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21.01: Welcome to the New Year! · Writing Excuses

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[SPEAKER_02]: This episode of Writing Excuses has been brought to you by our listeners, patrons and friends.
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[SPEAKER_02]: If you would like to learn how to support this podcast, visit www.patrion.com slash writing excuses.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Season 21, episode 1.
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[SPEAKER_02]: This is Writing Excuses.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to the new year.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Tools not rules.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Four writers by writers.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm Mary Robinette.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm Dengwan.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm Erin.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm Howard.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Welcome at everybody to 2026 and our season 21.
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[SPEAKER_02]: The podcast is officially old enough to drink, depending on where you live.
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[SPEAKER_02]: As a result, we decided to make some changes, small ones, like we have a new tagline, you'll have noticed, we're going to talk about why we made that change, and then we're going to tell you about the curriculum that we've got planned for you for this season.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And we'll talk about some intentions as well.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So, why did we change the tagline?
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[SPEAKER_01]: thing, you know, four writers, by writers, tools, not rules, which kind of sums up, who and why we are and have been since 2008, writers talking about writing and we're talking about the tools we use rather than trying to
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's a really nice way to think about what we're trying to do here, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I think so much of writing advice you see on the internet or in person or whatever it is can be very, very prescriptive.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It can be, this is the only way to do this.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This is the only way to write like you must do XYZ to be successful writer and
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think a lot of that comes from a very understandable place.
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[SPEAKER_00]: People want to have a simple way of doing things, people are used to doing things their way, and think that can apply very broadly.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But from our perspective, each of us has a different background.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Each of us has a different approach to our various practices.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I see a lot of different techniques across a lot of different writers.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And so I think trying to avoid this space
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[SPEAKER_00]: but still can give useful actionable advice.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think tools not rules is really where we landed as a podcast, you know, we've had a lot of conversation among the group of us of who are we, what is our identity as a podcast, what are our goals, what are we trying to accomplish with all this?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And I think just making sure people do have the tools to succeed is so much of our mission.
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[SPEAKER_01]: the aha moment for me was when I tried to come up with certainly there's some hard and fast rule, you know, writer has to write.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You got to sit down in front of the keyboard and then I realized, no wait, I know at least
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[SPEAKER_01]: one New York Times best-selling author who dictates their novels into a machine.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I know people who write long-hand.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And so, nope, that's not a rule.
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[SPEAKER_01]: That's just the way I happen to do it.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And if at that most basic level, how I make the words appear
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[SPEAKER_01]: on whatever I'm calling a page at the time if that can't be held in common across all writers then there are no rules at all.
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[SPEAKER_01]: There's just personal practice.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I also just want to talk a little bit about the four writers by writers and I think part of it is about
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[SPEAKER_03]: I think it can be really easy for people to say, oh, I'm not a writer yet.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I am not a writer.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I didn't write yesterday.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I'm not a writer.
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[SPEAKER_03]: My writing hasn't been published.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I'm not a writer a thousand, thousand different reasons.
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[SPEAKER_03]: But I think like looking at all of us, like listening to all of us, we all come to writing from different places.
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[SPEAKER_03]: We all write in different ways in different formats.
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[SPEAKER_03]: And if we can all call ourselves writers, then I wanna offer that as a way,
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[SPEAKER_03]: to say, call yourself a writer as well.
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[SPEAKER_03]: By listening to this podcast, you are now a writer.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I have said it.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I am the arbiter of all things, Haza.
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[SPEAKER_03]: And so I think that every time you hear the tagline, I want you to think of it as I am a writer and I am part of this.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, all you need to do to be a writer is have the intention to write and hopefully put some words on a page.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think being a published author is a really different thing and being a writer is a prerequisite, but it's not required and I think publishing your work and, you know, finding that career path.
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[SPEAKER_00]: is a separate step from being able to call yourself a writer and I want all of you to really feel empowered to create the stories you want to create to put words on the page in the way that you want to and to celebrate that as real, beautiful, difficult, creative work.
