Something Old, New and Borrowed for 2014

by Malena Lott

It's ordinary time. I used to loathe the "in between" — of holidays, life events. I always wanted something to look forward to 

Every woman needs her own power drill. 

- something BIG and bold and photo-worthy.

Now I relish the ordinary day and finding extraordinary moments within each one and I've tried to stop judging a day, a week, a year as "good" or "bad." Now to jumpstart this year, I give you something old, something new and something borrowed to make our writing year a big success.

Something Old:
I get the rights back on Dating da Vinci this summer sometime. I'm thrilled I'll get to give it a new cover, new pricing and control the marketing. And the cool thing about the Internet is even "old" things are new to someone. And my novel Fixer Upper was the first one I self-published in 2010 and it's my top seller now. Pause for a moment and be proud of your past achievements. 

Something New:
I do like to set my intentions for the year so it helps me to come up with a theme to keep me on track. I settled on Get Real, where I've (probably stupidly) committed myself to a weekly blog post and video about a new topic I (and we) can get real about. I started with time because I'm so tired of how much it slips away and am certain I'm the one to blame for any of it being "lost" or wasted. I want to take bolder action with my intentions this year and that means paying attention to what I do and where my mind goes.

I'm currently writing my second Messengers YA book, Genesis, and I know once I commit to daily work on it, I'll love the story again.) I'd like to finish a mystery I started but don't want to commit to that just yet. It might be 2015 and that's okay with me. I also get to edit and publish other writers' work and that's a fun challenge. The story and strategy are my favorite parts.

I think it's important for writers to be broad with their interests, too. We can feel like we live in a cave in a world of all imaginary people. That's why I started a new media site, Sooner Spaces, focusing on stories about stylish spaces and the people behind them in Oklahoma and it's been a blast. I'm getting out of the house, meeting people and getting to be creative in a new way.

Take a deep breath of gratitude that we get the opportunity for creating something new. 

Something Borrowed:
Well, it's not exactly borrowed, but I have set an intention to not buy anything new the rest of this year for me personally. After a closet cleanse, I realized I have loads of extra clothes and if I do need something, I'll try to shop thrift first or actually borrow a friend's. We'll see! I'm also borrowing lots of great advice from people I admire to include in my Get Real series.

Treasuring the things we have help us to feel we have and are"enough."

I'd love to hear your old/new/borrow for 2014 and I hope you'll get real with me this year. No time like the present.

Malena Lott is a storyteller and strategist from Oklahoma. She's written five novels and two novellas under her name, one young adult book under pen name Lena Brown and an advice book, Dance Mom Survival Guide, with co-author Jill Martin. 

Setting intentions

by Carleen Brice, author of the novels Orange Mint and Honey and Children of the Waters 

A good friend of mine says she sets New Year's intentions instead of making New Year's resolutions. She says resolutions seem too goal-oriented. According to this great online article on "The Power of Intention" intentions are a way “'to have in mind a purpose or plan, to direct the mind, to aim'....
By setting an intention, you make it clear to yourself and others, just what you plan to do. Set an intention to redefine what it means to be serious about your dreams."

*I like this idea. With the new year coming up and being in hardcore revision mode I'm thinking again of my writing intentions.

On a blog about writing, it’s easy to focus on the craft of writing: Characters, plot, setting, storytelling. It’s sometimes easy to focus on the business of writing: Do I need an agent? Should I self-publish or not? How do I build my platform? These things are important, and I know I speak for all of us Girlfriends here when I say that we hope we can help you improve your books and your writing careers.


Today, however, I'm hoping to get you to think about what writing means to you, what purpose you want your work to serve for you and for your readers. Being an author offers an amazing opportunity to express ourselves. We have a deep responsibility to get it right, to honor this opportunity, to not waste it or treat it frivolously.

As far as my intentions go, I've been thinking about what deeper things I want from writing and what I hope to give through it. As I finish up this revision on my third novel here are the intentions I'm (again) setting:

I want my writing to be entertaining and interesting. I hope that readers might laugh and cry when they read my books. But I want my writing to mean something more than that too. I want my writing to touch people, to make them feel known and understood, if only for the short time they spend with my characters. I want to make them think, to maybe see things a little differently or at least understand how others might see things a little differently. And maybe I, too, can learn something from all this, can see things a little differently, understand something a little more.

Those are my intentions. What are yours? (Try Flying Wish Paper for a fun way to set your intentions.)

Happy Holidays and happy writing!

*This blog post was inspired by a former post I did on my personal blog.