The Simmering Mind

Oh my goodness, SO many good and interesting links came my way this past week!  So there are some great Simmer Starters today.  Lots of variety here.

You Are God’s Workmanship (Jon Bloom at DesiringGod) – Ahhh, I love almost everything from Jon Bloom on this site, and this article I especially adore.  “When Paul says that you are God’s ‘workmanship,’ don’t think of your clunky seventh grade shop class project. Think of The Odyssey, Beowulf, The Divine Comedy, Paradise Lost, or The Faerie Queen — great works of epic poetry.  The Greek word Paul chose for this sentence is ‘poiema,’ and what he had in mind is a work of masterful creativity.”

20 Six-Word Stories That Are Absolutely Heartbreaking (Tickld) – Amazing examples of how much impact just a few words can have.

How to Target an Audience (And Avoid Book Launch Flop) (Kimberley Grabas) – A great how-to post on finding your target audience!  Really good advice here.  Another good one from the same site: 101 Quick Actions You Can Take Today to Build the Writer Platform of Your Dreams.

The Definition of Hell for Each Myers-Briggs Type (Heidi Priebe at Thought Catalog) – Just some amusing (or grating) Myers-Briggs fun.

Two Sisters, Two Views on Gay Marriage (Elizabeth Corey and Mary Campbell at The Atlantic) – A fantastic example of what tolerance really means…loving one another despite differences.  “Mary and I live in a pluralist age when people of goodwill often hold radically different views. This calls, I think, for tolerance of the old-fashioned kind, not persecution of those who differ.”

Charles Spurgeon, Susanna, and the Pilgrim’s Progress (Ray Rhodes Jr.) – Just a sweet story about how Spurgeon sent his future bride a copy of a novel to encourage her.  Godly fiction can inspire and open minds to truths from Scripture we may not have looked at so creatively before!

How to Flesh Out a Character (Nathan Bransford) – Good advice here.  I like the tip about following your character through a typical day.

WritingTip – Be Excited (David Farland) – “The single greatest thing that you can do to motivate yourself to write is to cultivate an attitude of excitement, one that energizes you and drives you to work hard, to spend every spare moment productively. So, how can you get excited about a story? Here are just a few steps to building excitement.”  They’re good steps!