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[SPEAKER_02]: This is something that we say all the time when we're doing the writing excuses, cruises or workshops that we are all writers.
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[SPEAKER_02]: It's just that we are at different points in the path, but we're just peers.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And so this podcast is a group of your peers, talking to you about the things that we have learned.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And hopefully, giving you some of the benefit of our advanced hindsight.
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[SPEAKER_01]: One of the most motivating things that a writer ever told me can land, who passed away, got 15 years ago and he said, lots of people will tell you, you can't write, don't let them be able to say that you don't write.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I just love that.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, if I write, I am a writer.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Exactly.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I love that.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And so what we're going to be talking about today and for the rest of the season are hopefully a bunch of tools, not rules, that will help you.
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[SPEAKER_02]: We're specifically we're talking about this season a couple of different streams.
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[SPEAKER_02]: So we're going to lay out for you what those streams are.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And in the second half of this podcast or of this particular episode, we're going to talk a
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[SPEAKER_02]: So we've got a couple of different streams.
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[SPEAKER_02]: We've been thinking about this as deconstructing structure.
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[SPEAKER_02]: So we started talking about that last season.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And this season is really looking at the plot aspects of structure.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and how what all of those mean and how they work.
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[SPEAKER_02]: We're gonna talk about that a little bit today.
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[SPEAKER_02]: We're also gonna be talking about barriers.
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[SPEAKER_02]: There's gonna be a whole stream of podcast episodes that are coming to you this season that are about barriers to writing, the things that get between you and writing.
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[SPEAKER_02]: They're not necessarily the story.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And then we're also gonna be doing some deep dives on specific structures.
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[SPEAKER_02]: We're gonna be doing deep dives on a couple of specific topics, you know, wild cards.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And we're going to be looking at all of those this season.
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[SPEAKER_02]: We wanted to kind of give you an overview of what to expect.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Does anyone want to explain what we mean by deconstructing structure?
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[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, the thing that we're really trying to do with this season is think very critically about structure.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think the structure is one of the most common things where people get super prescriptive of you have to do with this way, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: You have to say at the cat, you have to use a 3x structure, a 5x structure, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think it's the one that people most reflexively go to.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Well, stories work like this, all stories do x, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And I think
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[SPEAKER_00]: I at least, and I think many of us feel a reflexive sort of opposition to that of this idea of like, no, stories can be lots of different things and can exist in different ways and are very sensitive to cultural context, to genre, to style of storytelling, medium, even, all of those things.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And so,
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[SPEAKER_00]: when we were like, okay, let's do a season about structure.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Let's talk about structure.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It really sort of came down to how do we unpack this?
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[SPEAKER_00]: How do we make this feel like something we're comfortable and excited to talk about?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And that means deconstructing a little bit.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Not in like a postmodernist way, but let's break open the toolkit.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Let's show what is in the toolbox, what you can use, what you can reach for.
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[SPEAKER_02]: One of the things that I made me start thinking about this was there's a cookbook called salt fat acid heat, which is looking at kind of like, what are some of the core principles?
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[SPEAKER_02]: And then I was also thinking about it because with puppetry I talk about here are the principles if you have these four principles you can make any puppet look alive, any any inanimate object and the techniques, the specific mechanics that you use are going to change depending on
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[SPEAKER_02]: what kind of puppeteer you've picked up, but the core principle, the underlying pieces at the underlying structure, if you will, is the same, and I started thinking, does writing have that as?
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[SPEAKER_02]: And I had been noodling on it a little bit, but I remember this moment, I don't know if you remember this, Aaron, but we were all sitting around at one of the recording retreats with these note cards, and you said something about writing as a form of jazz.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And like that jazz has this structure that music has this structure, but that you can start to play with it.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And I thought that was such an interesting, interesting way to think about it.
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[SPEAKER_03]: And I think like it's funny, I sometimes like dislike classical plot structures because I think they can get really shoved down your throne.
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[SPEAKER_03]: And like anything that somebody tells you a thousand times,
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[SPEAKER_03]: I hate it.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I don't like it.
