The Ten Stages of (Publication) Rejection

Rejection Stage 1:

I'm okay, everything is fine, I'll find rep somewhere else

Rejection Stage 2:

                                                        But why didn't they like it

Rejection Stage 3:

                                                           They don't understand it!

                                                   They're so unfair, I worked so hard!

Rejection Stage 4:

                   I'm trash. I'm shit, I'm a terrible writer, I'm not even human why should I try anymore

Rejection Stage 5:

I WILL CUT AND BURN YOU UNTIL YOU SHINE BRIGHT LIKE A DOITSU GOD DAMN IT

Rejection Stage 6:

                                                                               y this

Rejection Stage 7:

                                                                              Sleep

Rejection Stage 8:

                                      Did I write this poorly, or was it just not up to their tastes?


Rejection Stage 9:

             Cheetos and Ginger Ale and Comfort Writing ab something else to rinse the taste away

Rejection Stage 10:

                                                             Reluctant acceptance.  

                                                  Time to move on and try again.

The Improv Technique For Writing Your First Draft

First drafts are difficult. First drafts suck. First drafts are AMAZING. First drafts are torture. First drafts are super fun.

These things are all true simultaneously. Writing is really simple, but it's also one of the most complex things you can attempt. It's a career path fraught with paradoxes and cognitive dissonance, and we continue to do it because we are all sado-masochistic monsters who desire to inflict as much pain on others as we do on ourselves. Emotionally, because physically that would be illegal.

One of the hardest parts of first drafting is the conflict between needing to think really hard to keep things moving, and having your brain freeze up and refuse to cooperate because it's being overused.

But one of the most advantageous things you can sometimes do with your writing is shut down the critical thinking part of your brain and write, letting words just fall out on the page the way they want without really bothering to think them over, like flicking a switch that causes the thoughts to bypass your frontal lobe and just flow out of your fingers. That is in fact how I am writing this article right here right now, and also how I managed to ace both my college-level English classes in twelfth grade.

Critical thinking is for subsequent drafts, when you go back through to edit; the first draft is for creativity, and somehow, paradoxically (one of our favorite things), creativity sometimes means turning ourselves off.

So as an exercise in turning off our critical thinking, this is the introduction to my 7-step program for using Improv to turn off our inner critics, get those words on the page, and finish that damn first draft as fast as possible.

What is Improv?

If you're unfamiliar with the concept, Improv is short for Improvisational Theatre, a genre of entertainment in which people come together and perform a piece that is written in the moment; there are no scripts, no pre-planned plot points, just whatever each person is bringing to the table.

Sometimes Improv takes the form of a game, like Emotional Elevator (in which each character represents on emotion, and infects the others in the elevator with that emotion until they leave), or just an interaction or story. Sometimes prompts are chosen from a hat, or by submission, or are taken from the audience to help establish the setting, plot, and characters.

Often Improv is comedic; the spontaneity of Improv provides endless opportunities for laughs. Other times, it can be more serious, and Improv bits can last only a few seconds or as much as several hours.

The Setup


-Set your goal; it could be a certain wordcount, number of chapters, whatever
-Set your deadline; how many days/weeks/months are you giving yourself to get this done?
  -Find your writing space; somewhere quiet and private is usually best, but wherever you can turn off your brain is a great place to be


The Rules

1. Yes, And

The cardinal rule of Improv is always say yes; its codependent companion is, then add an "and." In the context of Improv this means that whatever your partner states or proposes immediately becomes the truth; no matter how outlandish, they are always telling the truth, never lying. Even if you don't like what they've proposed--perhaps that you're a greedy fishmonger bitch, or that the sky is made of angel wings and the sea of hellfire--you have to accept it, because if you don't, the audience will stop trusting both of you.

Because Improv is all imaginary, it only works if the audience trusts that you're telling the absolute truth, so you have to roll with everything your partner says, and they have to roll with everything you've said.

Then, once they've brought something to the table, you bring something in the return--the and. Because a story doesn't move forward if something new doesn't happen!

In the context of this game/challenge/whatever you want to call it, Yes, And is a singular activity--you are providing both the Yes and the And.

"What the hell does that mean?" you may be asking, "Isn't that just normal writing?"

