Writing Craft: Show / Don't Tell

Lessons I've learned about writing...

In the world of creative writing, no phrase or lesson is more repeated than the famous:

Show Don't Tell

What does that mean, exactly? It means don't give me a fact but show it to me. Let the actions of the character tell me he's nervous. Let the characters actions and motives be so tied to the setting, that they direct what details I get to see.


Read this:

Dr. Briar sat nervously on a hand-made leather chair with mahogany inlays. 

Now read this:

Dr. Briar sat fidgeting in a hand-made leather chair, rotating his middle finger around on the mahogany inlays. 

What's different?

Dr. Briar sat nervously on a hand-made leather chair with mahogany inlays. 

Dr. Briar sat fidgeting in a hand-made leather chair, rotating his middle finger around on the mahogany inlays. 

We show him fidgeting and rotating his finger, this gives us more reason to talk about the inlays. But could this be better? Sure, there are a thousand ways to write this sentence. Let's add just a bit more detail.

Dr. Briar sat flicking the magnetic strap of his tablet open and closed, periodically adjusting his potsition in the hand-made leather chair, rotating the middle finger of his other hand around on the mahogany inlays. 

There's at least one problem with this new sentence. The structure is a bit off. "ING" is almost always death to a story, let's change that up a bit.

Dr. Briar flicked the magnetic strap of his tablet open and closed, periodically adjusting his position in the hand-made leather chair, and rotated the middle finger of his other hand around on the mahogany inlays. 

The ING wasn't awful, in this case, but changing this from a present tense ING to a past tense ED can help with consistency of storytelling and it gives a weight of finality to the phrase.

This has been a lesson from the things I've learned about writing. Good day to you,

Darrell G. Wolfe

Storyteller | Writer | Thinker | Consultant | Multipotentialite

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Constitutional Amendment Proposition: We The People Clause

Constitutional Amendment Proposition: We The People Clause

We are taking back the government...

It's high time for another amendment to the constitution. There are already several great proposals, including a Convention of the States to make it happen.

As I've been thinking about it, there are several things I would like to see in an amendment. Here are a few points to consider:

1. Preserve the Original Consitution: The amendments should reinforce or clarify the intent of the original constitution, not change it. Article 1, Section 9, paragraph 5 of the US Constitution says that there shall be no direct tax (income tax, property tax, etc.). The 16th Amendment Reversed this protection, and should never have been passed.

16th

Permits Congress to levy an income tax without apportioning it among the states or basing it on the United States Census.

July 12, 1909

February 3, 1913

3 years 6 months 22 days

2. Power/Control: When you give government power, it does not like to give it back or reduce its influence. It's like a giant power suck. Case in point, the 27th Amendment was proposed to make sure that the Congress wouldn't give themselves raises, so it demanded that any raise given not take effect until after the next election. The result? It took 202 YEARS for a congress to finally ratify (agree) to the proposal.

The 27th: Wiki

27th

Delays laws affecting Congressional salary from taking effect until after the next election of representatives.

September 25, 1789

May 5, 1992[5]

202 years 7 months 10 days

3. Amendments should clarify the rights of the people and restrict the rights of the Government.



New Proposals

That being said, here are some of the things I'd like to see in a new Constitutional Amendment:


1. REPEAL THE 16TH AMENDMENT AND CLARIFY that no Tax, Levy, Fine, Fee, Ticket, or any other cost shall be laid on any individual person or entity or their property. This includes the removal and ban of all Income Taxes, Property Taxes, Traffic Tickets, Licencing Fees (driver's licenses, hunting licenses, or gun ownership licenses, etc.).


2. HARD TERM LIMITS should be enacted for 100% of elected officials. The current state of affairs is a direct result of "career politicians". These offices were meant to be held by "statesmen", who were people leaving the private sector to serve in the state for a period and then return to live under the laws they produced or preserved.

A. 2-Terms per office: No person shall hold any elected office at any level (Federal, State, County, City, or otherwise) for more than 2 terms in their lifetime.

B. 4-Terms per individual: No person shall hold any combination of elected offices for more than 4 terms.


3. HARD INCOME LIMITS: No elected official shall make more annually in total government compensation than the previous years US Household Median Income for the US Population as a whole; currently $43,585.00 annually.

