My Mind Is Cluttered

I’d really like to start writing again – fiction, that is. When I imagine myself as I really want to be, I am a writer. I have all of these story ideas, but I have trouble forming scenes from them. I’m guessing that’s just a matter of practice? I’ve read up on the subject, but I still have trouble. Maybe I need to do more exercises, but it feels like such a waste of time! On to my next problem:

I have an issue with taking the time to write. I have all kinds of time at my disposal, if only I could organize it properly to be productive. I’m constantly distracted. Every time I receive a text message, an email, or a FaceBook notification on my phone, I drop what I’m doing and respond. If you are my friend on FaceBook, you’ll see me popping on and off all day long, and somehow I can waste endless minutes doing meaningless tasks, responding to emails, and just trying to organize my thoughts so that I can progress through the day. So I have a hard time coming up with the block of time that I need to be able to think in peace.

Do I really need that huge chunk of time set aside in my day to write? I wonder if I could just write on the fly? Something like this blog post is not a problem. I only have a couple of minutes at my disposal, and I can hear Ian practicing his drums and the television from the living room, but none of that bothers me. I wonder if I could get to that point while writing fiction? I doubt it…

What do you all do?

Agenda-driven fiction

Six months ago, I read a post about agenda-driven fiction. And I must say, I love what the author had to say.

As Christians, reaching others for Christ should be our only agenda. Our education, our career, our relationships, every decision we make should be weighed against what we are accomplishing for the kingdom. We don’t see many Christians today who are living a life exclusively for God. We get too wrapped up in ourselves, in our aspirations. A part of me envies the missionaries and others who are doing nothing but serving. I want to be a light in the darkness, but too many times, I want to do it on my own terms. Because I am only here for a short while, I want to meet my goals that I have laid out for myself. But since we do have such a short sojourn in this world, all the more reason we should be spending our time reaching others. How am I spending my time? What am I writing? Am I too busy writing what I imagine myself publishing in five or ten years? Something that I imagine will be admired by the world? Or should all of my writing material point to Christ? I agree with the writer of this post: if something that I write reaches just one person, the time I spent writing it will be worth more than anything I can earn writing a parade of best-sellers.