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New Day Herald

How I Write with Spirit

The author of Lighty, the Light Light shares how he co-creates the MSIA Christmas Eve skits with Spirit and crossed-fingers.

John Hruby is currently the Director of Event Production at the University of Santa Monica. He is also a Writing and Creativity Coach. Space Spiders on Prom Day is his first novel. He lives with Amy, his awesome wife and his two awesome kids Connor and Cayden in Los Angeles.


Dear God, help me to write something useful and funny.

That’s my short writing prayer. You can see my full writing prayer inserted in this article, but I’ve learned that when it’s time to write it’s time to write. Save the long prayers for prayer time. I said this short prayer just moments ago when I found myself looking at the fantastic, vibrant, white screen of my Mac laptop. The glowing, blank, electronic page was waiting for me with anticipation. I believe the naked canvas is not good or bad. It’s the state of the writer that determines how he/she views the blank page (paper or computer).

The first thing I usually do is turn down the brightness on my computer screen. Today, right now, it’s 6:06 a.m., and I just woke up. The white screen is pretty bright and my eyes are still adjusting. I like to get up early and write before the rest of the family wakes. I’m a morning person and it’s quiet in the morning.

I’ve come to view the blank page as a possibility. I say, “It will be interesting to see what happens today.” I try to say this with adventure and whimsy. Sometimes I say it with crossed fingers. To be honest, I do view writing this way, but I try not to think even this when I start. My intention is to NOT think at all. When it comes to creating, I have found the best practice is to start. That is why setting myself up for success the night before I write is so important.

Awesome Success Tip #1: Set Yourself Up for Success.

The Night Before Writing

It’s the night before writing and all through the house,
I prepare my computer with keyboard and mouse.

Cayden my eight year old is sleeping in bed,
Connor my teen says he’s wide-awake in his head.

The leftovers are wrapped and are in the fridge keeping cool,
And the kids’ snacks are all packed and ready for school.

Sometimes the house is tidied and the laundry is folded (or not),
Schedules are coordinated: sports, karate, school play, sleepovers, it’s a lot.

I open my laptop in the midst of this perfect storm,
I pull out a sweater and my slippers so I’ll be warm.

Because when God wakes me before the sun rises,
I need to sit quickly so I’ll catch the creative surprises.

I’ve learned it’s best to start and not to think,
It’s best to sit and start typing, to establish the link.


ndh_2016_05_johnhruby


Here’s how I set myself up for success: My goal is to arrange everything so that when I wake at 5 or 6 a.m., I can literally turn on two lights, slip on my slippers, put on a robe, press the spacebar (waking up my computer) and start typing. Starting writing HAS to be as easy as picking up the remote control and turning on the TV. I have found it very helpful to remove as much friction as possible.

Sometimes, at night, I look and feel like a zombie as I pull out my laptop and warm clothes. The good news is, the creative mind is not really needed for this first step. I can be exhausted—toast—and still set myself up for success. In the A.M. I will be refreshed and this extra ten minutes of zombie setup will pay off. Before going to bed, I pull out my laptop, plug it in, open it to the place of the story I’m working and put out my robe and slippers (if it’s going to be cold in the morning).

If all of this is not set in place, I have found myself staying in my warm bed in the morning.

Awesome Success Tip #2: Start Before You’re Ready.

The above poem is a good example of the joy and surprises I experience when I write. I had no intention of writing a poem this morning. But when I wrote, “The Night before writing … ” I said to myself, “Oh geez, I’m going to write a cheesy poem based on that famous Christmas Eve poem. I hope it’s entertaining.”

I actually thought that because I have found that when creating I have no idea if what I write will make it from the first draft to the second. Ideally, it will. Sure, it’s a good idea for me to have an intention in mind, so that I set the rudder of my creative boat in the direction I plan to go. But I’ve found it’s best to be open to the adventure of creativity. When I start I never know if I’m going to co-create a bald eagle or platypus—both cool in their own right, but very different from each other.

I made a promise to God a while back. The conversation went something like this:

God. I’ve been playing around with this intuition thing. I’ve been listening and hearing you for some time. In many cases I’ve followed my intuition and things have worked out swell. I have also run tests and NOT followed that little voice to see what will happen, and things didn’t work out so well. After all these adventures (and more than a few judgments and much compassionate self-forgivenesses), I can honestly say that I’ve gotten to a point in my life where I trust my intuition, gut, heart, soul, Spirit, You and follow it (most of the time).

