The Gift of Now

I struggle frequently with feeling like I don’t know what I’m doing or writing about. I just need to get older, to have more life experience, to have done more, to know more. Then I can write better, more accurately. While some of that is true, and research has its place, I’ve become unfocused and lost sight of something critical.

I write about main characters who are within two years of my age in either direction. When I started writing, that meant my first MC was 19 years old. My second one was 21. I haven’t decided on the age of my current MC, because I need to do a bit of research before picking, but he’ll still probably end up between late teens and early twenties. So, what’s significant about that?

While I’m struggling with life, figuring out what’s next, complaining about not having enough experience, I’m trying to write characters with a mindset more mature than mine. But wait…if they’re close to my age, there’s nothing wrong with giving them struggles like mine.

The 19-year-old can be overwhelmed by life after high school, trying to find a job, and struggle with this new thing called being an adult.

The 21-year-old can hide behind his mask of training and schooling he’s had, but still struggle with feeling small, inadequate, and…not knowing enough about the life he’s facing.

And the mystery age MC? He’s still young. The guys he knows are young. Yet they’re slopping through trenches, facing enemy machine guns that will mow them down in rows. I can imagine what it’s like to face death like that, at my age. He can see all the hurt, all the pain in his world, and just want to fix it…but he can’t. At least not right away.

As I get older, I’ll be able to accurately write about the feelings of a 30-year-old, 47-year-old, etc.

Writing with the mindset of the age I’m in will bring incredible insight to readers younger or older. Especially for older readers, it will jog their memory and bring them back to relating with old feelings and questions they once had. It will create emotion in them.

I’m always amazed at writers who can go back in time and really capture the innocence of, say, a 7-year-old, without making the kid feel wiser and older than they could possibly be.

The other day, I was thinking about how valuable it was that I could do this with my MCs because we’re close in mind-maturity…and something amazing struck me. Now is a gift. Today is a gift. It’s a present from God to me.

I don’t need to be ashamed for feeling lost, for not knowing it all, for the kinds of questions I have. It’s normal. It’s life. And it’s there for me to use and bring beautiful depth to my stories. It’s an endless supply of writing material. It will help me write with the mindset that these characters would truly have.

The old turtle, Master Oogway, in the first Kung Fu Panda movie put it well. He said, “There is a saying: Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called the present.”

It’s time for me to stop looking at what I don’t have and to realize the amazingness of what I have to work with now. Where I currently am in life is an extraordinary gift. I shouldn’t throw it away.

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How can you use your “now?” Your gift?

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