Kung Fu...YOU!

by G.Parker

One of my family's favorite movies right now is Kung Fu Panda. Watching it the other night, I felt a little bit of déjà vu. Although I've seen it several times, this was the first time I'd seen parallels to another movie. You may think I'm stretching it, but it felt like we were watching a remake of the tale of Anakin Skywalker -- the sad story of the promising young apprentice with darkness inside that becomes the evil he was trained to fight.

We've all heard that every story has already been written, but there are different versions waiting to be told. What I find intriguing is how differently we can tell the same thing. And while I thought that part of the movie interesting, the part I wanted to dwell or expound on was the moral of the tale.

There is no secret ingredient.

In associating this with writing, what I'm trying to say is all of us write in our own unique way. Whether it's the time of day we write, how long we write, writing in spurts or consistently, we all write differently. Many successful writers offer their "secrets", but what works for them might not work for us.

One of the men in my critique group wrote his first novel getting up early in the morning and writing each day before work. He felt driven -- he never had to use an alarm, he just woke up and started writing. That would never work for me -- I have a hard time crawling out of bed at 7:30, let alone 6 am. I do write better in the morning as a general rule, but I find that set times and routines don't always work for me.

What I want to say is take heart in your uniqueness. You are special. What you write is definitely yours, despite the fact it may resemble something that has been written before -- it still has your twist on it.

Go to it, and may the Force be with you.