Well, yes and no; because for this goal period, I'm challenging you to write whatever comes to mind. No matter how ridiculous, off-topic, or just plain stupid it may seem, if it pops into your head, you write it. Then, once it's written down, you add the next thing that comes to mind.

It's vital that you go with the first idea that pops to mind, because only then can we properly tap into your subconscious and get you thinking without thinking. In Improv the golden rule is that the first idea is the best idea, but we often throw it away because we're insecure, worried that it's too much or not enough. Eschew that now; write the first thing that comes, and if it turns out not to be the best thing? Fix it in post. That's why we edit.

(Side note: After this process is finished, I do assure you that much editing will be necessary. This pursuit is about getting words out on the page, not making them perfect.)

2. No Buts

Another primary rule in Improv is No Buts, (not to be confused with butts, which are often used in Improv). If you add a but, it's an automatic denial; you're saying that the previous idea isn't good enough.

In this pursuit, it's fine for your characters to say but, but if you find yourself thinking, "But that wouldn't work!"/"But that doesn't make sense!"/"But" ANYTHING, then you're denying your own ideas; your confidence is incomplete, and you're letting it get in the way of your creativity.

Smash that But to smithereens and save it for the editing process! You have more important things to do right now! Namely, Write Write Write!!!

3. Justify

Sometimes when you find yourself wanting to add a "But" it's because something doesn't seem to make sense. It happens! But instead of denying this weird thing that doesn't make sense, we need to justify it instead. Slash that but and stick in a because instead, and give the context, to yourself or your readers!

Ex: "The sky is pink! But that doesn't make sense!" Becomes "The sky is pink! Because there's a thinner atmosphere and lots of red suspended dust in the air, like on Mars!"

This helps makes sense of that which is confusing, moves you along a path that makes sense to you, and keeps that dreaded But as far out of the equation as possible.

4. Quickly Establish Setting, Relationship, Plot

In Improv it's important to establish the Who, What, Where, When, Why and How as soon as you can; this is intertwined with your justifications above to some degree, but here we're largely talking about your scenework and character interactions. Sometimes we spend a long time meandering around things in real life, spiraling closer and closer to the point the longer we spend time in a place or with another person, but this often doesn't make for great fiction (unless done very well, with the intention of adding tension) so try cutting straight to the point:

Where are you? When is it and What is everyone doing? Who's there? What do your characters want, and Why? How are they planning to get what they want?

Establish these things fast so that the audience understands what's going on and can imagine the scene easily, then get into the juicy bits, the exciting stuff they came to see. As Chuck Wendig is fond of saying, skip the boring bits. If you're not having fun writing it, they're not having fun reading it, I can almost guarantee.

5. Give Yourself Gifts

In Improv, Gifts are the little tidbits of seemingly throw-away information that you and your Improv partners sprinkle throughout a conversation--the mention of your wife being pregnant, you have a blue ribbon in the National Scrap-Parts Bike-Making League Championships, you're an active member of an underground BDSM club exclusively for short doms and tall subs.

Whatever it is, the more information you give earlier on, the better it'll be for you later on, because you'll have more to pull from, and you get a better and better feel for your character as these details come out. And then, when something happens, you can pull on those Gifts to improve the story later on--maybe your characters need to get somewhere fast, so you build a bike out of the garbage in your apartment, or you need to abscond the scene so you get a text from your wife telling you she's having the baby, or someone says they recognize you from somewhere and you can be like, "You were my best mate's tall sub last weekend!"

We do this all the time in our writing and never think about it--little details that we give our characters "just because" become a big deal later on, and can even explode into entire character or plot arcs, or be the secret key to defeating the Ultimate Badass at his own game.

So in this exercise, give yourself gifts--give yourself lots of Gifts, don't be afraid to dig down into the depths of who your character really is, get all UP in those guts, sprinkle the breadcrumbs and then follow them home! It may just get your characters out of tight corners later, and having already established things as truth, it will feel much less like a Deus Ex Machina.

6. No Mistakes Only Happy Accidents

My first Improv teacher at AMDA, Katie Muchlin, was very fond of saying that "There are no mistakes, only happy accidents."

