I think one of the biggest obstacles to writing is figuring out if you are on the right track with something. I think it's right up there and probably bound tightly with self doubt. One of the best cures for self doubt is to see one of your ideas become reality. The genre that sees this most is science fiction, because sci-fi predicts scientific advancements in the name of a good story, and sometimes they know what they're talking about. Or sometimes, they just get lucky. Comics have had this happen a few times too, but they're certainly a close cousin of science fiction.

Manned space flight? Check. Exploring the universe? Working on it. Men on Mars? In the planning stages. Talking to someone over a two-way wrist radio? Even better: digital watches with Skype. I'm sure there's plenty of stuff that I don't recall at the moment.

This kind of affirmation is almost as sweet as a first kiss. It makes you feel "tuned in" to the world somehow. It's like the universe telling you, "Yes, I like that idea." Kind of like your story getting optioned for a movie, only your idea gets optioned for life. Kinda cool.

I had one of these moments, and mine falls more into the "got lucky" category. I first posted The Supermodel Vs. Superblonde Razing The Rhinodome High Steaks Super Steakout Party With Mike Rofon & Ted Atete on June 15, 2015, in Character Creation Contest #38. From there, it of course went to the CCC 38 Voting Thread, and from there, I posted it solo on the forum. In that story, I had two superwomen meeting in a football stadium for a grudge match. In an effort to plausibly reduce collateral damage and injuries, I banned spectators from the stadium, and it was televised with the help of flying drone cameras that were licensed to the football league.

First: I just thought it was a cool idea. Second: I also thought it was impossible, because I immediately thought of all of those drone-carrying-gun videos on Youtube. A drone-bomb as terrorist weapon seems like a distinctly likely possibility, and the security nightmare of having to distinguish terrorist drones from camera drones seemed like a logistical nightmare. So I said, "Yeah, cool idea, but it'd never happen. That'd just be crazy."

I posted the story solo to the forum on September 23rd, 2015. As it turns out, this news story was released September 22nd, 2015: NFL First Major U.S. League to Win FAA Permission to Use Drones. What?! Too crazy!

Third thing about having the idea in my story: I didn't know that licenses were actually required to have a drone. If you check out the news story, it says that the FAA has to license any unmanned drone for use. I still shake my head just thinking about this.

Funnily enough, this ties into my A-Number-One rule for writing: never throw away an idea. No matter how silly, dumb or unusable an idea is, it might be the star of your show down the road, after some other details come to you. Keep notes somewhere, and every so often, go over them and see what your subconscious has done with it, because until your mind unlocks the potential in that idea, it's secretly still working on it, whether you realize it or not.

Or...maybe you just want to be able to look at that note, and say, "But...but that really happened now! Cool!"

And believe me, when it happens, it's very cool.

Your affirmation doesn't have to be in life imitating your art though. It just has to resonate with someone. Maybe it just needs to resonate with you. If you put it out there and you're not happy with it, you know what the problems are and what needs to be fixed. But when it's right, and you know it's right, you get that feeling- you know in your bones that you've hit some kind of story truth. It's a good feeling.

Always look for that. That's when you know you're on the right track.

Be the pencil. Just write. -cb

Be the Pencil, and all content, except for quoted material, is owned by Chris Bishop. Copyright Chris Bishop 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022.