Best of Devitt: What do we need to make it work?

[IU Contributing Author Jim Devitt is taking the week off to move some money to an offshore account or move to a different house or maybe move to the music. I’m a little foggy on the details. Anyway, here’s a selection from Jim’s greatest hits. Enjoy. – Hise]

Are you a serious writer? What does that mean, exactly?

I’m sure you are all familiar with the famous quote by Thomas Edison about invention being 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration.

If that were the case, a serious writer would not wait around to be inspired to produce their work. You would grab your lunch pail and show up at work every day to pound out 3,000 words or more.

There’s truth to that.

Anyone who writes on a deadline knows this feeling. You roll up your sleeves and get it done. You don’t wait to be inspired or you could be staring at the computer screen all day.

You follow a schedule and have goals. You write even when you have other things tugging at you. That is not inspiration but perspiration. Those of you who are trying to turn writing into a business, not just a hobby, should embrace the concept of hard work.

Writing every day. No matter what.

Ah, but how important is that 1% that Edison included in his quote? Perhaps without that 1% gift from our unidentified source, you might not be able to get up at four in the morning to produce another three chapters before “work.”

I know, serious writers don’t believe in that stuff—do they?

To me, inspiration is an insatiable need combined with an unexplainable optimism that keeps me going when it’s tough.

It helps us accomplish things that we never thought possible. Proof in point, the emotional rush I felt when I had the proof copy of The Card in my hands for the first time. How many of you have finished your first book and held it for the first time, wondering how you ever did it?

Inspiration, that’s how. That tiny 1%.

Inspiration is everywhere: music, books, nature, people, animals and more. This tiny 1% transforms us from readers to writers.

How many times have you been reading and practically throw the book aside and start scribbling down your next idea?

How many of you have music on when you write? I don’t always, but when I do, I know that I’m on a roll.

Who has ever witnessed a sunset or sunrise and felt an immediate desire to grab a paper and pen. Nature can grab that 1% while you’re hearing the pinging of sleet battering your window, seeing the blue, other-worldly glow inside an ice cave or feeling the infinite void of an ink black sky with pinholes of bright lights.

As writers, we look at the world differently. We don’t see someone’s junk when we sit down at a table in a bar when it hasn’t been cleaned. No, we see the lipstick-caked cocktail napkin and develop a story of why, at that moment, did she decide to remove any evidence of lipstick. The pretzels scattered across the table isn’t just a messy patron—I’m sure the bowl was knocked over while the couple rushed out without being seen. That would explain the half-finished beer.

That’s an example of the 1% inspiration that drives us. Most people would be looking for someone to clean the table, and we’ve already logged a scene in our brains for another chapter in our WIP.

Do you keep a notebook handy to capture these thoughts? Do you jot down notes in your iPhone to refer to later?

As a writer, we should be looking for inspiration everywhere. You should be so stoked about life and the ability to stir emotions in our readers that you see inspiration at every turn.

Just don’t forget the rest of Edison’s quote. Make time and plan for the other 99%—the hard work. Otherwise, you’re left with only inspiring yourself and cheating your readers out of the emotion and adventure they are seeking.