La-Tessa Montgomery

I’m being pulled in three distinct directions all at once.  Each demanding attention, each demanding priority.  But which master shall I answer? Will it be Duty, Dreams, or Destruction?

Being in a vortex of one’s thoughts is a scary thing:
      Am I good enough, smart enough?
      Is this the right decision?
      Should I go left, right, forward … backward?
      Will I fail?
      What happens when I do fail?
     Who am I, really?

It’s a painful thing:
      Why am I not enough?
      Must my shortcomings cripple me?
      Will it always be this way?
      Why aren’t I good enough to be first… to be priority… to be only?
      Why am I doing this?
 
It’s an enlightening thing:
      Yes, I’m worth it
      Yes, I deserve it
      Yes, I will … one day I most certainly will
 
The pressure is always greatest at the center. And it also happens to be darkest there as well. Yet if a pinpoint of light is allowed in, we can gain clarity and perspective while swirling & tumbling around the abyss of our own making. 

Only through trials can we face our fears and demons with the opportunity to come through to the other side. Only then can we know who we are, what our worth is, and what we truly value in life and others. 

Steel sharpens steel.  Living, loving, and dreaming is not easy, nor should it be.  Without the occasional stumble and scrape, will we  appreciate the lazy stroll on a clear day?

Total word count produced during Week 1 of the book camp is….  3,809

Not bad, but no where I near I needed to be.  I’ll admit, the NBA Playoffs are seriously messing with my concentration this year (Go GRIZZ!!) but I digress…

At first glance, I was heading into week 2 6,191 words below my weekly goal.  So I knew I had work to do, but I was confident I could do it.  Then I looked at my daily word goals and realized I’d horrible miscalculated my daily word goal. HORRIBLY.  Bascially, I’d only set my goal at half of what it needed to be.  So instead of needing 10,000 words a week, I need 20,000 …

Like I said… I was COMPLETELY off and I blame the playoffs (go GRIZZ!!) for my suspect math calcuation skills.   So actually, I’m heading into week 2  16,191 words off my goal.  (I’m such a spazz sometimes…. LOL)

Ok, I’m off to tackle my real writing goal for the week and I hope to make a dent in my week one deficit as well.  Hmm, I may have to go off grid this week to get anything done.

(But to be clear, going “off grid” does NOT mean I’m giving up any of the Grizz playoff games. I’m  just sayin’ )

Yes, yes. It’s that time again my friends. Tomorrow is day 1 of the Savvy Authors  May bootcamp.  I’m excited to get started. My newly finished UF draft will be my project for the month.  I’m hoping I can complete the total 1st round rewrites on it, thus  putting me in good shape to start my polishing phase for it in June.

I’ll admit, this is a highly ambitious project– undertaking  a 90k word rewrite in just 30 days– but I’m convinced with concentrated effort, I can pull it off.  My rough draft is a little over 80K words and I believe I can reuse atleast 85% of it for this next draft.  My main goals are to:

1. Add a new Act I (roughly 20k words)
2. Eliminate some now unnecessary scenes
3. Rearrange a few scenes to better serve the plot
4. Add about 15-20 k of new content. 

It won’t be easy, but generally nothing worth having , nor any goal worth attaining is.   I’m not going to lie to myself and even say I’ll do daily updates here as to my process, but I will do a weekly recap.

Best of luck to all my fellow bootcampers.