Rising Author Tag!

Hey everybody! I got tagged by my friend Eliza from Writing in the Rain to do the "Rising Author" tag. Thanks Eliza! Here were the questions I got:

1) What music do you listen to while writing? I usually just use music when I'm writing sad or intense scenes. I use soundtracks pretty much exclusively. I wrote the last scene of my finished novel to "Rue's Farewell" from The Hunger Games (it was on repeat many times).

2) Do you prefer writing on a computer or writing with a notebook and pen? Definitely notebook and pen. I wrote most of my NaNoWriMo novel on the computer though because there's NO way I would have finished it with handwriting it. But I just really like handwriting for some reason.

3) Do you plan to have your books traditionally published or self published? I go back and forth on this one, but most of the time the answer is traditionally published.

4) Pride and Prejudice or Lord of the Rings? That's really hard....they're so different. I can't pick.

5) Does your faith influence your writing in any specific way? Since I write books where the main character goes through a lot of emotional hardship, I would say that the way my faith influences my writing is that something always gets them through it. I don't necessarily call it God all the time because I want my books to be appealing to non-Christian audiences as a light to them, but you can kinda tell.

6) What books and/or movies would you compare your work in progress to? Oh gosh, that's hard. Shadows is probably like Divergent meets The Illusionist (not the plot of that one though, the concept).

7) What's your favorite part of the writing process? Writing the first draft, editing, letting people read your writing? Um, I send out my first (most unedited) draft to my readers, and hearing their feedback is awesome. Also their groans of not knowing what will happen next.

8) What one word would you use to describe your writing style? That's easy. Dramatic.

9) What do you reward yourself with after meeting a writing goal? Nothing lol I just pat myself on the back

10) When did you decide you wanted to be a writer? Well, I wrote my first story when I was 4, but I guess around twelve was when I decided I wanted it as a career.

11) For you is writing a hobby, ministry or future career? Both a career and a ministry.

Hope you guys enjoyed that!

~Clarissa

Managing Your Commitments

First of all, this is my second time posting this week, which is what I want!

Teenagers are some of the busiest people out there. We're often trying to balance school, work, our social life, our spiritual life, and other commitments. It can often become overwhelming and we feel like we're going to crash and break into a gazillion pieces. In addition, the quality of everything that we're juggling decreases because so many other things have our attention. It can be very tempting to add more to our plate by saying yes to things people ask of us, but we have to learn how to manage our time and commitments effectively.

The first step is to prioritize. There are some commitments in life you simply can't ignore or let go. Spiritually, it's your quiet time with God, going to church on Sunday, and probably also youth group. The last one isn't like a must, but in my opinion, it should come before most other things. I personally struggle with prioritizing my quiet time (although I love going to church), but it is probably the most important thing in any Christian's life. Secondly, it's your commitment to your family. However you may feel about your family, being a part of one means you have to contribute to it, ie. by doing chores and such. My mom, although considering me her right hand, is pretty good about letting me have time for other things.

Next comes school and work. Obviously, you need to get your schoolwork done when it's due and you have to work when your boss schedules you to. (side note: don't just take off work suddenly because you got invited to a party. I know it sucks not to be able to go, but it sucks even more for the people who have to pick up your slack, speaking from personal experience.That's another part of prioritizing I guess) And actually, if you learn to manage your time and work steadily without distraction -which is so hard for an online student like me - you'll find that you have more time for other things than you thought.

Then there's the case of doing things you promised you would do. This year, I made the unfortunate mistake of not turning down my role in drama when I had a chance and subsequently, spending a lot of time doing something I don't particularly enjoy (being in drama, not acting. I love acting.) However, I made a commitment to do it, and I have to honor that commitment, even though most of the time I don't want to. That's been a great thing to learn for me.

After all that, you have the commitments that you want to do, like hanging out with your friends or writing part of your novel or singing in choir or whatever. This is the hard part. You enjoy all of those things and you want to cram a bunch of that in because you like it. That's not healthy. You could go home early from the party on Saturday so you won't be falling asleep in church the next morning. You could politely tell the graduation coordinator that you can't do the banquet slideshow because you already have a lot to do being senior leadership secretary. And sometimes, you shouldn't have to feel bad turning someone down or saying you can't do something because you need time to recharge and do something that makes you happy.

