Month: August 2014

ARE YOU REALLY SEEING?

On By Victoria LK Williams (Vicki Williams)In UncategorizedLeave a comment

Are you a people watcher?

Have you ever sat and watch somebody and wondered what’s going on behind those eyes; what are they thinking about? What is their next move going to be?

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You can have a lot of fun inventing stories about the actions of others around you just by watching as they react and interact with others. In your mind you have your story all figured out. You anticipate their moods and you smile to yourself when they do exactly what you thought they were going to. 

But then it happens. Somebody does something totally unexpected before you know it, your mind is going off and all other different types tangents.  Your story has taken in a twist.

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 Adults can be pretty predictable in their actions and may not lead to as many interesting stories, but children? Children always seem to do the unexpected. Their minds are open and they’re ripe and ready for exploration and learning. This often leads them to discoveries that you might not see, just because we expect a specific outcome. They take simple delight in the little things around them and they are easily amused by the everyday things. As adults we tend to become complacent and a little cynical. The simple things that a child thinks is amusing we may think is boring or mundane.
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And if you happen to be watching animals, wild or domestic, you can almost always count on being surprised!

So, maybe we need to open our minds as we watch the actives of those around us and see things through a child’s eyes or an animal’s honest reaction.

Really SEE, and our stories are sure to be authentic: we might be taken by surprise more often.

WATCH FOR THOSE ROAD SIGNS!

On By Victoria LK Williams (Vicki Williams)In UncategorizedLeave a comment

Road signs.

Have you ever noticed the many road signs you can see as you travel?

What’s even more fun is the fact that the road signs often reflect the community in which they are found for instance down here in Florida it’s not at all unusual to find a road sign that says Alligator Crossing or Peacock Crossing. A new caution sign I saw was Turtle Crossing; I guess you really have to watch for that one, and take your time.

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In a more mountainous area you might find road signs that say Rock Slide dangers or Avalanches Zone. These road signs give you cautions as you drive around town doing your daily activities help you be safe and get to where you’re going with minimal hazards.

But wouldn’t it be wonderful if there were road signs for life events? Like that guy you’re going to go out on a date with. Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a big sign that showed up and said Caution Crazy or Boring!

Other signs I would have liked to have loved to have seen when you’re raising your kids are signs that give warning for those trigger points that can lead to temper tantrums and fights between brothers and sisters. Although kids don’t come with a handbook, they do come with a lot of challenges. Can you imagine having road sign that can direct you around upcoming problems? Image signs that tells you; Caution get plenty of sleep, you’ll be up all night with a crying baby or

Caution child will climb tree and fall, breaking an arm.climb tree

But we don’t have road signs in our life, we just have to go from our own judgment experience and the wisdom of others around us who have been through it before us. And part of getting that wisdom is going through the experience yourself, without the road signs and with mistakes.

So you go forward with the adventure of life and parenthood. Hopefully when your child gets to be old enough you can teach them some of the road signs they are going to have to look for and point them in the right direction.

It will be up to them to read the signs as they show up on life highway.

beautiful life sign

THOSE FIVE LITTLE QUESTIONS

On By Victoria LK Williams (Vicki Williams)In UncategorizedLeave a comment

You can find a story every day.

Every day that you wake up and walk outside your four walls you have the opportunity to see something new and create something different from it. As a writer it’s important to not only write, but to observe and to see what’s going on around you. Little tidbits can create the best books. It can be something as simple as a bird flying overhead and you wondering what direction it’s going and where came from.migrating_penguin_preview

Or maybe it was part of a casual conversation you overheard when you stopped for a quick lunch. It is amazing how one little bit of the conversation, taken out of context, can send you in wonderful directions of your imagination.buzz-clip-art-12

 It can also be observing people in action; little kids are perfect for finding inspiration for stories. Their innocence and wide-eyed observations let you see things in a totally different way.. The little children aren’t the only ones that observes things differently than you might. Have you ever heard a teenager look at something and say how boring, but you were thinking it was really exciting. So, obviously, it’s all a matter of perspective from the observer’s point of view. And as we get older things that we looked at in our youth look totally different now.

But the items that you observe shouldn’t just be people. Take the ornate object this just sitting there in a forgotten corner; what’s the story behind that. Maybe it was something that was left years ago by somebody who didn’t come back for it. Why didn’t they come back to collect the item? Where did they go that they didn’t take it with them?

question1Everything you look at can have you starting to ask questions. They’re questions so old and mundane, so part of our elementary education that they are second nature to us.  We don’t really think about them, but the questions are: Who, What, When, Where and Why.

So your challenge today is to look at things differently. Pick out one thing that grabs you and creatively think of it differently than the context in which you actually see it.

Let your imanigation go and have fun!