Is it a blog about people sharing their secrets in an open forum? Or is this a shock site intended merely to cause a reaction (and sometimes, as with a visitor’s email response to the last pic, not a positive one) ? You be the judge.

Here’s one I like for the July 17th post–

And another–

For me, this is art. Or at least what I’d like to think art should be: people opening and unburdening and others watching (check out the visitor counter at the bottom of the page) and being challenged to be equally brave or creative about something they’ve repressed too long within their emotional shells.

My mother and her friends wouldn’t approve. In fact, she’d go out of her way not to get it, or to put any effort into trying to understand the symbolism and energy beneath the project. And maybe that’s a part of why I love places like this and kept circling back to them in my formative years and ultimately became an artist myself. This project and others like it hint at emotional independence and rebellion. I suggests there’s more beneath the vanilla surface of our lives and calls for us to dig deeper.It says it’s all right to be what we hide inside–that everyone’s equally careful with their true hearts and we’re all in the same place of being “messed up” once we stop pretending everything’s “okay” and that’s the way we like it.

Anyway. Mosey over to Post Secret this morning and discover something new about strangers and maybe even about yourself. There’ll be more out here to read later today, but I wouldn’t want to leave you hanging with nothing odd to think about for a third Monday in a row ;o)

Only six more months in my self-declared year of revision? The first half of ‘10 pretty much finished off whatever energy reserves I carried over from ‘09. I’m rebounding nicely, though, and have enjoyed an infusion of creativity the last week or so while I sort and sift and pick and choose what my focus will be moving forward. That’s the key to revising your year (and your life) the way I’m attempting–finally zeroing your expectations out, finally meeting every commitment you’ve made, then sitting back and making intentional decisions about where your energies are best spent going forward.

As a writer, you’ll come upon crucial moments like this every 3-5 years or so.Moments that will either open doors in your career because you dare yourself to see the world with new, more informed and more experienced eyes, or keep you chained to the past that brought you where you are but can take you no further without significant change.

As a human being, sometimes life hits you with this kind of personal turning point when you least expect it, as it has me over the last year. Stalling out in shock is to be expected. Throwing your hands in the air and just getting by for a while works, especially when you have promises to keep and a family to care for in the midst of your private turmoil. But eventually you have to decide if the next phase of your life is going to be about being a victim or being a successful survivor.

That victim/success paradigm applies to a writers’ career, too. With so much change in our industry, in our world, it would be easy to say “Who the hell knows,” throw your hands in the air, and decide there’s no way to get ahead. What’s the point. We’re all a victim of our economy and changing industry after all. But we all have the chance to thrive under adversity, and that’s a writer’s challenge every time she faces a setback.

The next six months will continue my experiment in intentionally thriving and remapping not just my personal outlook on life, but also the momentum of my publishing career. If you’ve been following me (mostly on Twitter and Facebook lately), you’ve witnessed me already weeding out activities that were proving toxic to either my ability to create or to live a creative life. I’ve scaled back, so I could better see the bigger picture around me. And I’ve made some changes. Simpler contests and online content that still reaches readers and other writers, without overwhelming my limited resources. More focus on work and family and the life that inspires me, away from the sometimes negative media and social media chatter that could consume my perspective if I let it. Cheering on others as they work hard and fight for their own success, making that cheering personal and individual whenever I can, rather than throwing my net wider and trying to force a “presence” amidst a sea of people grasping to be the latest “expert” everyone should admire.

Yes, I’ll still be promoting my books and will begin travelling and teaching again soon. That’s part of my job–a piece of it that I dearly love, when I’m feeling up to the challenge. But to keep myself inspired to work and dream and create new projects that I want to be promoting next year and beyond, I need to dig deeper into the well that I write from. I need to get back to basics and reconnect regularly with the pieces of life I haven’t made enough time to focus on for a few too many years.