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[SPEAKER_03]: But just the way that really great jazz musicians understand classical music because part of understanding music in general and how it's used in different ways allows you to have the base that you can then use to accept or reject parts of the music that have already come into your life.
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[SPEAKER_03]: I think that deconstructing these structures, it's like, maybe I still hate the hero's journey, but maybe there's one thing in there that I find really helpful that I can put in my own toolbox and I don't have to take the rest of it.
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[SPEAKER_03]: But without breaking it down, there's no way to know what is that kernel of really cool wisdom that I can actually take from something that maybe I don't like the rest of the corn cob.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I mean, there's a couple of topics here we dive into, which are structures that I've historically been opposed to or not a big fan of and was really interesting to be forced to sort of sit down and go through and then be like, oh, okay, I get why this exists.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I get why we will use it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It may still not be for me, it may not be what I go to or what I'm interested in seeing more of, but it was.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It's useful still to understand why it exists even if what you then want to do is act in opposition or break from it because again, understanding the tools helps you choose what fits your project and your style and your particular voice.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And I think one of the things that we found as we were talking about this and digging into it was that there were common pieces that you would see something.
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[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, oh, dark night of the soul happens here, but in this other place, what you get is a contrast moment.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And then you start to realize, oh, dark night of the soul serves as a contrast moment.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I started thinking about it again, going back to food, at one point, chocolate chip cookies didn't exist.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And then someone was like, what happens if I put chocolate chip in?
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[SPEAKER_02]: And they became kind of ubiquitous.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And then someone else was like, but what happens if I put sea salt on that?
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[SPEAKER_02]: And the first time you encountered it, it was amazing.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And then someone thought, what happens if I put bacon on it?
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[SPEAKER_02]: And it was like, oh, okay, well, that's different.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And we're excited for a
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[SPEAKER_02]: And then you're like, okay, but actually that's just different.
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[SPEAKER_02]: It's not improving things.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And so I think the thing about looking at these structures and looking at the pieces of them is that you can think about doing a recipe or an ingredient swap in something that you're writing if it doesn't play well for you.
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[SPEAKER_02]: You can think about, let me try this weird out there avant-garde thing.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And maybe it's going to be something that's like, yay, novelty, and it'll be fun for a moment.
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[SPEAKER_02]: But maybe it'll be something that's like, oh, no, this really has bones.
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[SPEAKER_02]: This does a thing and understanding why it does it is exciting because then you can do things with intentionality.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I think that I've discovered, as we've done, a whole lot of interior home improvements,
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[SPEAKER_01]: is that there is a specificity of tools beyond just, for example, the Philips head screw driver.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I've got a Philips head screw driver that I just, you know, grab when I need these Philips head screw driver.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But in many cases, that screw driver fits into the screw head and wobbles just a little bit.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Which means I'm a little bit of a terrible design and it shouldn't be using them.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Which means I'm more likely to strip the screw if I use that screwdriver on that screw.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And so I'll open up the box of bits and find a screw head that exactly fits a bit that exactly fits the screw head.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Nice and snug.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And then I can plug it into the drill and I can go to town.
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[SPEAKER_02]: where it's what I don't more likely to do is be like, oh, it's so much trouble.
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[SPEAKER_02]: It's through a kitchen knife I can use.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But the point, the point here, though, is that with writing, there are a lot of tools that I know the name of and I kind of think I understand it.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But once we start picking these things apart, I realize, oh, wait.
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[SPEAKER_01]: If I try to use this tool as described here in this other circumstance,
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to strip all of the screws and make a mess.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I need a refined version of this.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I need a slightly different version of this in order to fit.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I didn't learn that until we began deconstructing things and really looking at what they were made of.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And to your point, there are also times when you don't have access to that.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Finally, perfectly.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And you're like, what do I actually need to happen here?
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[SPEAKER_02]: What is it that I need to have happen here?
