Today, January 13th is Make Your Dream Come True day! I didn’t discover this fact until very recently, but dreams, goals and maintaining the wherewithal to make them come true deserves some serious blog time. It also requires some serious, individual world building time.
As a paranormal romance author, I’m living my dream of being a professional, published author. Every day I get to play in fictional worlds that I dream will resonate with readers looking for an action-packed, entertaining story.
But I didn’t get here by chance. The stories don’t magically tell themselves,to paraphrase Donald Maass of The Fire in Fiction. It’s been years of sitting down at the keyboard, researching the marketing trends, and honing my craft.
No matter what your personal dream is, to make your dream come true you must have an idea of what your world will look like when you get there.
Visualization is a key to the world building process for both my fiction and my reality. I like to close my eyes and imagine what the Chicago streets look like in 2096. What secrets (good and bad) will urban decay hide and who will profit from urban renewal are just a couple of questions that come to mind as I study current maps of the area. What will science accomplish? What technology will be an epic fail?
Similarly, it’s fun to visualize what my real world will look like when I reach my goals and realize my dreams. Again, I close my eyes and picture myself where I want to be, personally and professionally. I build that world to keep my dreams safe and keep myself on target to reach them. World building with visualization has worked for me for both big and small dreams, short and long term goals.
That time I spend world building for my personal dreams helps me deal with the inevitable rejections and market changes in publishing. It also helps me deal with the speed bumps that show up in manuscripts and real life with equal regularity.
So today, on Make Your Dream Come True day, treat yourself to a little visualizing and world building!
Live the adventure!
If you’re in the area, Total Health Fair Charleston is going on this weekend. The greys and I will be with our local greyhound rescue and adoption group on Saturday January 15 from 12-2, signing copies of the Adopt A Greyhound Guide as well as my paranormal romance novels. This is a free event for the community so I hope to see you there!