You are bound to make mistakes, in writing as in Improv as in life; when that happens, don't dwell on them. Justify what you have to justify and move on--and maybe that happy accident will turn out to be the single best thing that's ever happened in your story, you don't know!

Follow the breadcrumbs, Hansel, and when the bird eats them out from under you, take a deep breath, count to ten, and fumble through the dark because damn it you need to get Gretel the fuck home already, it's midnight and it's dark and you're like eight, literally anything could eat you. There is no time for tomfuckery and self-pity when you're mired in the depths of Creepy Forest Number Nine, Han. Just push through and everything will turn out alright.

7. Find A Button

You find a button at the end of a scene, both in Improv and in normal acting, but also in writing; the button is difficult to define, but you know it when you see it. It's the point at which it makes perfect sense to end the scene; everything that needs to be resolved is resolved, and all the questions that need to be raised have been raised. This is often the "oh snap" moment, or the witty oneliner.

Once my class played a game in which members of the audience would enter as members of a family with a unified theme; this theme was "criminal," and one after another children and parents and the like were revealed who were all terrible. A comment ("Gift") was made that one of the children was supposed to be watching the person they were keeping prisoner in the basement. So when the conflict was rising to a din and things were starting to get out of hand, I ran across the stage and screamed, "I'M FREEEEEEEEEE!"

That was an immediate button; at that point the class was in tears, nothing more could be said, any conflict that was going to be raised or absolved had been raised or absolved, and no one would miss the scene for its ending--and neither would anyone resent it its length.

We've all been in situations where we read a story or watch a show and a scene just goes on and on and on when it doesn't have to. Even if it's just a few lines too long, you can tell that whoever was writing the piece didn't know how to press the button, one they sometimes give to themselves. Next time that happens, keep an eye or ear or finger out for a place that seems like a natural ending point, where the scene could end and it wouldn't negatively impact the rest of the story at all.

The difficulty in Improv is finding that moment yourself, because it's all happening so quickly and there's so much going on at once. But we have to try.

So as you write your scenes, if you ever find yourself getting bored or stuck, find a button; think of it as an escape hatch, the big red button that says DO NOT PRESS and yet resolves all your problems; then pound that thing into the ground and keep moving. You have to keep that momentum under you or you'll stop to second-guess yourself.

8. Keep The Story Moving Forward

Speaking of keeping moving, did I mention you should keep moving?

Don't look back. Don't stop to tie your shoes or smell the flowers or roll in the grass; go, motherfucker, go go go, we're opening our parachutes in t-minus ten, and one's got your name on it!

Don't let this baby stall out, friend, you can do it, I believe in you! Just focus on the "And;" what is the next logical happening after the last happening? Or the next illogical happening, whichever comes to mind first. Do you know where this is all headed, where you plan to end up? If yes, aim that fucker and blast it. If not, then just run, dude, and you will find that path through the forest, even if you have to cook ten witches to do it.


9. Don’t Ask Questions


Another rule in Improv; don't ask questions. Why? Because questions are not information. Questions are, in fact, an admission of ignorance; you don't know this thing, the audience says? Why don't you know this thing? Aren't you supposed to be real?

And then they remember that they're paying to watch people pretend on an empty stage and their minds explode. Don't make your audience's mind explode; make statements, not questions.

Of course, you want your audience to ask questions, to keep them interested, but for this pursuit try focusing on making them ask "what's going to happen next" instead of "What's happening now?"

Don't ask questions of your audience; you are in control, you know everything for all intents and purposes (until we get to the editing stage at least), and that's what they need to believe. Try to steer away from characters asking questions when you can, too, because again, it provides no new information; it is an admission of, and often even a repetition of an admission of, ignorance. Sometimes that's necessary, sometimes it's not.

Don't worry, you'll get a feel for it eventually.

Really what this means in regards to your writing is BE CONFIDENT. You know your world, you know what's going on, don't waffle. This is your time to shine, and the more confident you are, the more your audience will believe in you.

10. End The Story In A Different Place Than It Began

     This seems obvious, and it kind of is; what's less obvious is that every scene is a story in and of itself.  This is a throwback to number seven, really; you want to end the story as a whole, but also every individual scene in a different place than the one in which it began.  Your characters are different people, or have a different relationship, or have changed their goals.

