The Stories That Beg to Be Written

And What To Do About It

Within you reside tales of hope and of love, of frustration and sadness, of fear and desperation. Of happiness and adventure, of insight and epiphany.

These tales call to you with varying degrees of patience. Every day you hear their whispers, like the echoes of a dream, they are the pieces of those tales that clutch to the fervent allure of life, the belief that soon you will release them into the world, to inhale the mighty air of their peers, and to sit side by side with their contemporaries.

They yearn to know form by your hand, through your perspective, and through your passion. They wish only for this small chance, this small opportunity to come to light, so that others may read them, know them, and perhaps, share them.

And yet, how long will these tales endure as prisoners of your soul, kept in chains by fear, reluctance, and hesitation. To ignore their pleas is an injustice. Not a worldly injustice, where there are many to help, but few who will.

No. An injustice because you are the sole teller of your tales. You are the master of ceremonies, the leader, the liberator, the writer, and by revealing your tales, your hidden sparks of creation, you can change the world. You can change your own world. And isn’t it about time?

Deep down we all know, more of our dreams have died inside than outside.

Because of the roles I have taken as an editor and writer for ILLUMINATION and ILLUMINATION-Curated, I have had the privilege to work alongside a multitude of kindhearted, well-intentioned, aspiring writers and editors.

With a strong spirit of collaboration, these publications, along with their newest sister publications, Technology Hits, ILLUMINATION’s Mirror, and SYNERGY, continue to provide some of the best opportunities for writers of all skill levels. And I am happy to be a part of this great community of publications.

From a young age, writing has been a passion of mine. But back then there weren’t as many opportunities as there are now. It was just sending typed-up articles and manuscripts to magazines and book publishers with all these formatting rules and query processes. Looking up publisher’s addresses in obscure books from the library, and the backs of old magazines. Envelopes, postage, and handling. Oh, my!

To all the writers back then, who were able to navigate through all that and get it done — you are my heroes!

I grew up in America, but with limited means, and as a consequence, limited dreams. I know those things would never hold back the exceptional, but I suspect back then, that even as bright as I was, my dreams and ambition were just average. I settled for merely reading books from the local library and writing in a tattered spiral notebook when I could. Maybe I would do it one day, just not then.

Well, time and technology change everything, don’t they?

When I first began writing on Medium, I’ll admit I really didn’t know how to take advantage of everything it was offering me. I thought being part of a publication was absolutely unnecessary. I even wrote about it in this article.

But that particular article is what would eventually lead me to joining ILLUMINATION as a writer. It’s kind of funny when I think back on it. To be fair to myself, many of the publications I encountered in the beginning were nothing like ILLUMINATION. They were just microcosms of the same systems that I had encountered before. A lot of rules, a lot of scrutiny, and a lot of rejection. If you throw in little-to-no guidance and little-to-no empathy, it could really make a person want to give up on their writing dreams.

Medium wasn’t all bad though. There were many individual writers who would read my work and offer praise and encouragement. Complete strangers. I can’t express how incredible they made me feel. Those individual comments put the biggest smile on my face. That’s why I kept writing here. That’s why I joined ILLUMINATION.

You see, on this platform, one reader can make the single biggest contribution to your dream. One editor can improve your writing skills for the rest of your life. And one publication can present your work to the entire world, just because. Those are powerful things, wonderful things.

Embracing the power of individual contribution, I am taking this moment to create awareness of two of my own publications. While I will still remain a part of the ILLUMINATION family of publications, I don’t feel my journey with Medium would be complete without also starting my own.

My publications center around fiction, and though you may also continue to publish fiction with ILLUMINATION, I wanted to offer another home for the stories similar to the ones I grew up reading. Authors like Ray Bradbury, Robert Silverberg, Fred Saberhagen, and perhaps my favorite author David Gemmell filled my mind with awe and wonder. Their stories have remained with me all this time, and I am grateful for their work.

Here is my contribution to the genres of wonder and possibility.

Fantasy, fiction, science fiction, horror, myths, legends, westerns, epic poetry.

Resources and techniques for writing fiction. Author, book, movie and TV show reviews. And most importantly, stories about how fiction has impacted the real world in general, and you personally.

If you would like to see your stories here, let me know in the comments. I will add you to both publications because I know if you have stories for one, you have stories for the other.

If you are already a short story writer for Medium, that’s great. You can get started right away. If you are a book author, I want to let you know you can write an entire novel by posting a chapter at a time, if you would like. Allowing you the opportunity for immediate feedback and giving you the chance to make changes as you go.

In other words you don’t have to spend months (years?) writing, editing and completing an entire novel, then cross your fingers and hope it does well. That was how it had to be done in the past. But remember time and technology? You could write something right now and publish it tonight. Later on, you could gather up all your chapters and self-publish a novel out of them. It’s all up to you.

Take a good look at all these publications before you. Here is a chance to experiment and practice. Here is a chance to get your work out into the world and create greater visibility. Here is a chance to be a part of something really big, and quite possibly life-changing.

I believe there is a bit of genius hidden in the stories that beg to be written. But when ignoring the whispers just doesn’t work anymore, maybe it’s time for a bit of madness. Take care, and I hope to hear from you soon.

Thank you for reading. You can subscribe to my future content here. I share my articles on Leadership and Management and their application to your world on my publication, The Endeavor Perspective. You can also check out my fantasy and fiction publication, A Bit of Madness, as well as its non-fiction counterpart, A Bit of Genius.