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[SPEAKER_02]: I need something that will allow me to turn this screw.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We're not having that camera.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I can get that screw into the wall.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And that's all I've got right now.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So, away we go and I'll fix it in editing.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I want to, sorry, you just made me flashback to this time in theater.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Like I actually am pretty tools savvy that the kitchen knife thing is when I'm desperate and don't have a handy tools.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I remember this time where someone had offered to help me with the thing, and I might grate.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Can you help me with putting the shelf up?
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[SPEAKER_02]: And they attempted to drill a hole with the driver bit, no screw, no, they all they knew was that they were supposed to put a bit into the drill and then put it against the wall
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[SPEAKER_02]: And it profoundly does not do that thing.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And so this is, I think, sometimes what happens to writers who are early in their career, and someone is like, this is the tool you should use.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And doesn't explain why or how it works.
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[SPEAKER_02]: And so that's what we're going to be looking at is the why and the how it works.
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[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I agree because what you just said, I have no idea why that is wrong, why that wouldn't work,
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[SPEAKER_03]: I heard driver, and that was the end of it for me.
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[SPEAKER_00]: All little books are going to be, not all pointy things are drill bits.
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[SPEAKER_03]: See, and that broke it down for me in a way that I will now, when I knew you're much like the rest of our year is going to do, right?
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[SPEAKER_01]: By the way, a thousand drill bits is about the size of a cat.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think on that note, we need to take a quick break here and when we come back, we can talk about the other aspect that we're talking about this season, which is personal processes.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome back.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So we're really excited to talk about all these different tools that are applicable to sort of how you think about structure and what you're bringing to your project.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Last season, we talked a lot about personal processes, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: How we each work.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And I think you can see that a lot of the tools that we talking about are applied in different ways there.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But the other thing that we wanted to address this season is what are the barriers to writing?
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[SPEAKER_00]: What are the things they keep you from getting into a place where you're producing work and producing work you're excited about?
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[SPEAKER_00]: So we're really breaking down at least a handful of the things that commonly get in the way of writers and talking about what are some tools that you can use to address those issues and how can you apply them to create a process that works for you?
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[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and those are things, everything ranging from some time management stuff to brain stuff to how do you retrain your family to believe that you're a writer?
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[SPEAKER_02]: All of these things.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I'll go ahead and do a spoiler.
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[SPEAKER_02]: It's hard.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It's all hard.
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[SPEAKER_02]: It's all hard.
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[SPEAKER_02]: So, we're going to be talking about all of those things, but at the core of it, the core of the barriers and the structure, all of it comes down to this underlying thing which is why, why is the barrier happening?
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[SPEAKER_02]: What are you trying, you know, why are you trying to make this decision like this which tool is going to work for you depends on what you're trying to do so why are you trying to do a thing.
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[SPEAKER_02]: So since we're in the beginning of the year.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and the beginning of the season, we also wanted you to think about what your intentions are, what is your intention with your story, what is your intention with your craft, how do you want to fit into your life?
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[SPEAKER_02]: So we want you to think about those intentions as part of thinking about what structure you need, what pieces you need for writing.
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[SPEAKER_03]: In some ways, I think about the barrier-breaking thing as deconstructing the structure of your own life.
20:00
[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, like, plot to have structure, but so does our lives have, even the unstructured life has some structure to it.
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[SPEAKER_03]: You wake up, you sleep at some point to go.
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[SPEAKER_03]: And so I think thinking about what are the structures around us and how do we think about those as well?
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[SPEAKER_03]: It can be so easy to just,
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[SPEAKER_03]: move through life with so much going on and never kind of like look up and think about what are the habits you're building for yourself?
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[SPEAKER_03]: What are the things that you want to change and how can they be changed?
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[SPEAKER_03]: And I think the intention setting is great because it's sort of like what do I wish this was at the end?
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[SPEAKER_03]: Like what what is the thing that I want to get to?
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[SPEAKER_03]: And then once you know what your intentions are, sometimes it helps you see what are the barriers between
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[SPEAKER_03]: and the actuality of me being able to do it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, last episode you heard us talk about us, sending some pretty concrete goals for ourselves.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And then sort of how did that go?
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[SPEAKER_00]: What was that experience like and things like that, right?
20:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is really sort of like what energy do we want to bring to the new year, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: We are on the customer of a new year.
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[SPEAKER_00]: What are the things that we're hoping to accomplish at least in how we approach?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And some of that may be very specific goals of like I want to do XYZ and some of that may be more general in terms of,
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[SPEAKER_00]: What barriers are in front of me and how do I want to address them?
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[SPEAKER_03]: It sounds like you want to go first, don't I?
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, okay, I can go first.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think the watch word for me this year, as it often is in my life, is balance, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think the thing I'm trying to find is how to balance the number of things that I am trying to do in my time and without sacrificing quality or efficiency on all those fronts, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: If I have any sin, it is that I'm always trying to do too much, I'm trying to do too many things at once.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I have many different interests.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I have many different things that draw my attention in my enthusiasm and things like that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
22:08
[SPEAKER_00]: So the first is I'm trying to bring on some new clients.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I'm trying to stay on top of my queries.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
22:16
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm trying to find a way to make sure that I am getting back to people in a time away on that front at the same time that I'm meeting the goals and expectations of my existing clients.
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[SPEAKER_00]: right.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And so the first challenge I have is balancing the bringing on new work and then still executing on the work that haven't fun of me.
22:35
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a very familiar challenge to any freelancer out there, right?
22:39
[SPEAKER_00]: It's both you need to be doing the rainmaking side and also the the making short your crops are harvested properly side, right?
22:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Like it's it's both aspects.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and a lot of being an agent is managing that rhythm of things, which is historically been a challenge for me, and I'm sure we'll continue to be a challenge.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So, especially the first half of this coming year, that's really one thing I have my eye on.
23:05
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm also working on a big creative project, which I've alluded to a couple of times, and so keeping that on track and working on that in my spare time is important.
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[SPEAKER_00]: while meeting all the other goals in my life, which is, you know, maintaining a healthy social life.
23:21
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, making sure my home life is good and well-order that I'm getting regular exercise and meeting my own fitness goals and anything like that, right?
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[SPEAKER_00]: So all of that is requiring balance.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It's requiring perspective.
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[SPEAKER_00]: How do I make sure that I'm keeping an eye on all these different things?
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[SPEAKER_00]: I've issues with the object permanence, right?
23:41
[SPEAKER_00]: If it's not in front of me sometimes, it slips.
23:44
[SPEAKER_00]: If it's not in front of me, it doesn't exist, right?
23:46
[SPEAKER_00]: And so how do I keep things in my field of vision so that I'm tracking all the things I need to be doing and staying on top of it?
23:52
[SPEAKER_00]: And living a well-rounded life that is feels satisfying and exciting and enriching in all the ways that I want my life to be.
24:01
[SPEAKER_00]: It's kind of a broad answer, but that's what I'm bringing.
24:06
[SPEAKER_01]: I mentioned some interior home improvements.
24:10
[SPEAKER_01]: One of the things that we put in this last year was a pot rack that hung the pots so that when I am facing the cooking area,
24:23
[SPEAKER_01]: All of the available pots are in my peripheral vision and I bring that up because I didn't expect that to be a big deal, but knowing which pots and pans are not in the dishwasher are not in the sink.
24:35
[SPEAKER_01]: was huge.
24:37
[SPEAKER_01]: This whole business of keeping object permanents, having things visible as I'm working so that I know what to reach for next.
24:47
[SPEAKER_01]: I did not know how big a deal that was until we redesigned the kitchen space and now I'm never going back.
24:57
[SPEAKER_01]: Now for my own part for the writing intentions,
25:05
[SPEAKER_01]: Shlock mercenary books and we are getting ready to put number 19 in the print.
25:12
[SPEAKER_01]: We're finalizing the stuff that goes, the bonus materials that go into that.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I would really like to have all 20 done by the end of this year.
25:24
[SPEAKER_01]: But at the same time, I'm terrified because once that's done,
25:33
[SPEAKER_01]: your out of excuses Howard now go right.
25:35
[SPEAKER_01]: There are no excuses for me not to devote 100% of my energy to something new to whatever comes next.
