Writing and Parenting

Being a full time parent while trying to write is certainly tough. But even when you're not writing, you can still be writing. A few ways I've found to take care of my little one while staying creative:

Every kid has their movies they want to watch over & over again, which can be terribly annoying on many levels, especially when you're trying to work while the background shrill of the same songs & dialogue echo through the house day after day. I suggest a change in perspective. Remember that these big budget animated movies are put together to appeal to not only to kids, but to a mass audience. These films are huge investments and it's very important these companies make their money back. Therefore the storytelling structure they use are usually very traditional and very tight. They usually follow the Hero's Journey format very closely, all characters serve specific functions and purposes (usually all archetypal), character arcs are well defined and specific, and there's very little fat in the way of dialogue and purpose. So if you're watching Beauty and the Beast for the 101st time, try watching it with your writer's eyes and ears: what's the subtext of every scene/what are they REALLY saying in storytelling terminology? Notice the scene transitions, the "buttons" on the end of every scene; What does each character want and how do they go about getting it? What are the archetypes behind every main character? What is the anatomy of an individual scene? What are its beats? Can you identify basic structural elements such as the inciting incident, the call/refusal to action, the first and second turning points, the midpoint where everything should shift - how does it shift? There are a million more questions you could ask yourself, all of which will enhance or inform your own writing in some way. The point is if you have the right frame of mind, instead of trying to block out these films as an unwanted annoyance, you can instead watch them over and over again with your little one and be just as fascinated, engaged and interested as they are on repeated viewings.

Bedtime I find is another good opportunity to be a good parent and also flex your creative muscles. Instead of reading a book, take some of your little one's favorite characters and make up a story on the spot - akin to freewriting. You'll immediately find you're inadvertently painting yourself into creative corners, and in order to keep the story going you'll have to improvise, and quickly. The real value of this instead of mulling a story point over and over in your head before committing to it, as we tend too often to do, you'll have to silence your inner critic in order to forge ahead. You may find you have an innate knack for 3 act structure. You may discover you have a gift for thinking out of the box, for connecting seemingly unrelated story elements, for dialogue, relationships, character or you may discover you need serious help in one or many of these areas. Again, the real value in this exercise is it exposes your strengths, your weaknesses, and most importantly, get that inner critic out of the way of your storytelling process.

More often than not as soon as your little one has drifted into dreamland, you'll leap to your computer inspired and on fire. Or maybe you'll just sit on the couch and watch T.V. In either case, you have stretched and worked that storytelling muscle while taking care of your "real world" responsibilities. And if you're a parent you know well enough the importance of multitasking!