BICHOK!

No it’s not Klingon, but it is a battle cry. If you want to write a book you must put your butt in a chair and your hands on the keyboard.

I had forgotten this phrase, until this last week. I, like so many others, found myself home due to freezing weather. So much time to write, but so many distractions; coffee to savor, a novel I haven’t read, movies to watch, even the dust bunnies started calling my name after awhile.
I was looking through some papers and found the letters written in the margin of a manuscript. Oh, the memories that simple phrase brought back.

Many years ago, four youthful writers met every Wednesday night. They were convinced that their dreams of publishing and seeing their names on best selling lists would soon arrive. We would write, read, critique, and pass along marketing news. Many times, when parting, the evening air would ring with this phrase, BICHOK. I don’t think it’s original to our group, but we sure used it-lots. With this simple phrase we challenged and encouraged each other to write every day, write more than yesterday. Come to critique with your best pages and try to make them better.

Support, encourage, commiserate

Even though we no longer meet weekly, we still encourage, challenge, commiserate the rejections, work on plots, and critique each other’s work. That’s a sacred task-helping a friend achieve their publishing dreams.
So today I want to encourage you live your dream, whatever it is. If you’re a writer I want to challenge you to write, write more than yesterday. Submit your work, believe in yourself and BICHOK.

Ella