#My500Words Challenge

In a moment to satisfy the intense need for self-fulfillment, I entered into the 500 words a day challenge. This is good for me because I love to write and am in dire need of feeling fulfilled. So here goes my first free write.

I spend a lot of time on Pinterest. Many people are addicted, but not me. Although, some people might argue that against me and claim I’m simply addicted to all things social media-related. I’m actually quite productive on Pinterest; I use it frequently for artistic inspiration for both visual and verbal ideas on how to be a better artist of words and of acrylic paint.

I discovered Pinterest while I was interning in Washington DC; one of my colleagues used it to find new recipes and almost always shared her experiments with us the next day. I don’t cook a lot, nor am I a crafty kind of person, so I wasn't quite sure how using Pinterest would benefit me.

Flash forward three years later and I use it for inspiration. I love it. My favorite way to capitalize on this inspiration right now is to simply do a search for “writing” and see what pops up in the feed. Overall, I’m thoroughly impressed with how much information I've been able to compile. I’m even more impressed when I turn to this board for inspiration and retrieve the pins I’d forgotten about!

This helps me so much as I conceptualize and write my novels. I just finished my very first novel this past summer, something I’m very proud to admit but still somewhat hesitant to discuss with my peers. My hesitation does not come from anything other than the realization of just how personal the story is to me.

I read somewhere (on Pinterest, I believe) that said if your story cannot be explained in a simple sentence, then it isn't a good idea. If people are begging for more after you entice them with that ONE sentence, then you've thought of a good idea. From that moment, I tried to deduce the point of my story, and came up with this: It’s about a woman who has the things that society expects her to have, and her lack of happiness pushes her to seek out new things and want more for herself.

Let me tell you, most people ask me to tell them more. Who is this woman? What does she do? Why is she unhappy? What kinds of choices does she make to find that happiness she is so desperately striving to have? So many questions, and about 55,000+ words later, you finally get to know.

It was such an amazing experience to write, revise, and finish this story. It was like I was immortalizing a piece of my soul within the pages, and now a part of me is going to live forever. Hey, that’s a great line! I should remember that if I ever choose to write a story about a writer.