So God, I’m going to do this writing thing with you now. When an idea comes to me, I’m going to go with it. I’m not going to think. If I’m writing a story and a character is wearing a scarf and I see it as a red scarf, I’m going to make it red. I’m not going to think, I’m just going to do it and we’ll see what happens.

Thank you, God. I anticipate good times and interesting adventures with you. And, on a side note, if you could help out the Cleveland Browns next year, that would be really great.

Awesome Success Tip #3: Be Open to Inspiration a.k.a. Be OK with Spirit Saving Your Creative Butt.

I’ll share two real life examples of ideas just “popping into my head” and how “going with the ideas” and co-creating Spirit assisted me with my writing. The first example is with writing the first Lighty the Light Light Christmas Eve skit. The second involves writing my first novel, Space Spiders on Prom Day. Yes, you read that correctly. Not the usual stuff MSIA ministers write. And, I know what you’re also thinking: Finally, someone is writing an action adventure, sci-fi, over-the-top, romance, thriller about Prom. (Thank God, literally.) But first I feel called to share this.

My writing mantra is “To Entertain and Enlighten.”

I believe people want to be enlightened while they are being entertained. Some people don’t know this and I’ve found it’s often a good idea not to mention it to them. Why do I think this? People went to see Star Wars (The New Hope IV – the first Star Wars movie that opened in theaters in 1977) for Darth Vader, Chewbacca, light sabers, R2-D2, hyper-speed, and Leia’s super cool hair-do. I was ten and I saw this “first” Star Wars movie in the theaters about seven times. The Stormtroopers, romance, and droids grabbed my attention just as they did with so much of America. But there was something more that intrigued my young Jedi mind. I was introduced to the Force. This was the first time I considered spirituality with what many consider a Buddhist slant. I learned the Force is in everything and I’m connected to everything. Sure, my dogmatic hit-me-with-a-ruler religion of my upbringing told me God was in everything, but I never felt like they meant it. I always felt my religious instructors really felt that God was with US, you know, the “true” believers, and not so much with the heathens that didn’t do exactly like us. Obiwan didn’t play this judgmental game. The Force was in everything and he meant it. I consider old Ben Kenobi my first wise teacher and mentor. A few years later, Yoda was my second.

Sure, I could use everything I learned from “my religious God” to help me to pay attention in school, walk their version of the straight and narrow path, and experience a lot of guilt and shame along the way (boring and not so healthy). Or I could use the Force to wheel my lightsaber, use the Jedi mind trick on the weak-minded, and blast my X-Wing fighter at just right the moment to blow up the Death Star (exciting and empowering). This was the first time I realized God could be fun AND practical. I could be a co-creator with God. Life could be an adventure and I could be guided by the Force to do really cool things.

As I grew older I also consciously realized science fiction could actually reveal more wisdom and truth than actual people who were instructing me and supposedly teaching me the Truth.

Awesome Success Tip #4: Entertain first (because God is fun) and then enlighten (just enough).

Lighty, the Light Light

In 2009, I felt called to be in charge of the kids’ room during the L.A. minister meetings. MSIA calls the kids morning program, H.U.G.S. which stands for Helping Us Grow Spiritually.

Julie Lurie was heading up the kids room at that time. Her kids had grown and she was being called to participate with NOW Productions in the other room streaming the Ministers Meetings. My kids were then four and nine, and while I was a little concerned about leading a pack of wonderful (and perhaps wild) kids I felt called to say yes. My lovely wife Amy said she’d help too and for this I am forever grateful.

When I was asked to do something with the kids for Christmas Eve I was horrified. I’ve been told I don’t sing well. Also, my experience of getting my kids to practice anything was proving less promising than my singing voice.

So I did what most people do. I relied on God and money. I’ve been writing since I was a pre-teen so I decided to write a story I could read. This would take the pressure off the kids. Cayden and Lucinda were only four. They were cute as all get-out but did not have a lot of on camera experience yet. I also offered to pay Connor and Cayden to get on them on stage because they were skeptical and perhaps a bit scared. (Please don’t tell Lucinda and the other kids that I paid Connor and Cayden. I didn’t need to pay the others so I never offered. I guess I was developing producer skills too.)

