Autumn Inspiration

Each season creates new hope and possibilities. Autumn, the season between summer and winter brings crisp air and symbols of harvest and abundance. Those symbols can carry over into your writing. It’s time to harvest your best sentences, chapters, paragraphs, dialogue, and ideas and write that story that’s been on the forefront of your mind for so long. It’s time to buckle down and edit that manuscript you put away in a drawer or in a file on your computer. It’s time to query agents or become an indie author. It’s time to reap the rewards from all your hard work and live in the abundance you deserve.

I’ve compared writers to raindrops and snowflakes in previous seasonal inspiration posts. Today I compare them to colorful falling leaves, all different, all beautiful in their own unique writing ways. We need moments of comfort to recharge and collect our thoughts. Get your vitamin D on, soak up the last rays of strong summer sun. Jump in a pile of colorful leaves like you did when you were a kid. Sit outdoors near a firepit and sip some fall sangria or hot apple cider. Dance in the cool air and remember the phenomenal writer you are or aspire to be.

Cooler temperatures and shorter hours of daylight cause leaves to cease their food-making process. This triggers the much anticipated changing of the leaves. Green pageantry fades and a spectacular assortment of colors from golden yellow, to shades of orange, to candy-apple red, and distinguished browns emerge in all their glory. Step outside and feast on the magnificent colors while you enjoy delicious s’mores or a caramel apple. It’s time for everything pumpkin, tasty lattes and savory soups, delicious pies and seasonal beers with a cinnamon/sugar rim, and of course pumpkin spice. Get into the season, revel in its changes, fab colors, and seasonal tastes, and fire up your laptop. Write, take a break, write again, repeat.

Don’t forget your writing space when you decorate for fall. Add autumn splendor to your desk or wherever you do your best work. Bring in a palette of festive fall colors, strategically place faux pumpkins, gourds, and garlands of foliage, in or near your sanctuary, to inspire. Create a fall vision board and include your writing goals for the season. Hang it or set it down someplace prominent so you will see it as you write. Settle in, let your words flow through your fingers, and tap away.

We must all step away from writing to recharge, rejuvenate, and center. Find a quiet and peaceful place to meditate. Light a pumpkin-scented candle. Listen to soothing music that reminds you of autumns past. Take a bubble bath with harvest-spiced bath bombs and savor the calming aromas of fall. During your moment of comfort, ponder your story and characters. Consider your plot, sub-plots, and twists. When you’re feeling restored, start pounding those keys with all you best ideas.

Here’s one you may not have thought of – make moon water. Yes, you read that correctly. Grab a glass jar, fill it with spring water, set your writing intentions include your goals and dreams, (I like to write mine down and put them in their own jar or envelope) put the jars/jars outside overnight during a full moon and let the energy of the moon charge your water. This simple exercise gives power to your plans and energizes your dreams. It helps make them palpable and real. Some spritz themselves with the charged water and others drink it. It’s your choice. I choose a spritzing from time to time as a reminder of the intentions I set and why I’m working so hard to become a published author.

Use the grandeur of fall to knock an interesting scene out of the ballpark. Describe a passage with a colorful autumn landscape and a backdrop of cool air, where two, would-be lovers kiss for the first time. Let the scents of burning leaves, hot-buttered rum drinks, and sweet apple cobbler lead them toward intimacy. Does she get tipsy on the alcohol, giggle at his jokes, and lean into him for stability? Does he feed her apple cobbler from his fork and throw an arm around her to keep her warm? Pull out all the fall stops and work it ladies and gents.

This one is a no-brainer and can obviously be started in any season, but the opulence of autumn provides a seasonal miracle that is both grounding and humbling. The growth provided by spring and summer gives way to an abundance of new beauty before decay takes over in autumn, followed by death in winter. The entire process begins again year after year. It’s nature at its finest.

What writing accomplishments are you grateful for? Write them in your fall gratitude journal. They can be big or small. I’m grateful that I take things one day at a time and that I never give up on my dream of becoming a published author.