     This can help you find the button on every scene (and your story as a whole if you're kind of in the dark about where it needs to end).  Whenever you're unsure about where a scene should end, ask yourself if things are different now; do people know things they didn't know before?  Important things, not just baseball stats or the names of the cloud formations (unless those things are important to your plot of course)?  Have their plans changed?  Are they in a different place mentally, emotionally, physically?

     Make sure things are changing; if everything stays the same, the story is going nowhere.  Pretend you're a Robinson and Keep Moving Forward!

Conclusion

     And that's about it, really!  Hopefully, using these techniques, you'll be able to turn off that brain and bang out a great first draft.  Just remember:  Any first draft is a great first draft, no matter how patchwork or illegible; it is a first step, a very long, very hard first step, and you made it.

     Learning to run will be so much easier now that you've learned to walk.

How To Write Tourette's, Part Two: Character Basics

     Characters with Tourette's Syndrome are uncommon, but as our understanding of the disorder increases and awareness spreads, we're finding that it's more commonplace in real life than previously thought.  As I mentioned in this post, there the numbers were once as low as one in every thousand children, some think that the statistics might actually be one in every hundred.  As the prevalence rises irl, why shouldn't it rise in the media?

     So let's talk shop.

     How do you design a character with Tourette's?  Start with a character without Tourette's.  The disorder has a typical onset of age 7-12, but the full range extends further, and there is no "typical" case of Tourette's.  Regardless of the age, your character existed before the Tourette's, even if only in an infantile stage.  They had likes, dislikes, interests, hobbies, skills, a personality--before the Tourette's, your character was a whole person.

     Take a minute to think about how old your character was when their tics started, and what they were like before the onset.  Make a list of the things they enjoyed, the things they hated, and what they felt--their relationships, their background, their passions and opinions and lifestyle.

     Miribeth Cumberbatch, a girl in my current WIP, is an athletic teenager with a passion for body-building.  She loves to read and does fairly well in school.  She's always had trouble making meaningful connections with kids her age and tends to spend a lot of time with her mothers.  Until moving to Niloh, Miribeth never really questioned the state of the world--like many teens, she took things as they were and dealt with what problems she needed to on a day-to-day basis.  She has very few strong opinions and always tries to find the path of least resistance and lessened conflict when she can; her muscles are just for show.  Her family is poor, so she likes to do for others (in a non-monetary fashion) and she feels particularly protective of her mothers, feeling that they work hard enough to provide her with what they can.  Thus, when she senses that something would inhibit plans they're excited about or limit the options available to them, Miribeth tends to omit, stretch the truth, or outright lie.
     And she also has Tourette's.

     Reading that passage isn't terribly important, so don't feel bad if you tl;dr-ed it; the important part lies in the fact that there's a lot of shit up there, and her disorder takes up the line at the end.  Am I saying it's not a part of who she is?  FUCK no!  It colors every part of who she is, but people have a tendency to start with a disorder (or a phobia/sexuality/etc. etc.) and do the rest later, which often ends in disaster.  Maybe you already have a firm handle on CREATING the characters and you just need help doing the actual nitty-gritty shit, in which case just skip down a bit, no one told you you had to read the whole article.  But please don't just ASSUME you're one of those people, either.  If you have trouble writing/have never written a character with something "different" about them before, at least try it this way once.

     "Okay Maggie, I have my character.  Now what?"  Now you start to "filter in" the disorder.  How old was your character when they began experiencing tics?  What about when they were diagnosed?  The younger your character is when they start experiencing tics, the more used to them they're likely to become--but the less accepting their classmates are likely to be.  Depending on the child and the parents, it can also be much harder for the parents to understand that what's happening to their child isn't voluntary; young children aren't as capable of explaining to their parents that they're not in control of what their body is doing, and since many young children will lie about anything they think they can get away with, it can be hard for parents to believe it even if the child manages to express the sentiment coherently.

     When children begin onset at older ages, however, it can be seen as a purposeful attempt at being contrary, particularly if the children have contrary personalities.  Some parents don't believe in Tourette's, or will never be able to admit that something is happening to their child, but I'll touch on parental impacts later.

