A Bicycle Or An Airplane?

*R*

I've been doing a little research for my writing lately and learning a lot about what writing will look like for me in my own personal journey. While I've had practice writing spiritual things here on this blog and on MOHL, I've not had as much help in the area of how to write - besides essay writing in highschool. :/

I plan to read some books this year to give me some tools and encouragement on the rules and tips of non-fiction writing - the "do's and dont's", if you will. At the moment I feel as if I may be simply throwing random idea's together praying they somehow flow together and create a book. ;) I'd like to have a little more confidence.

Jessica made me realize why I've had so much trouble when I go to write, however, that has nothing to do with *skill* at all. I've been trying to act like my fiction-writing friends and I can't do that. My sweet writing friends approach their writing from a different point of view, almost as an "invisible" spectator - the reader disappears in a world the author has created - whereas I must be bold and address the reader outright.

I don't have any of those "walls" that fiction writer's have - I talk directly TO the reader. So all those normal writing rules that are so easy to find online must broken. That's why half the articles I've read are almost no help whatsoever, because they are tips about plot lines and character development and I don't need that for what I'm working on.

I get to have an entirely different set of rules to follow. It's both exciting and somewhat irritating at the same time, because that means I must chart my own path as I seek out what God places in my heart to say.

As I sat there contemplating, that's when I realized a very interesting simile...

I feel as if I'm trying to learn how to ride a bicycle as I watch my friends flying high in their airplanes. There are no similarities except that there are wheels on both!

{All photos via Pinterest}

High-Flyer {The Fiction Writer}

• Creates a world of their own
• Imagination & Daring
• There are no roads - they go as they please.
• Builds dreams for others to hold on to.

{All photos via Pinterest}
Cycler {The Non-fiction Writer}

• Follows a path, finds new roads
• Grounded
• It's all about the life lessons
• Encourages those who cross their path

I realized I'd been trying to copy others. I'd been trying to be like girls I admire instead of being myself. I wanted to be like them and learn from them because they have had more experience than I in writing.

Yet, I cannot learn how to ride a bicycle by standing by and observing how others fly an airplane. I will get nowhere that way. I will still be standing there, with bike in hand, not having any idea what to do with it or how to use it. I must I must blaze my own trails and as I do God will lead me alongside other cyclists I can learn from occasionally. But I must never steer off the path God has placed ME on.

God has a specific purpose for my writing. No one else can write what He has put on my heart for me to accomplish. Like Moses, God's put a staff in my hands...I must obey, trust without fear, and see what He does with it. :)

I must admit though, watching all my high-flyer gals certainly puts a dream-like spirit in this girl that is fun to see.

Perhaps I will take my sister's advice once again; she suggested getting a kite for my bike...


Always in His Keeping,
~Rachel~