Managing your commitments is a combination of prioritizing, honoring your word, being smart, and taking time to make sure you are healthy and happy. Focusing on a few things is better than being all over the place with many.

~Clarissa

"Falling"

As a freshman and sophomore, I went through a season in my life where I really struggled with a lot of things and I would write poetry to express my feelings. It was an outlet and it helped me process my emotions. I didn't realize how messed up I was then until I went back and read it after I had come out on the other side of that season. I wrote a lot, but after that time, I abandoned it.

My poetry is probably the rawest writing I have. It's just pure feeling strung into metaphors and imagery. I have some worship poetry too, and that arose out of times when I felt intense praise and love for God. As such, it's pretty personal but also powerful. Yesterday, I had a rough moment and the words just came to me. That's another aspect of my poetry: it just flows out, unlike a novel, where you have to worry about character arcs and plot twists.

Just as a disclaimer, my poetry does not rhyme and I don't worry about technical aspects most of the time because like I said above, it's raw expression of my feelings. But I'm super excited to share some of my writing with you and I hope you enjoy it!

"Falling"

My hand is slipping
From the ledge above
My fingers scrape the edge
The ground is far away

I let go
And I am falling
Falling, falling

Air rushes by
Scenes blur past
Sound has gone
I am left alone to spin

The ground opens up
It will receive me
I will never return

A flutter of wings
A touch of warmth
A glow of delivery

Angels carry me up
They set me down
My feet turn away
The ledge is behind

I am free

~Clarissa

Productivity

First off, I must apologize for not posting in awhile. I really wish I could post twice a week (#goals), but I don't see that happening in the near future. I know, I'm lazy. Anyway.

This post was inspired by the fact that I had a super productive weekend. I mean, it was really productive. I haven't felt that accomplished in a long time, and let me tell you it was an amazing. My body is tensing with excitement just thinking about it.

Now, I don't know about you, but I LOVE lists. I have so many random ones and half of the ones that I do aren't even necessary. There's just something great to me about them. I don't know why. So, although you probably don't care, I'm going to give you a list of what I completed this weekend.

1. All my chores (my least favorite thing, but the most necessary)
2. I made up a Google form and sent it to all 30 of my senior classmates. That required copying all their email addresses down. Kinda fun, cuz I like forms too. I know, I'm so weird.
3. I typed up my senior bio for the yearbook and got my mom to sign off for it. Then I sent it in.
*side note I got a checklist for my senior year and that made me so happy. I GET TO CHECK STUFF OFF. I love doing that!
4. Typed up some eblasts to send out for senior deadlines. As secretary of CHEFA's senior leadership team, I am responsible for sending out all the eblasts for senior stuff.
5. I completed my future plans form for the graduation program. I just turned it in today, so I can check that off!
This last thing surprised me. I agreed to go out shopping with my mom at 3pm. I am a homebody, and I don't like going out very much. Also, I was kinda tired. But I went out!
6. I bought my black tri-fold board for my senior board.
(All this stuff was on Saturday)
7. And finally, I bought my banquet dress yesterday. I still might look around some more, but I really like this one. Maybe you'll get some pictures of me after banquet in March. :)

Ok, I just realized that my list took up wayyy too much of this post, but oh well.

Now, the most important point about all this weekend is that I actually felt like doing everything. I had fun doing it. I wanted to do it. That is a pretty amazing thing because I struggle with productivity. I often don't have motivation for doing things. I go through phases. Sometimes it's intense, where I have to fight apathy and lethargy and other times it's pretty easy to overcome just not wanting to do something. If I'm honest, I am rather weak about stuff. If I don't feel like it, most of the time I don't do it. I do recognize it, however, and I'm working on correcting it.

Productivity is a product of your will. Your want and drive to do something results in something being accomplished. Life isn't filled with stuff that is easy to do or stuff that we are excited to do. But this weekend taught me something. The accomplishment of completing a lot of tasks is a rather awesome high. Even if you don't anticipate it and feel great while you're doing it like I did, you can know that you will have a sense of pride and accomplishment over your work, and then you will make it through the days where you don't want to be productive.

As a last note, sometimes we need a break. Everyone does. Don't push yourself to the breaking point. You will be more productive if you know when you need to take a breather.

~Clarissa