Thursday, April 7, 2011

G is for... Generosity

The writing community is amazing and I'm both proud and privileged to be a part of it. I only really discovered there was a community for writers about two years ago, and I've been astounded by the generosity there is in it. Agents and editors regularly hold chats on Twitter where they answer questions. They're not paid to do that. It's something they do because they genuinely care about writers and want them to succeed. Other writers are extremely generous with their time, offering critiques and answering questions about the process.

Critiquing takes time. I know I spend about an hour on every review I do of someone's chapter or story. So offering to critique a novel or even just part of a novel is no small commitment. But that fresh set of eyes cast over your work is so valuable.

It's easy to get discouraged in this business. There's a lot of rejection, a lot of days when self-doubt rears its ugly head and you think maybe it would be easier to just give up. But every time I ht this point, something comes up that renews my faith in writing, something that comes from the generous spirit at the core of this community.

In what ways have you been affected by generosity lately?

4 comments:

  1. I love how even the smallest offers of generosity are as important and useful as the big ones you mentioned. Just the fact that my writing group and my blog followers take the time to read what I write and to comment on it astounds me. Sometimes in this big world you can feel very insignificant, and it's nice to know someone is paying attention to you.

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  2. The whole A-Z challenge has produced a lot of generosity, I think. A lot of peopel taking time to make others feel included and part of something bigger. Very cool.
    -mood

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  3. I love this community! I've only discovered it in August last year, but people are so quick to offer help and/or advice.

    ^_^

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  4. The shout outs I receive from other writers are the best kind of generosity I experience, because those shout-outs stem from my own generous giving towards the other writers.

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