By Tammy Karasek
Adult coloring books are popular now. I have a stack myself.
I’ve always loved to color and for years our daughter would try to find a new
pack of crayons for my stocking at Christmas. Often a new fun book would be
sticking out of the top of the stocking, too. Now we don’t have to color in
children’s books. We also don’t have to use crayons. We have a huge assortment
of colored pencils and fancy adult books in which to use them.
I’ve always used coloring as a stress reducer, even though
I’d probably be considered a little OCD about staying in the lines, or that the
colors would be balanced in a paisley design. Just the experience of slowing
down and coloring was a way to slow down my mind. But I colored it my way with
no pressure to color it the way everyone else did. If you do color, are you the
type that must stay in the lines or are you okay with the occasional slip over
the edges?
Though how does coloring relate to writing you might ask.
Quite a bit of parallel I would answer.
In writing we have certain rules or lines we need to stay
within. But the way we write within those lines is chosen by us. Like we might
choose pink (I would!) to color the flower, we also choose the words to best describe our
thought or design if you will.
Even though we have the choice to stay within the lines or
rules, we can also sneak a little over the line. We get to add a little flair
to the picture. As writers, we are using words rather than colored pencils to
tell our story—or color our page. And each of us will use our own creativity to
do that. We may choose carnation or a fuchsia pencil rather than just pink to
liven up our story. We’re staying pretty much within those lines, but we’re
going bold to make our statement pop. Or we may go with taupe or grey instead
of cream to subdue the story.
If you like to color, are you the type that stays perfectly
within the lines and uses the basic eight colors? Or are you a daredevil and go
bold with the 64 pack and go over the lines?
And what type of writer are you? Do you stay in the lines or
take it to the edge? Do you write with bright colors and show your
personality—your voice—in your writing?
For me, I’ll be grabbing that fuchsia pencil, thank you very
much.
You’ll
find Tammy Karasek seeing
humor and causing laughter in every aspect of life. Her past, filled with
bullying and criticism from family, is the driving force of her passion to
always encourage others and give them The
Reason to smile. She’s been married to her college sweetheart, Larry, for
37 years, a mom to their grown daughter, Kristen, and wrapped around the paw of
a little dog named Hattie. Born and raised in Ohio, her family now resides in
South Carolina. She is the President of Word Weavers Upstate SC, member of ACFW
and My Book Therapy/Novel Academy. She’s the Blog Editor for Word Weavers
International. A Conference Assistant for Blue Ridge Christian Writers
Conference. A monthly contributor for The Write Conversation. A contributor in
the 2018 Divine Moments Compilation Book—Cool-inary Moments. Also a regular contributor
to several other blogs. Connect with
Tammy: Email: tlkarasek@gmail.com Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/tammy.karasek Twitter:
https://twitter.com/tickledpinktam
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tammykarasek/
Website: https://tammykarasek.com
No comments:
Post a Comment