So, be on the look out for regular posts about…

My Waterfall Project

My Shoe Project

Things my Teenager Says

Dream Theories

and a lot more, including a summer blog contest as well as sporadic “pop up” contests on random days when you least expect them. I’ll be running a contest in July, for example, to encourage readers to subscribe to the blog so they’ll get updates every time there’s a new post. Keep an eye out. You never know what will happen.

It’s hot outside. Time to cool off where the air conditioning’s running and make this year’s revision fun! Feels just like Christmas in July to me ;o)

I’m in the middle of working through both editorial revisions of my next beautiful book and waiting on doctors to treat symptoms stemming from my surgery in January. Both, as it turns out, are equally disturbing paradigms. And for the same reasons, I’m beginning to realize. Because this is, after all, my stuff, and now other people are messing with it. I mean, what if I don’t like what they say? What if they don’t give me a choice of what to do next? What if they think it’s worse than I thought???

You know what these reflexive questions are? Simple, basic anxiety. Giving up control, and the fear of what’s beyond my hold. Which means I should be VERY good at this, since I’ve been a professional writer of some sort for a decade now. But, nope. DON’T TOUCH MY STUFF!!! still rears its ugly head far to frequently.

As I said in my last post, my editor’s a goddess, so I’m in excellent hands. But I still panic when I first look at line edit and revision notes. I’m still that child I was long ago, afraid of not being accepted or good enough or needed or whatever scares kids when they first dip their toes into the world beyond the playpen. It’s the same with doctors for me. Can I trust him? Will she take care of this problem until it’s resolved, or is this going to be another odyssey with no end in sight?

The thing is–the control over our emotions and self-esteem and our health and a lot of our day-to-day reality is very much beyond our hold on many levels, most of the time. And in moments like these, that truth becomes painfully clear. And we tend to panic. You mean I can’t have it all now and my way and you HAVE to touch my stuff to help me??? Well, yeah. Them’s the breaks, buttercup.

So, today’s lesson in acceptance is seeing that the revision of my book and my health to better, shinier places has never been mine to direct. This point in both processes has been coming for a months now. I can fight it and make myself crazy, or I can accept and trust the professionals I’ve asked to help me, and do everything I can to collaborate and work with them. I can reach for where I want to be, and welcome them on the journey, or I can be afraid alone…

Let the people you trust touch your stuff, and your stuff’s gonna be all the better for it (read between whatever lines make you chuckle here, my friends ;o).

BTW–If you don’t trust the folks in the trenches with you, re-access your team (see yesterday’s post for my teamwork mantra) and make whatever changes you’re resisting. Otherwise, you’re starting in a place of fear, instead of embracing the best help possible with your writing, your family, your health, your life, your whatever…

Another BTW–Fear kills your creativity and vitality and ability to trust others. If you can’t surround yourself with people whose advice you trust, then you have to ask yourself why–what’s holding you back from getting where you need to be?

Final BTW–Yes, I’m challenging you to analyze your own creative process if you’re a writer and/or your own fears if you’re not (no one’s off the hook here). You didn’t think I was going to go through the rest of this year doing this on my own, did you???

Oh, yeah, Secret Legacy is lovely (says the world’s BEST editor says), but there are some amazing suggestions, too, for making it an even more exciting read for fans. So begins the BEST part of my job–reworking a completed draft. Shaping it. Spinning turning points. Honing characters. Upping tension and conflict and the impact of every scene. Adding new ones that create richness and depth I couldn’t see while fighting to make the first draft work.

