Never Stop Moving

The phrase that became the mantra for inspirational dancer and teacher Eugene Louis Facciuto, better known as Luigi, was short, sweet, and powerful. “Never Stop Moving.” These three words had great meaning for him. When he was in his twenties, just beginning a career as a dancer in Hollywood musicals, his life nearly ended when he was struck by a car. He suffered such severe injuries his doctors told him he would be paralyzed for life. His career as a dancer was over before it began.

But Luigi refused to listen, especially to those who urged him to sit quietly in his hospital room and give up his dreams. He began to repeat, “Never Stop Moving” and live its message. He willed himself to walk, then to dance, eventually performing in such MGM classics as “An American in Paris” , “On the Town” and “Singin’ in the Rain”. He created a dance technique now taught the world over, specifically designed to keep dancers from being injured and to help heal those who’ve suffered injuries or illnesses. Luigi himself taught until he passed away in 2015 at the age of 90. Thousands of dancers continue to use his technique.

“Okay, Flo, this is really cool and we’re sure your toes are pointing and feet are flexing as you remember long, but fabulous, hours spent taking Luigi’s class. Fine. But what’s this got to do with me, the Generic Writer, sitting in front of my computer working on the Great American Novel?” Bear with me, GW. My toes are pointing and my feet are flexing but there’s a bigger point to this.

“Never stop moving.” The phrase, like Shrek’s character and Donkey’s parfaits, has layers.
The first is obvious. Physically MOVE. Odds are you’re sitting for hours every day in front of the computer, shoulders hunched,and neck forward. Remind yourself to get up every thirty minutes or so (set an alarm if you need to remember) and, if nothing else, do some arm jacks. A few squats. Move your body.
The second layer goes along with the first. Don’t quit. Or, to quote from “Galaxy Quest”, “Never give up! Never surrender!” Say you’re stuck in the middle of your first - or fiftieth - novel. You’ve reached a point where you hate the plot, the characters, the dialogue, the theme, the future cover, your spouse, your critique partner, and the dog who needs walking. Don’t stop the momentum. Take a break from writing and, like layer one, do something physical. Preferably more than the arm jacks or squats. Walk the dog. Jog to the park. Head to the kitchen and bake some zucchini bread. Put some old trashy disco on whatever device you use for music and dance around the house. (Sidenote: Try not to trip over the dog. No worries if you have a cat. Cats will never place themselves in danger of being stepped on, but dogs have a knack for finding spots right in the center of the action.) It doesn’t matter if you’re moving with the finesse of a trained dancer. Jump up and down flailing your arms. I AM a trained dancer but when I’m feeling frustrated I’ll slap Bruce Springsteen’s “Cover Me” on the CD player and literally just jump up and down flailing my arms. Amazing what it does for the psyche as well as the heart and lungs.

Then come back to the work in progress and regain the momentum, but maybe change things up a bit. Slow down your pace of writing for a few hours. Speed up your pace of writing for a few hours. Go for some stream-of-consciousness writing. Try writing a book in a week - or a month. (Talk about constant brain movement.) I repeat, don’t stop the momentum.

If you need to send a query to send to an agent or editor, that’s another way to keep moving, in terms of writing rather than physicality. It doesn’t matter if this is your first- or fiftieth- proposal. Published and unpublished authors face the same angst about rejection, along with the almost universally disliked creation of the dreaded synopsis, back cover blurb, and taglines. But instead of standing still and screaming, “I’d rather write a 500 page novel than this stupid synopsis, back cover or tagline! I'm mad as all get out and I'm not gonna take it anymore!" Move your mind into a different way of looking at all the above. Write five blurbs in longhand. (Tear up the paper if it’s bad). Check out TV trailers for ways to cram an entire plot into one or two sentences. Again, move your body away from the computer and out the door and walk the dog down the street making up taglines for each fireplug you pass. The one thing you DON’T do is say, “I’m stuck and I’m staying stuck so I’m quitting.” Shift the movement. Write the blurb or synopsis on a day when the characters refuse to cooperate in Chapter 10 and you have no clue how to get them to Chapter 11.

Similarly, when suffering an attack of “Promo-phobia” make yourself continue sending those ARCs to reviewers or posting on social media or contacting local bookstores about signings. I repeat, keep the movement going, including whatever you’ve been doing physically. When you’re exhausted, get back to accomplishing whatever tasks you can and stop worrying that you’ll never complete the 500 great suggestions provided by the marketing gurus on Facebook.

The third layer. This is the parfaits’ chocolate filling within your book. Check your work-in-progress. Is there an impetus at the end of each chapter for a reader to move to the next? And the next? Is your reader feeling paralyzed with boredom because every chapter is like the one before it in length, and the tempo has remained a fox trot for 300 pages instead of switching to a salsa now and again? Is your dialogue different in tempo for each character? Have you created characters who are earthbound and stagnant - or are they free to move and grow within the book? If you’re writing a series, are you stopping your characters from moving out of the niche where you placed them in Book One?

Finally, let’s layer a bit of whipped cream on top. When you finish the last chapter, is it really over ? Have you forced your reader to come to a complete halt by wrapping everything into a neat bow, or are they curious about what happens to the characters following Happily (or not) Ever After? Can you fire their imaginations and send them moving into the future, asking what that future holds for these people they’ve spent days living with? I just finished rereading an old Phyllis Whitney romantic suspense, “The Flaming Tree”which not only left me with some suggestions to give to a friend in need of healing, but made me wish Whitney had written a sequel so I could peek in on the heroine ten years later. Movement beyond the book itself.

And what about you, oh Generic Writer, and your own future movement? Have you stopped writing because you typed The End? Get moving again. Start a new book. Write a short story or an article or a poem. Writing begets writing. It’s a lot like exercise. Once you start you tend to want to keep going.

Never Stop Moving. Keep your momentum strong. Don’t quit. Add some layers to your work. Walk the dog now and then. The dog will thank you.
So will your body, your mind, and your spirit.