Tadaaa! Guest Blogger... And 50th post! I Just Realized!

Yeah! I saw on my dashboard thingy that I have 49 posts, and today is the 50th! I should really start paying more attention to these sorts of things.... So! Our guest blogger today (in a very long while) has the special... privilege! Yes, that's the word. The privilege to be the 50th poster! So, everyone, please give a warm welcome to... Zuzu! Or, just Zu. :)
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To all you NaNoers I know, hi! And thanks Cossy!
One day, we all tell ourselves, we will either make writing a big part of our lives as adults or we’ll wish the urge to stare at a computer screen for hours on end will go away. We are sleep deprived people who live in our minds. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. If you’re a writer, when you’re not thinking about anything else your mind is on auto-wander straight to your novel. You’re watching TV and your character is yelling at you for being cruel in their story or in Chatzy at midnight. We can’t help it. But in any case we’re lucky our parents are supportive—or at least willing—of the late nights, the questions, and everything else that entails…
If you really care about your writing, and about the adventures your characters go on, then you have been irreversibly sucked into the void. It might let us go when we have attend college, get jobs, all those things that line us up for the real world. But for now we are writers, and whatever else our individual lives make us. Writing isn’t quite like an addiction; not everyone likes it. We all have our friends who, like us, really like writing, those that are okay with it, and those who despise words on paper altogether. No, it’s not something that you can control for the time being. It is an enormous part of who we are as people.
That said, never take your work too seriously: If you like it, too bad if no one else does. You write what you like. Something glorious: Freedom! Poetic License! And another great thing about writing is that you can say things—directly or just hinting—that you feel like you just can’t IRL.
Truly, characters can be your best friends! However ridiculous this may seem, they actually make fun buddies outside of their novel. You go on a walk, talk to them, you run out to the mail, race them. It’s a good way to get to know them better. Not to mention that if you’re stuck, just write! Free-write! They’ll get you out of trouble eventually. And you create the world they live in, the adventures they go on. It’s something really awesome about writing; you can momentarily live in the world of your imagination. We have them for a reason! Of course, there is in fact a more respected, more active world out there, ‘tis true. But if we weren’t here, where would the world of books be?
Something I struggle with, and notice in a few people’s novels, is that as the story progresses, the different personalities become more and more similar. One of my favorite things about reading a good book is that all the characters contrast nicely and are so vivid. I always get so caught up in the plot that I forget about that. Something I like doing is studying people. I don’t mean being like a stalker, but if you walk past so many different people in a city or when you’re stuck with them on a train, it’s great to see how they act or look. And it’s AWESOME if you can find someone that looks like one of your charries. There are so many other people that you have never seen before and will probably never see again, and they all have their own lives. Real, believable characters are supposed to have their own lives, just like we do.
And finally, where do we get inspiration from? It’s a fine question. Some things just come, others we get from the feeling of a certain place or from the weather. Even if you never go anywhere with it, write down whatever comes to you. Even if you think it’s a lame idea, it is an idea, and it came from your imagination. Trust your writers’ mind; it’s different from everyone else’s.
Well, thanks for listening to me guys! See you around here, NaNo or Chatzy!
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That was fantabulous! Don't you all agree? Thank you so much Zu! And congrats on being the 50th poster! :) Have an excellent weekend everyone, and I have a special post lined up for Sunday. Thank you all!
-Cossy