{"id":3951,"date":"2015-02-25T06:00:35","date_gmt":"2015-02-25T10:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/?p=3951"},"modified":"2015-02-22T18:16:02","modified_gmt":"2015-02-22T22:16:02","slug":"writing-and-what-it-teaches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/?p=3951","title":{"rendered":"Writing and What It Teaches"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I haven&#8217;t spent a lot of time thinking about the role of writing in my life lately, because I&#8217;ve been under deadline. I don&#8217;t spend a lot of time ruminating when I am under the gun of the daily word count. Actually, I should be writing my next novella right now, but I wanted to stop for a moment and reflect\u00c2\u00a0on why I spend so many of my waking hours at this task, and why I love it so much.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/thCAC04499.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3561 lazyload\" data-src=\"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/thCAC04499.jpg\" alt=\"thCAC04499\" width=\"242\" height=\"176\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 242px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 242\/176;\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3561\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/thCAC04499.jpg\" alt=\"thCAC04499\" width=\"242\" height=\"176\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I find that opening a blank page on my computer and asking my characters to tell me their story holds up a candle and a mirror to my own inner thoughts. I learn more about the things I value, like love and friendship and family, and I remember why those things are so important to me.<\/p>\n<p>I remember why I like happy endings, and why joy is such a blessing and yet so hard to capture on the page.<\/p>\n<p>I remember why I am in love with love, and how deep a part of me that love will always be.\u00c2\u00a0My love affair with love is something I came to accept about myself long ago, which is why I am still writing at all.<\/p>\n<p>I remember the joy of discovery and how it happens on every page, in every scene. Characters I thought I knew surprise me, and I surprise myself. There is joy in that, too.<\/p>\n<p>So as I swim down the river of yet another adventure, I want to thank the gods of inspiration and the gods of caffeine, all I have read and all I will read, all the things that go into the alchemy that is creation, and the ability to sit at the computer, day in and day out, and do it again.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I haven&#8217;t spent a lot of time thinking about the role of writing in my life lately, because I&#8217;ve been under deadline. I don&#8217;t spend a lot of time ruminating when I am under the gun of the daily word count. Actually, I should be writing my next novella right now, but I wanted to &hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"> <a class=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/?p=3951\"> <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Writing and What It Teaches<\/span> Read More &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":""},"categories":[56,6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3951"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3951"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3951\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3953,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3951\/revisions\/3953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}