As a writer, I knew I needed to make the Light a specific character and give it a personality so the kids could better understand and relate to it. I didn’t want to talk about the Light in an all-encompassing way. J-R and John Morton do that far better than I. What I needed for the story was Lighty the Light Light. Something fun to hear and say (to help bring in the joy of Christmas Eve) and something the H.U.G.S. kids (and the kid in everyone of us) would enjoy.

There’s a point in the first Lighty the Light Light story where the kids in the story fight over Lighty the Light Light. I knew that wasn’t good. Fighting in a Christmas story based on the idea of scarcity is probably not at the core of MSIA’s teachings nor a part of the original Christmas story. But I was stuck. Both kids in the story wanted to have Lighty the Light Light and there was only one. Fortunately for me, I had been creative enough in my life that I wasn’t worried. In fact, I’ve learned getting stuck just means I’ve used up all of me and now it’s time for me to be surprised. It’s time for some more from somewhere else to show up. I probably said something like this: “I wonder how this is going to work out?” Which brings me to…

Awesome Success Tip #5: Saying “I wonder…” opens me up to receiving input from Spirit.

Whenever I’m ready for inspiration or an idea that could assist me, I say, “I wonder …”
It’s a great way of opening me up to Spirit, to inspiration, to receiving something new.

• I wonder what would make this scene more exciting?
• I wonder what would make the second act of my story work better?
• I wonder how this Space Spider is going to sneak up on Chevy and Sweetie?

And this is what happened when I was co-creating the first Lighty story with Spirit. The idea I needed came to me. The kids in the story realized there isn’t just one Lighty. They realized the more they used and sent the Light, the more there is. The kids sent Lighty to many different people, even Grouchy Edna who gave them socks as Christmas gifts.

When I started writing the first Lighty story I didn’t know how it was going to end. I didn’t even know the middle. I just started writing and trusting that the story “would all come to me when I needed it.” Fortunately for me I had been writing for a while so I learned I could trust God, Spirit, the Creative Process, whatever you like to call it.

One more point that I’d like to focus on here. I have found this to be very useful when I’m coaching my writing clients: I’ve discovered that it’s not useful for me to say, “I don’t know what to do.” My word is my law in my world. Declaring this is not useful in being creative. That’s why I recommend writers (and all artists) ask themselves instead, “I wonder what I would like to read if I was reading the book I’m writing? I wonder what I would like to see if I was watching the movie I’m writing?

Example #2

Here’s a specific example of how I worked with God when I wrote Space Spiders on Prom Day.

The main heroes of this story are Chevy and Sweetie. They are high school seniors and they have been sweethearts for some time now. However, Sweetie is the Prom Committee leader and Chevy thinks Prom is a waste of money. (Notice how I created conflict right away to make the story more interesting. This is not Spirit-led. This is Writing 101.)

Awesome Success Tip #6: Know your craft. Practice. Do your Research.

I believe one of the responsibilities of an artist is to give God something to work with. What do I mean by that? Mozart supposedly heard a song inside his head and then he sat down and played the song on the piano. If I heard a song inside my head I could not sit down and play it. I don’t know what a D minor or a C sharp sounds like nor do I want to take the time to find out.

I have written. I have read books about writing. I have taken classes. I have paid professionals for feedback. I have belonged to writing groups. I believe every writer and artist has a responsibility of learning their craft, so when inspiration comes the artist can move with ease and grace, incorporating the “download” or “intuitive hit” into the physical form.

Doing research gives me material to create my story. When I started writing Space Spiders on Prom Day I decided to place Chevy, Sweetie, and their friends in Pennsylvania. Why? After doing a little research, I found out there are 500,000 hunters in the state of Michigan but there are 900,000 hunters in Pennsylvania (PA). So I chose PA. I decided the story would be more realistic for high school seniors to successfully shoot machine guns if they were raised shooting rifles and shotguns. Because when you’re writing a story about giant sixteen foot spiders from space you want your story to be as realistic as possible. 😉

Here is the specific Spirit example I feel called to share:

One day when I was writing Space Spiders on Prom Day, I had an idea that was either brilliant or lousy, a bald eagle or platypus—I didn’t know at the time. If the idea worked out well (and it did), I would later call it “inspired.” If it didn’t make it to the next draft then it was a thought, a risk, an idea that didn’t pan out. One of Chevy’s best friend is SNAFU, and they are both members of the high school hunting club. Here is the line:

There is only one female in the hunting club, and she’ll karate chop you in your head if you so much as bump into her.