25:45
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like I've been putting that off for five years now and I need to stop putting that off.
25:53
[SPEAKER_01]: but also we had to get booked 20 out.
25:55
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I like what you said about balance because I am going to be balancing the very mechanical, very flowcharty, spreadsheety process of putting book 20 in
26:17
[SPEAKER_01]: the pure summoning of the muse in order to find the thing that I love, the thing that I am going to passionately pour creative energy into in order to pay the bills in 2027.
26:36
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's it.
26:41
[SPEAKER_01]: That's
26:46
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
26:48
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm much like John one in that I tend to pick a word.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I have used stable and that we moved that year, suddenly, without expecting it.
27:00
[SPEAKER_02]: So that worked out very well.
27:02
[SPEAKER_02]: It was 2024, which was
27:05
[SPEAKER_00]: I believe state intentions are important, but the encounter reality sometimes.
27:11
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
27:12
[SPEAKER_02]: But it's so true.
27:14
[SPEAKER_02]: But one of the things that I find that when I'm sitting down to write that often, if I write at the top of the page, just kind of the shape of my intention of the feeling that I want a reader to have, sometimes it's a single word like cozy, that it can serve as a check.
27:30
[SPEAKER_02]: for me when I'm making decisions that I can come back and I can look at it and go, is this going to be more, is this going to be cosier or is this going to be not cosy?
27:40
[SPEAKER_02]: And the same thing was true when I picked stable, it was like when I was making decisions, this year the work that I'm picking is play.
27:49
[SPEAKER_00]: I love that.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I have been working very hard for a very long time and the world keeps being on fire.
27:59
[SPEAKER_02]: and looking for moments when I can play and celebrating those those tiny moments is what I'm interested in doing the next year, both with my my personal life, but also with my writing.
28:15
[SPEAKER_02]: I have been playing it as we've been recording episodes.
28:20
[SPEAKER_02]: I've been like
28:21
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I, I've never actually used the saves a cat structure.
28:25
[SPEAKER_02]: Let me, let me try it, let me see what it does and not thinking of it as, I have to get this right, but let me play with this.
28:33
[SPEAKER_02]: This is a toy, let me just see what it does and that I'm finding, I'm,
28:39
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm looking forward to some joy with that, and I will also say that the reason I picked that word was because of a speech that I heard the writer slash puppeteer Liz Harra give several years ago at the
28:58
[SPEAKER_02]: which was about playing as an act of joy and defiance and the idea that she writes for the
29:18
[SPEAKER_02]: and having failure happen as a result of play is a joyful act and that that's where a lot of the best discoveries come from.
29:28
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's what I'm planning is playing for the this year.
29:34
[SPEAKER_02]: That's my goal, my intention.
29:36
[SPEAKER_00]: I love that.
29:38
[SPEAKER_00]: It's so important to make space for that and make space for
29:46
[SPEAKER_03]: Uh, I think we're out of other people.
29:48
[SPEAKER_03]: So, um, yeah, can you go on?
29:50
[SPEAKER_00]: No, no, of course.
29:51
[SPEAKER_00]: No, it's your chart.
29:53
[SPEAKER_00]: You don't get to escape.
29:55
[SPEAKER_03]: What are you talking about?
29:57
[SPEAKER_03]: Um, there is, I think there's two things.
29:58
[SPEAKER_03]: So I have both, uh, I think I like also having like intentions.
30:02
[SPEAKER_03]: I will often like sum up the previous year with like a word, like now that it's done, what was that the year of?
30:08
[SPEAKER_03]: And then I'll be like, okay, what do I want this to be the year of in response?
30:12
[SPEAKER_03]: Where sometimes means like picking the same word twice, you know, because like it didn't
30:16
[SPEAKER_03]: last time.
30:17
[SPEAKER_03]: But what I will say for this upcoming year is I really want to build, I think that is the thing I wanted to.
30:24
[SPEAKER_03]: I want to build structures.
30:26
[SPEAKER_03]: I want to build a life.
