Tag: hope

Encouragement (and a Little Hope)

~ JodiLea ~ 4 Comments

I came across this quote today while cleaning my office:

The person who removes a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.

— Chinese proverb

MonkWriting
I really needed to read that.

I have tried to move a mountain with a bulldozer, big chunks at a time, in my impatient way of doing things, and it is not going well…

I haven’t even opened the file that contains my novel in weeks. This alone makes me feel like a big loser instead of a writer working on a novel. I have started many novels in my life and got distracted by something (or just got bored with the story), only to abandon them to the bottom drawer.

I can’t let that happen to this one – it is too good.

I worry that I won’t be able to get back into the groove after weeks have gone by. From a distance, the novel becomes an immense, complicated project and completely out of my league. Self-doubt gnaws at me with familiar voices. “You’re wasting your time,” “You write like a kid,” “It’s way too corny to be taken seriously” – and those are the nice ones.

Funny how one sentence can put things into a new perspective – that encourages and gives hope. A sentence that states a simple truth, that can be applied to many things for many people.

Yes, my novel is a huge undertaking and overwhelming when I dwell on it. If I just take it one small section, one chapter, at a time, then I can get it finished.

Thank You, Chinese monks, writing proverbs.
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photo credit: ed 37 ~~ via photopin

It’s Valentine’s Day. Again!

~ JodiLea

It all starts when you’re a kid. You bring a shoebox to school and make a Valentine Mail Box.  Your shoebox gets wrapped up in fancy paper and decorated the way you like. Then you make a slit in the very top so valentines can be “mailed” to you. Your mom buys you a package of 30 valentines and you spend hours at the kitchen table addressing them to the kids in your class. Even kids you don’t like will get a valentine from you (and you from them).

On the big day I could not wait to run home and open my valentines. Hoping that John or Roy or some boy wrote me a special note inside their valentine to me. Never happened. Not even once.

Why have I not learned from this? Each year I revert back to that little girl surrounded by torn open valentines, and heartbroken. I know it will happen again this year – just like last year and the 45 years before that. Tonight is Feb. 13th and I am feeling  sad in advance. I know that is ridiculous, but it’s who I am.

Deep down in my soul, where reality is overruled by feeling, there is a glimmer of  hope. No amount of  pessimism, intelligence or giving myself a good talking to, can sway it.  The  “just maybe” part of me keeps longing for a passionate, romantic outpouring of adoration from the man I love. On Valentine’s Day.

I get the fact that Valentine’s Day means nothing to 99% of the male population. So??  It does mean something extremely important to your woman. Some effort on your part for one freaking day of the year, is all we’re asking. Don’t give us that crap about “I didn’t know what to get you”. Have you ever seen a movie that had a leading man and woman in it? Do you watch television?

Valentine’s Day is not like President’s Day. It is on the same damn day every year. February 14th.  Shame on you for pretending you did not know when Valentine’s Day was. You know who you are.

Here’s some free advice:  On the list of things we would like to get from our men on Valentine’s Day,  “Nothing”  is not one of them.