I wrote down the line as soon as I thought it because that is my agreement with God.

When I wrote this line I had no idea who this young woman was or how she might fit into the story. It came to me, and I wrote it down. No thinking. I then continued writing the story. I knew she might be interesting because she is the only female in the male dominated hunting club. I also knew she would probably be interesting because she knew karate and possessed some sort of bad attitude. But I didn’t know her name, backstory, character arc, or what she might accomplish.

I have learned that thinking is really good, but not when I’m in the middle of creating. Action is very useful when I’m creating—specifically, typing. Thinking is very useful when pondering and/or rewriting, but not necessarily when I’m actually typing.

So flash forward about a month and 150 pages later and I arrive at another exciting part of the story. I’m going to be vague here because I’d rather not write “spoiler alert” when discussing my own story. So I get to the part of the story when some of the characters are having a challenge with the arachnids from space. They are down to their last grenade. It doesn’t look good. Then, others show up and I realize as I write this that one of these others is the “female in the hunting club” and then it came to me, she is the ex-girl of so-and-so and she’s still upset with him. Do you see how wonderful this is? In the middle of the apocalypse, we have teenage dating angst. Fantastic! And, what is really fun for me was that this was an inspired idea from somewhere other than myself. What a fun surprise.

Awesome Success Tip #7: Remember God is the constant. The writer is the variable.

I often believe God writes through me. I was about three years into Space Spiders on Prom Day when I suddenly felt like I understood and was actually doing what my ministerial blessing talked about. One of the lines of my ministerial blessing is something like, “you will be doing the work and you won’t be doing the work.” For years I’d say to myself, “What does that mean?” Then, one morning when I was writing Space Spiders, I felt it. I was doing the work – I was writing – and I wasn’t doing the work – it was flowing through me.

I have come to realize that when God creates through me, God is the constant. I am the variable. God through me is going to be very different than God through you. And, thank goodness. We don’t need two people on the planet creating the same art or writing the same stories in the same way. That would be boring and redundant.

So for me, it is really important to embrace my uniqueness. It is important for me to own it. It is important for me to celebrate it. Dylan is Dylan. Bruce Springsteen is the Boss. And Lady Ga Ga is forever changing. Catcher in the Rye is very different than Fifty Shades of Gray. Let’s celebrate that.

Awesome Success Tip #8: Being in the FLOW with Spirit means Fun Loving Oneness Writing.

Inside of me I have a joy meter. If I’m having fun and laughing and experiencing joy then I consider I’m on the right track with allowing my godness to flow.

Flow = Fun. Loving. Oneness. Writing.

I believe writer’s block comes from judging myself or my writing, as well as trying to figure out what I’m going to write before I start.

To keep flowing, I’ve come to realize it’s important for me to have fun, to be loving toward myself and others, to trust that I’m connected and one with everything, and to start writing the next sentence even if I’m not aware of how’s it going to end.

Awesome Success Tip #9: There is no such thing as a mistake. It’s called a first draft.

I use this one even when I’m writing an email. I have found it is really useful to say to myself, “This is just the first draft. I’m getting ideas down. I’m having fun. I’m just going to wing it.” Then I say, “I’m going to write the book I’d like to read. I’m going to write the movie I’d like to see. I’m going to rewrite this so there is no pressure. This doesn’t have to be perfect.”

So these are some of the ways I create with Spirit. I often feel like I write something better than me. If I surprise myself and make myself laugh out loud or cry and I didn’t see it coming – then where did that writing come from? I mean, how can I surprise myself? I find it very interesting.

Lots of Loving and Light,
John Hruby

P.S. Christmas Eve 2016: The H.U.G.S. kids and I have been asked to do another Lighty the Light Light story and we have said yes!

If you missed or would like to experience the blessing of the Christmas Eve events again, The Lighty the Light Light skits are the first live performances after the Welcome and the Calling in the Light of each of these events. Click here to view the most recent event.

Space Spiders on Prom Day: Invading and available on Amazon on Wednesday, June 15, 2016


Read the complete NDH May / June 2016 Edition

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