4. REAFFIRM THE 2ND AMENDMENT: No laws shall be passed regarding gun ownership except where an actual crime using a gun has been committed by the restricted.

5. VICTIM REQUIREMENT: No law shall be passed or enforced making any activity illegal, nor shall any person or entity be prosecuted or jailed, except where a specific person/entity has caused a specific harm to a person's/entity's person or property. No government body shall be considered a person or entity, nor shall any government body be considered harmable under this protection.


I'll probably come back an updated this later... you have any ideas? Comment below!

Darrell G. Wolfe

Storyteller | Writer | Thinker | Consultant | Multipotentialite

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Expression...

Bob Hamp has a teaching called Freedom from Depression.

He says that a synonym for Depression it Suppression; and, an antonym is Expression.

In other words, the opposite of Depression is to allow the Expression of who you were created by God to be.

As soon as I typed that, my Knowledge of Good tried to figure out how to make that happen. I started thinking about how to find out who or what I was created to be, then force it to happen, work harder at it, go get a degree, write more, do more of whatever the right stuff is...

Wrong.

All of that thinking comes from the wrong Tree... That's the Tree of Knowledge...

It's trying harder the Knowledge of Good... 

Totally the wrong tree.

We must look to the other tree...

LIFE is sourced in The One who created us.

LIFE didn't require a single good deed. LIFE was received by simply being in the presence of The One.

Adam was not made immortal, contrary to popular belief. Adam was made to require frequently the Tree of Life. As long as he ate of that tree, he would remain alive forever. Choosing the Tree of Knowledge cut him off from the Tree of Life.

Eventually, the slow cadence of death took its toll and he died, 900+ years later. The source of life was strong enough to sustain him for that long without a refill.

But only in the Presence of The One can we again find Life ourselves.

Got Life?

Selah

Bonus thought: what activities in your life make you feel more alive and which make you feel less alive (more numb)?

Darrell Wolfe

Storyteller | Writer | Thinker | Consultant 

me@DarrellWolfe.com

www.DarrellWolfe.com

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Got LIFE?

And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. Genesis 2:7

Are rocks dead? 

Consider this for a moment. A rock isn't dead, it's simply without life. It is not alive. In order for something to be dead (biologically) it must first have experienced or had the capacity to experience life. Death is not the absence of life, it is the removal of it.

Spiritually, Adam did nothing to earn life. God breathed LIFE into him. He didn't go to church, do twenty good things, or earn it in any way. He was without life, and LIFE came to him without his works involved.

How often do people say: "Well, I'm a good person..."

How does your being a good person help you get LIFE?

You see, Heaven, Hell, and Spiritual things are NOT a matter of Good vs Bad. 

And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. *** Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." Genesis 2 (9, 15-17

The Tree of Knowledge (Good/Bad) was a tree that brought death. Being a Bad Person and being a Good Person are both totally irrelevant to the topic of Spiritual LIFE.

LIFE does not come from the tree of Knowledge of Doing.

The Knowledge of Doing (Good/Bad) is what killed us in the Garden, and it's still bringing death to us daily today. Science and Religion are actually the same, sources of death.

LIFE comes from its own tree. It's freely given and must be freely received. 

Before Jesus ever came to earth to walk among us, he was there in the original garden. He was forming Adam. He was giving LIFE freely without merit or deeds or doings or earnings.

Religion tells you to try harder the Knowledge of Good. The Holy Spirit tells you to relax and receive the free gift of LIFE, the restoration of which is paid for by the freely given blood of Jesus.

Selah...

Darrell G. Wolfe

Storyteller | Writer | Thinker | Consultant | Multipotentialite

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Praying for others...

And the Lord restored Job's losses when he prayed for his friends. Indeed the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. Job 42:10

For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of His Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers... Romans 1:9

I prayed today, really prayed, for the first time in.... years? Maybe not years. Not sure. Everything before now, that I can recall was shouting & complaining, or some form of that. This was the first time in a long time that I prayed from a place of surrender.

I've been reading Job, off and on, for several years now. Did you ever notice, in Job 42, that it was AFTER Job prayed for his friends (not himself) that God restored Job's losses?

Interesting, eh?

So, that happened.

• Men (and women), when is the last time you prayed for other people? 