30:28
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm in a new place, like I really want to kind of like, you know, build things that I care about and figure them out.
30:36
[SPEAKER_03]: And, you know, some of that is sounds like work, but I actually think building is fun.
30:41
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm trying to take building the way that like,
30:43
[SPEAKER_03]: little kids think about like Lego sets or like blocks where it's like there's so much imagination in building you're trying to figure out what it is you try different things you start building this structure that didn't work you start over and so like building an iteration is something that I want to do in the next year but also I have a mantra that I'm using every time I'm trying to make a
31:09
[SPEAKER_03]: It's not for them, you know, it's just managed work for more.
31:12
[SPEAKER_03]: Um, but so if I'm going to talk about life, what's happening over there?
31:20
[SPEAKER_03]: It looks.
31:22
[SPEAKER_03]: Sometimes advertising really knows our soul.
31:24
[SPEAKER_03]: Have you had your break today?
31:28
[SPEAKER_03]: JK, but um, I think you also have a good question to ask yourself.
31:33
[SPEAKER_03]: But no, a lot of times I'm like, look, I just want to, like if I'm deciding between
31:39
[SPEAKER_03]: You know, buckle down and do this project or like go see a friend.
31:43
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm like, live moss, go see the friend, come back, then do the work.
31:46
[SPEAKER_03]: And so I think the two work well together because live moss is like me giving my chaotic impulse having self, a freedom to rain and run around and build is the structure that keeps me coming back so that when I finish living moss and I'm back to my name.
32:06
[SPEAKER_03]: Me, no, no, that's not good.
32:09
[SPEAKER_03]: When I'm back there.
32:09
[SPEAKER_00]: You limbs moss and now you need to slip.
32:12
[SPEAKER_03]: Now I need to just lift regular.
32:13
[SPEAKER_03]: Then I know what I need to do because I've built some structures into my life that are like, okay, here's what I need to be doing now that I've had my fun.
32:22
[SPEAKER_03]: And so it's my way of trying to basically, you know, have my cake and eat it too.
32:28
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that what this tells me is that for 2027, our intention episode is only in fast food slogans.
32:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Have you seen fast food slogan and that's going to be your intention for the year?
32:38
[SPEAKER_02]: Did you know that Taco Bell has an entire magazine and they take fiction, I know a writer who has been trying to crack it for two years now and has not successfully gotten them to buy a story yet.
32:56
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to, I need to know more.
32:58
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to go in this immediately after we're finished recording.
33:03
[SPEAKER_02]: And apparently they pay good money, but anyway, the deep ones are right.
33:10
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, so, uh, that brings us to the end of this episode.
33:15
[SPEAKER_02]: And you see the other reason that we decided to move away from our tagline 15 minutes long because we were increasingly not 15 minutes long, um, which is not to say that we're always going to do long episodes, but, uh, we decided that the structure of 15 minutes was not serving us.
33:35
[SPEAKER_02]: and that we needed to get back into the tools, not rules, and the rule about feeding 15 minutes didn't service.
33:42
[SPEAKER_02]: So what we're going to be looking at, here's your homework, ready?
33:45
[SPEAKER_02]: Your homework is to think about what serves you, what piece of last year you need to let go of.
33:55
[SPEAKER_02]: and what intention you want moving into the new year.
33:59
[SPEAKER_02]: So you're going to just write down, I am letting go of and then whatever it comes after that sentence.
34:07
[SPEAKER_02]: And this year, I am embracing and then whatever goes into that link.
34:12
[SPEAKER_00]: This has been writing excuses.
34:14
[SPEAKER_00]: You're out of excuses, now go reflect.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Writing excuses has been brought to you by our listeners, patrons and friends.
34:23
[SPEAKER_02]: For this episode, your hosts were Mary Robinette Koal, Dong Wan Song, Erin Roberts and Howard Taylor.
34:30
[SPEAKER_02]: This episode was engineered by Marshall Card Jr., mastered by Alex Jackson, and produced by Emma Reynolds.
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[SPEAKER_02]: For more information, visit writing excuses.com.