Insecure Writers Support Group Post--reaching for your dreams.

Hi all!

Lovely to see another month flit by in the speed of light, isn't it? No, not really. Are you like me wondering how time can go so fast and you never quite catch up with all the things you have to do?

So...when I was wondering what to share today, I found myself staring at a photograph. Not just any old photograph, but a very original sepia photograph taken in 1917 in Codforth, England, wherever that might be. It's part of an interactive activity at the State Library of Queensland's Distant Lines project.

Here we have a group of Aussie diggers, both young and old, who have survived Gallipoli and the Somme battles and are waiting for their next posting.

I couldn't help wondering--what dreams and aspirations did these soldiers have? According to the original text on the postcard, they were checking out this English village and exclaiming at the beauty of the churches. No doubt facing death gave churches an allure.

Australia was a young country, well, it still is, relatively speaking, and these soldiers would probably have been farmers, as most Australians were in the early 1900s. What hopes and dreams did they have for their return? Were they hoping the government would give them a larger selection to do their back-breaking farming work? Did they yearn to see their wives, their girlfriends, their parents? Whatever their dreams, I hope they achieved them.

So, peeps, keep on dreaming and working towards your dreams. Our future holds more promise than that which stretched before these soldiers. Let's take the future in both hands and aspire to dream!

More inspiring quotes here: dld.bz/dB9DQ 

Thanks for reading. Click here to go to more IWSG posts. Thanks so much to the hosts this week and to Alex J Cavanaugh, whose brainchild this meme is. And even though the month flies by too fast, I really love reading as many posts as I can.

• Do you believe in the power of dreams?
• Do you have reachable goals?

If your hopes and dreams include improving your writing,
WEP has just the thing. Join our Settings challenge
due to go live on August 19.

Happy April Fool's Day!! IWSG post. You're dreaming, right? Or is it your goal speaking?

Hello and welcome to April, the month where it's all happening! Today is IWSG post day, so thanks to Alex J Cavanaugh and his helpers for this month, Suzanne Furness,Tonja Drecker, Toi Thomas, Rachna Chabria, Fundy Blue, and Donna Hole! Thanks for collating this huge meme good people.

Also starting today, many bloggers are participating in the ginormous A - Z Challenge. Those who are not are often on a blog break where they're using their time to get their WIP underway, edited, polished, submitted etc. or working on other myriad writing projects.

Click to read more posts

I've participated in the A - Z for several years, but decided against it again this year. Instead, I'm doing my own AprNoWriMo (my own little NaNoWriMo) where after months of 'hunting and gathering' (research) I'm going to work on the first draft of my Paris story and comment on some A - Z posts that catch my eye.

Thinking about writing goals can make us insecure, as everyone else seems to have their first, second and third novel published and are working on their fourth, fifth or six. Hmm. Wherever we sit in the novel/short story/flash fiction/freelance magazine/blogging or newspaper article spectrum, it doesn't hurt to have a dream/goal/idealised future, does it? Life would be soooo dull without dreams.

Source

But writer's dreams can be dashed in a flash--a form rejection from a publisher/editor you just know should love your story idea, leaving you wondering where to turn next. So most of us have learned that a writer needs to :

• balance dreams and goals. 
• a dream is something that happens as if by magic (mega sales of your book, a review in the Paris Review, winning first prize in that prestigious writing competition). You have almost no control over these dreams, so try to keep them to a minimum (as if...)
• A goal is something you can work towards--finishing your second book within a year of your first, sending stories out to high-profile magazines, investing in a fancy schmanchy camera so the editor can't resist buying your pictures etc. Working on your goals will help stir up the magic that makes your dreams come true. (Oooh, National Geographic just came calling!)

Source

• What are your goals for April?
• What are your dreams for the future?
• If you're planning a new book during April, here is a fantastic link to Jami Gold if you don't follow her. What she doesn't know about writing isn't worth knowing.