     The larger the gap between onset and diagnosis, the more emotional damage the child is likely to suffer at the hands of the disorder and those around them.  Without a diagnosis the child might be scared (or even terrified!), uncertain, and try to repress their tics, which rarely works and is extremely painful to do.  The child may be afraid that other people might notice, and when people do notice they're not likely to immediately react with understanding--most people don't know anything about Tourette's.

     In the time between my onset and diagnosis, I remember being terrified every time I went to play practice, afraid that someone would notice the way my neck twitched and that I'd be thrown out of the play and never allowed to act again.  I was afraid that the people I considered stage friends would think I was a freak and never talk to me again, or worse, ridicule me for something I had no control over.  I still remember crying in the bathroom of the church basement one day during a water break because we were trying to dance and I couldn't keep my head still, and I was one hundred percent convinced that I'd be found out.

     If your story involves your character at a young age, these may be experiences you'll want to touch on, but you'll want to consider them even if the character is older.  The things that other children (and parents!) do and say when you're in such a fragile state can be more adhesive than hot glue, and they can affect the future behaviors and decisions of your characters.  For instance, Miribeth's onset was at the age of seven, and her diagnosis at the age of nine.  Her tics were mostly mild, but her teachers were convinced that she was a defiant little shit, so her classmates teased her and made fun of the noises and the faces she made.  This is part of the reason that Miribeth has trouble forming deep bonds with kids her age--she can't forget that some of her classmates would call her the Grinch or ask her where her owner was when she barked, and teachers make her nervous because she had too many of them say the wrong things and ask the wrong questions.

     After diagnosis, things are different depending on the school, the parents, the teachers, the student--just as in all things, the variables make a difference.  I've also found that emotions concerning Tourette's are often in flux; the child may come to terms with their affliction following diagnosis, but they'll have days when all they can do is cry, days when they want to hit people and scream at the world, days when all they want is to be left alone or else held close--it can be an isolating experience, and it can make a child feel like a monster, or like they're broken.  Children can learn to accept their disorder and to love themselves, Tourette's and all, but it is an uphill climb, and even once it evens out, the occasion rainstorm can send you sliding right back down to your last campground, especially if the terrain (ie, the variables mentioned earlier) is unforgiving.

     In the next post on the subject I'll either dive deeper into Tourette's personal impact, or talk about parent, teacher, and comrade feelings and reactions.  I'm probably forgetting things and therefore may need to revisit this later, but the best way to figure out the personal impact of Tourette's in any given situation is to consider your character's personality and/or ask someone who has it--my inbox (or the comments section!) is always open if you have any questions, and if you have friends with Tourette's they may be quite pleased to share their experiences.  If anyone has anything they'd like to add, let me know!  The comments section is always open!

How To Write Tourette's Part One: Neurology

Neurology:

     Tourette's is a neurological disorder in which one experiences both motor and verbal tics.  There are a myriad of tic disorders, but the defining aspect of Tourette's is the presence of at least one motor and one vocal tic each.  These are caused, it's believed, by malfunctions in the dopamine system, dopamine being a neurotransmitter.  What happens, essentially, is that excess dopamine rushes through the system at uneven intervals, causing parts of the body to move on their own, and on occasion a scarcity of dopamine can cause body parts to become stiff and immobile.  This dis-regulation is the heart of the disorder.

     Cases vary greatly in severity.  Tics can be as small as a grimace and a cough, or as wild as full-body thrashing and ear-splitting screams.  Sometimes tics can be immobilizing, or they can look like seizures or seem purposeful, though they are most certainly not.  I'll provide a thorough list of tics at a later date for your perusal (though to call any list of tics "complete" would be utter hokum), but for now keep these generalities in mind.

     Interestingly enough, the nervous system is not all that's affected by Tourette's Syndrome.  In the brain, we have four motor cortices, and in a typical human being, only two are active at a time.  However, in an individual with Tourette's all four cortices are active at once, which can make it more difficult to multi-task, but can also cause the individual to feel a need to multitask; in my case, I need to always have something to do with my hands.  If I don't have anything to do with my hands, I end up ticking more frequently, and I'll wind up chewing my nails and fingers.

     The four cortices being active at once mean that the individual is trying to both watch and do, listen and speak.  Overactive mirror neurons in the supplementary motor cortex are believed to be partially to blame for some tics, echolalic and echopraxic tics in particular, and are likely the reason that it can be so easy to set someone off.

