Creativity Challenge

On Monday, Ashley posted a challenge where she invited bloggers to join with her as she spends the month of July challenging herself creatively. She didn't give any strict parameters or put any restrictions for the month. The challenge is broad and vague but holds one key theme: creativity. You can challenge yourself through any means: photography, scrapbooking, writing, videos, blogging, design...whatever you want!

I'm taking on this challenge with her and other bloggers. I've been struggling for the longest time to get started on my novel, to stop wasting time and just write it. I've been so busy bouncing around other potential story ideas that would takes months and months of research to even begin to get started that I've let this story lay stagnant for over a year. Maybe because the story is not as exciting as my other ideas, maybe because it means digging deep into Christianity and myself, maybe because it's the only idea I've had that holds real weight and means this could become The Story one day. The Story that gets me published. The Story that turns me into an author.

For superstitious purposes, I don't want to go into detail on what my story is about. For now, let me be vague: it centers around a girl, age 18, as she heads off to college, leaving the comforts of home for the very first time. The End. (Yep. That's all I'm going to tell you about! Chew on that.)

My challenge is to begin the outlining process. While I read many writing blogs that give the pros and cons of outlining, I do believe I'm the type of writer who needs a strict outline. Whether or not my characters stick to the outline remains to be seen, but I do want to create an outline so I know what themes I want my story to be about, what struggles the character will face, and a basic overview of the plot.

Right now, all that's sitting in my "College Girl" file on my desktop is a two-paragraph synopsis, a list of background information I need to write about, and some questions about the main character's parents. (Are they high school sweethearts? Did they meet on a missions trip? Should I make her mother a different nationality than her father?) I really want to finish up writing up all the background information and start outlining my novel. I don't want to be too strict on myself and tell myself I have to have the entire process done, but I do want to at least have it started.

So there you have it. My Creativity Challenge for the month of July. Check out Ashley's blog for more about the challenge and to join in. I'll probably give weekly updates on my status and how the process is going. I hope you'll join me!