignore it. When I would rather draw or paint or cook or garden or learn to dance, I come back to what I know I’m good at. What I know is important in my life. My stories pay the bills, yes, but I write when I’m not being paid, because it’s important. Because it’s more than a job or an obsession or an impulse.

It’s a calling.

One I can invest in and know that, at the end of the day, my time was worth something.

Or, at least, that’s what I tell myself when my grasshopper brain is trying to convince me that I could drop everything I’ve been working on for the last nine years and learn to draw something better than stick figures so I can be an animator.

Because that’s a totally plausible outcome.

What kind of obsessions do you have? Tell me about them in the comments!

A Year of MasterClass

Posted on by A.R. Geiger

Christmas came early this year.

Mostly because of Black Friday, because who doesn’t love getting a good deal?

Neither my husband or I are big on gifts, so rather than running through the gauntlet and making him guess what I might like for Christmas, I made it easy and told him I wanted the all-inclusive subscription to MasterClass that was going on sale.

Now he has to play fair and tell me what he wants.

He hasn’t decided yet.

In the meantime, I get to play around with all my new classes! I’m going to fly through as many of them as I can in the next year, taking into account my somewhat limited time, and focus mainly on the writing classes, the directing course by Ron Howard, a gardening course by Ron Finley, and about ten different cooking classes, all of which I’m wildly excited about.

Oh.

And the Art of Negotiation by Chris Voss.

Because it’s taught by the FBI’s most successful hostage negotiator and who wouldn’t want to take that course??

I mean, how cool does that sound?

I’m pretty sure I can use that information in my life.

Somewhere.

In one of my books, at the very least. I’ll make something up.

I’ll be sure to keep you updated on my progress through the classes, give you shining reviews, and tidbits of information as I go along! I’ve started my first one already, and because I am a writer with a lot left to learn about story, I naturally jumped for Neil Gaiman’s ‘The Art of Storytelling’.

Because I love Neil Gaiman. His books are brilliant, his characters are everlastingly memorable, and I could listen to his accent for years. Seriously, narrating his own audiobooks was a genius move. I would listen to them just for his voice.

I’ll let you know how the MasterClass turns out! Thus far, it’s been very interesting and surprisingly helpful. I’m excited to see what else he has in store.

Have you gotten into any of the MasterClasses lately? Tell me about them in the comments!