Research and Statistics:

     Now you may have noticed that I've been speaking in uncertainties.  The reason for this is simple:  there aren't many certainties.  Tourette's being a relatively rare disorder, which isn't deadly or, in and of itself, harmful, it's pretty low on the radar of the public.  There isn't much research being done, and what is being done isn't getting big-money funding or huge pushes from a large and concerned populous.  "Tourette's" isn't in the common vocabulary as anything other than a joke; most people don't believe it's real, even if they've heard of it at all, and most kids who have it don't realize that they do.

     The statistics are about one in every three-to-eight hundred children, but as our understanding of the disorder becomes more prevalent and parents become a little more understanding of the honesty of their children, we find that the disorder may be more common still--perhaps as many as one in every hundred children afflicted, the ration male: female being 3:1.  Most children have only small tics--coughs, trills, finger-snapping, grimaces, blinks, etc.--which can be seen as nothing more than annoying habits by adults and lead to the absence of diagnosis.

     Children typically begin to show signs of tics between the ages of seven and twelve, but I've heard of children showing their first signs as young as two and as old as thirteen.  A childhood disorder, the onset cannot begin in adulthood, as that would be an entirely different type of tic disorder.  It's commonly said that tics start to decline around the age of eighteen and may disappear altogether in adulthood, likely due to the adult's ability to control their own environment, craft their own schedule, and better regulate their moods.  However, Tourette's does not stop when you get older; even if symptoms decrease, in times of stress tics are likely to return, no matter how infrequent, and the more research I do, the less true the myth of "never after eighteen" seems to be.

Diagnosis:

     Diagnosis is a very simple process.  Once my tics became more violent and noticeable, we went to our family doctor.  He knew nothing about Tourette's, but tested my blood, found nothing, gave us a tentative diagnosis and sent us to a neurologist.  Our neurologist interviewed me, performed a series of tests to check for a brain tumor, and handed me a slip to give to the school nurse.  It's a simple process because, like I said, there hasn't been too much research done.

Medications and Co-Morbid Disorders:

     Now when the family doctor first saw me, he prescribed fifty mg Clonidine twice a day, which did nothing and may have worsened the symptoms.  When I saw the neurologist, he upped the dosage and told me that if after a certain amount of time it continued to be ineffective, I should wean myself off the meds.   That's what I wound up doing, and come to find out, Clonidine is a drug used to treat ADHD and high blood pressure, which doesn't actually surprise me.  Due to history of heart problems and a desire to keep my mental functions intact, we chose not to medicate further and simply deal with the severe case I was dealt.

     The truth is, there are no medications for Tourette's Syndrome, due again to rarity and poor amounts of research.  There are seizure medications, which can either help to plug up parts of the brain that might cause tics, or can do absolutely nothing for the syndrome.  The drugs can be very harmful to the heart and can cause your mind to become foggy and dull; to some people, it's worth it, but personally I couldn't stand feeling like I was running at only sixty percent just to keep myself from spasming.  Tourette's can have my body, but it sure as fuck can't have my mind.

     Since you can't treat the Tourette's itself (not effectively, at least), what most people do is treat the co-morbid disorders.  Very rarely does Tourette's occur all on its lonesome--probably due to the neurological nature of the disorder, most people have something co-morbid, usually OCD or ADHD, but it can also be anxiety disorders, poor impulse control, neurological disorders, mood disorders, behavioral disorders, developmental disorders, etc..  Recently, DD officials have been opening their eyes to the possibility of certain "behaviors" in their populations being not "behaviors" at all, but tics.  Often we find that if you treat the co-morbid disorder, the tics decrease, largely because stress is a huge source and instigator of tics.  The less stress a child feels, the less apt they are to tic, and the more likely their tics are to be harmless.

Pet Peeve:  People who call it Tourette or Tourettes Syndrome.  It's called Tourette's Syndrome because it's named for  Georges Albert Édouard Brutus Gilles de la Tourette, a French physician and neurologist who documented nine cases in his lifetime.

     Part Two will be about the more personal aspects of Tourette's Syndrome, so be on the lookout!  If anyone out there has anything to add about the neurology of Tourette's, feel free to comment!