Darrell G. Wolfe

Storyteller | Writer | Thinker | Consultant | Multipotentialite

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A Conduit of Blessing, NOT a Reservoir

I've read the book of Job more than any other book in the Bible. I identify with him in so many ways (real or imagined).

As I re-read the closing chapters this morning, I found a theme running through beginning to end, a silver thread hidden among the tapestry of his life.

Self

There are four points through which this thread pulls most vividly:

1. Sacrificing out of fear for his kids, at the start (inward focus, fear of loss).
2. Self-Admiration (I'm so innocent) throughout the book.
3. The counter offered by Elihu > Then God (don't ascribe right-ness to yourself, but to God).
4. Sacrifice on behalf of his friends (outward focus, gain on half of others).

Sacrificing out of fear for his kids, at the start (inward focus, fear of loss).

At the start of his story, we find a man who is self-focused. You might argue that he was focused on his kids; however, he wasn't. He was focused on not losing his kids, which is a self-focus motive. He would make sacrifices from a spirit of fear (what if) rather than a spirit of faith (gratefulness of God).

Self-Admiration (I'm so innocent) throughout the book.

Throughout the book, Job focused on his own predicament. He focused on his own righteousness, or rightness, or right-standing. He said there was absolutely nothing in his life that wasn't perfect and God must be at fault. He started blaming God for his situation and pain.

Haven't we all, at one point or another blamed God for human suffering? But the start of the book shows it was Satan (who the Bible calls the god of this present world/age) who was the orchestrator of pain. 

The God of the universe handed control of earth to Adam. Adam never lost that control, but continually hands that control over to the spirit of influence he bows to at any given moment. Throughout the world, Satan, through men/women, influences the control Adam received. Men, Sin, and a sin-broken earth/environment are the cause of all human suffering. Not God.

The counter offered by Elihu > Then God (don't ascribe right-ness to yourself, but to God).

At the end of the book, God refuses to address the reasons' for Job's suffering. The final friend, the previously silent fourth friend, points out that God is to be praised and magnified. God-Focus, not Man-Focus, is the cure. 

Elihu shows us that by turning our attention from the problem entirely (including its causes and cures) and bringing our focus to bear instead on God's role, ability, and magnitude, we can then tap into that power (instead of little g's power). By developing a relationship with, and covenant with, God (big G) we can over-ride the things of this world and find a greater peace, prosperity, and wholeness. 

This isn't to say we'd never again experience affliction, but that we'd be in covenant with the One who can over-ride it.

Sacrifice on behalf of his friends (outward focus, gain on half of others)

Finally, we see the second sacrifice. Whereas the first sacrifice is made out of a fear of loss, self-focus; the second sacrifice is made on behalf of a request from God for his friends, outward-focus.

God got Job's attention to the needs of others instead of his own needs. As a direct result of that second outward focused event, Job's own situation was handled.

There were times, in years past, where God directed me to pray for others' needs and my own were miraculously taken care of. It's possible there is a principle at work here that transcends the specific events of Job's life.

Perhaps, when we turn out attention from our own wants, needs, desires, to the needs of others; our life's mission and purpose can be more clearly expressed.

Perhaps, we cannot be blessed in and of ourselves but we can be a conduit of The Blessing that flows through our lives to others. We receive "blessings" in the process but it's only when the hose of our life is "turned on" to pour out on others.

We cannot be a reservoir of God's blessing, but we can be a conduit. Darrell Wolfe

Selah.

Darrell G. Wolfe

Storyteller | Writer | Thinker | Consultant | Multipotentialite

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The Rapture Debate

https://bible.org/article/rapture-debate

In this great article, Sid Litke shows that The Rapture and The Second Coming must be different events. There is no other form scriptural stance.

He mentions the less popular view of a Mid Trib Rapture.

In light of a recent video teaching I watched, I'm exploring this as another possible interpretation. Nothing in this article, linked above, would negate a Mid Trib Rapture except the concept of imminence.

Believers are looking to the return of Jesus as the next event that could happen at any moment.

In the event of a Mid Trib Rapture, you can literally set the calendar for the exact day off Jesus' return. This fails the imminence test.

It requires further review and study, but my gut impression is to say anything other than a PreTrib Rapture fails sound scripture reading on the whole.

Still studying though.

Darrell

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