Back to School...Again. (A Novel Freshman Experience)

 The new term starts today at the University!

Ceramics II here I come. 

I spent last evening thinking about what I want to do this class.  And it struck me...I've been here before.  You know the place when you're learning a new skill...it's when you know just enough to be dangerous.  

When I started last term, I hadn't taken a test in...a very long time.  And other than a ceramics class in high school, which worked with slip and molds not clay, I'd never done anything like our ceramic class.  But I so love it.

As I was thinking about projects I want to try, I was suddenly reminded of when I started writing.  I'd been a reader my entire life.  I met some lovely writers online who supported me and cheered me on (the Dreamweavers were amazing!) and I wrote with sheer joy.  I'd been a reader all my life and wrote with just enough knowledge to be dangerous.  I'd never given thought to POV or hooks.  I read articles and talked to people, but that was all secondhand knowledge.  I learn best by doing, so back then I just did.  I just wrote.

That's what Ceramics was last term.  I read assignments, listened to lessons, but I learned the most when I just made stuff.  Not everything was a success.  LOL  But everything taught me something.  I made mistakes and hopefully I won't make them again.  

I can't even begin to tell you how much I enjoyed the class.  And it influenced my writing in so many ways.  I wrote an article that will be out in February about creativity and new experiences.  I wrote a short story that will be out free for newsletter subscribers sometime soon.  (Not a subscriber?  Join here.)  And my agent and I were talking about my success with the Maid in LA series (Quincy is one of my bestselling series) and she asked me to consider putting together a new cozy mystery series.  You might see shades of my going back to school in it! 

All in all, my first term back in college was a huge personal success.  I found something I love and it pushed me to new insights about me and my career.


Just imagine what my second term might bring!  Have you tried out something new lately?

Holly

You can check out my first term's Novel Freshman Experience posts at:Part 20, Part 19, Part 18,  Part 17, Part 16,  Part 15, Part 14, Part 13, Part 12, Part 11, Part 10, Part 9, Part 8, Part 7 Part Six, Part 5, Part 4, Part 3, Part 2, Part 1

PPS Hold Her Heart is on sale today!! It's a good book to talk about today because it's a story of discovery, too!