It’s a lot like life, revising a manuscript. I like to think we live out each decade with a playbook that continuously evolves., kind of like an outline for a book. We draft out our currently life, learn and grow, then as the years turn we see more and understand more and kick things up a notch into the next ten years or so. We work on who we are, what we do, how we live, and whom we expend our energy and experiences with. Just as we learn to deal with the crisis or conflict at hand, there’s a new level of tension waiting around the next corner. There’s no time for a total rewrite (not that we’d go back and start over, anyway), but there’s always our next chance to make everything that “is” work better and everything that “will be” as exciting and successful as possible…

So, now I’m revising my year (and my manuscript). I’m breathing new life into both, thanks to my guides (like my editor and friends) and the stardust their help and advice and friendships offer my world.This book and this life of mine won’t rock on it’s own–I need others to get me to the next level. That’s the “collaborative” approach I teach writers to follow as they learn their craft and learn to revise. Publishing, like life, is a team sport. Go it alone, and let me know how much stardust comes your way. It’s also the “don’t try to go it alone” techniques I taught folks for years, when I was training crisis and grief intervention. It’s the principle I’m working hard to follow in my life as a whole since facing the surgery in January and the after-effects I’m still not finished dealing with. Thank God that’s not something I’ve had to face alone. Don’t know where I’d be if I’d tried.

To sum up, my editor rocks for standing with me and digging deeper into my beautiful SL for the good stuff still waiting to shine. My friends and family and fans rock for waiting out the mess of the first part of this year, so we can bask in the stardust I believe is coming, just around the next corner. And I’m still here, still writing and creating and dreaming up story, because they’ve been by my side every step of the way.

Scary times? Yes. Truth be told, all authors are terrified at some point that their next story won’t measure up, and all folks facing health issues are afraid of what might come next. And there will always be more fear to come, never doubt it. But never, NEVER, have I felt alone on this journey of my life. Which makes me a truly lucky woman.

My hope is you’re building your own support systems/teams in both your work and personal lives. Give as much energy to them as often as you can. One day you’ll be amazed, as I am now, at how much comes back to you when you need it most!

Revision is life. It’s not for the faint of heart. Don’t try this stuff on your own…

Loosely, that’s the truth our Secret Legacy heroine, Sarah Temple, must deal with. You first met her (just recovered from a 10-year coma and losing her sanity because she and her psychic gifts have been the target of secret government dream research) in Dark Legacy, and she’s still battling back from the darkness consuming her mind. Only this time, she’s fighting to reach a terrified child no one else believes is real–and her only weapons are her misfiring dreams and the family she’s lost the ability to trust. Oh, and the man whose honor to his duty comes before all else, even his love for her… Which makes for an amazing fictional-paranormal-fantasy-thriller journey, even if I do say so myself (the draft’s in to my editor, who will no doubt be letting me know her revisions any second now ;o)

Loosely, it’s also continues to be the story of my life this year,though my dreams don’t have the power to kill or program others’ minds, the way Sarah’s and the secret child/legacy in my new Dorchester novel do. This year, more than any other, I’m re-learning the power and reach of the human mind, the frailty of the body, the strength of the soul, and the healing powers of love and human friendships.

It’s been a quiet four months out here, as I recovered and created the draft for which Dorchester’s been amazing enough to extend my deadline. Now, it’s time to start revising, not just Secret Legacy, but the secrets and magic and truths hidden in my own dreams–and in the choices I make every day about how I want to live my life going forward. Yes, we’ll be talking about my writer’s journey, but even more I’ll be sharing the human experience so many of you have overwhelming responded to. After all, that’s where a writer’s voice comes from, right–from her view of the world and how it feeds the characters and stories she tells.

So, come back tomorrow (for my April contest winner announcements, including winners from my Fresh Fiction contests), and for the official lauch of my “A Year’s Revision” blog discussion. I’ll be talking dream theory, what I’ve learned from crafting two stories about the amazing power of the human mind, my life’s journey this year and how it’s changing where I’m going as I move forward, and as much of your lives as you’re willing share.

This is a time of great change for our country, for the world, and for our individual lives and families. Which is comforting, in a way, because we know we’re not alone when everything we see and believe is shifting along with our own personal lives. Whether you’re a writer, a reader, or a dreamer, sharing your revision journey this year will make you and everyone you touch with your words stronger…at least that will be my goal out here…

Let’s dream our way home…