{"id":1965,"date":"2010-10-19T09:30:00","date_gmt":"2010-10-19T14:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/?p=1965"},"modified":"2010-10-19T09:30:45","modified_gmt":"2010-10-19T14:30:45","slug":"stuck-in-a-rut-reread","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/2010\/10\/19\/stuck-in-a-rut-reread\/","title":{"rendered":"Stuck in a Rut: Reread"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignright\" title=\"Robert Olmstead's A Trail of Heart's Blood Wherever We Go\" src=\"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/images\/atohwwg.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"333\" \/>All this week, I&#8217;m writing about ways to get out of a writing rut and recapture the spark from when you first started writing.<\/p>\n<p>Yesterday, I wrote about <a title=\"Link to The Juggling Writer article about revisiting old friends to get out of a writing rut.\" href=\"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/2010\/10\/18\/stuck-in-a-rut-revisit\/\">visiting old friends<\/a> and how that can help.<\/p>\n<p>Today, I&#8217;m writing about rereading.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">*\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *<\/p>\n<p>I recently sat down on a rainy day with my favorite novel,\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/B000H2N97W?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=thejugwri-20&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;creativeASIN=B000H2N97W\">A Trail of Heart&#8217;s Blood Wherever We Go: A Novel<\/a><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;\" src=\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=thejugwri-20&amp;l=as2&amp;o=1&amp;a=B000H2N97W\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" \/><br \/>\n(Affiliate Link). I stumbled upon the novel in the early 90s while knocking around a bookstore with a friend. I picked up the paperback (<a title=\"The Avon release of Robert Olmstead's A Trail of Heart's Blood Wherever We Go.\" href=\"http:\/\/www.abebooks.com\/en\/imagegallery\/imagegallery.shtml?images=http:\/\/ecx.images-amazon.com\/images\/I\/21soUN8lsBL.jpg\">this version<\/a>). The cover grabbed me, and the story within clicked with me like nothing else I&#8217;ve ever read.<\/p>\n<p>I deliberately didn&#8217;t read many books when I first started writing seriously, but I still read more than most people.<\/p>\n<p>When I reread a book I discovered when I started writing, I remember the weather, what I was doing, and what I was writing at the time. I can see my old room and become surrounded with that same feeling that the writing world was mine for the taking.<\/p>\n<p>I can&#8217;t pick up certain books without my head filling with memories of those early days of writing, when every time I sat down to write, the air around me seemed to crackle with energy.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">*\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *<\/p>\n<p>If you&#8217;re in a writing rut and finding it hard to get out, think back to the days you first really took writing seriously.<\/p>\n<p>Think of the books you were reading at the time. If you still have them, pull them off the shelf and reread one or two. If you don&#8217;t have the books anymore, go to a bookstore, buy them, and pick up something totally new to you while you&#8217;re at it.<\/p>\n<p>As your head fills with memories from the time, I&#8217;m betting it&#8217;s only a matter of time before you set the book down and remember what it felt like to write with reckless passion.<\/p>\n<p>The best thing about that feeling now that years have passed? Now when you sit down to write, you have enough control as a writer to turn that spark into a raging fire.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>All this week, I&#8217;m writing about ways to get out of a writing rut and recapture the spark from when you first started writing. Yesterday, I wrote about visiting old friends and how that can help. Today, I&#8217;m writing about rereading. *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 * I recently sat down on a rainy day with my favorite [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":""},"categories":[22,24,23,59],"tags":[67,14],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1965"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1965\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}