This is K.M. Island and you are listening to the 447 episode of the Helping Writers Become Authors Podcast.

It's been a month since I moved and a month since I wrote a post, recorded a podcast, or edited a word of fiction.

I tried to get ahead of myself as much as possible before moving, which turned out to be a good thing

since it took a whole month before I was able to get internet

installed in my new house. Note to self next time you move check on the internet

first thing and the result was that I did hardly anything work or writing related for almost a month other than check email once a day.

It ended up being kind of a nice break, one that allowed me to get fully settled before diving back into the normal routine. Now that I'm back in it though, I'm thoroughly enjoying it. It feels like home now.

And now I hope you enjoy today's topic. Five lessons from a lost novel. Mistakes are unavoidable. To fear them is to fear life

itself and to try to eliminate them is to waste life in a futile struggle against reality itself.

I dare say no one has more opportunities to learn these truths than does a writer.

As writers, our lives are a never-ending litany of mistakes.

Certainly mine has been full of mistakes,

everything from the opening sentences I wrote for this podcast, Thought Better of, and

replaced, to literally hundreds of thousands of deleted words I've carefully

saved from all my rough drafts to entire story ideas representing hundreds of hours of dedicated hopeful work

that have proven themselves unsalvageable and earned a dusty place in a back corner of a closet shelf.

I won't say I don't regret these mistakes.

I do. I regret the wasted time and effort.

I regret the bereavement of loving and nurturing something that never came to fruition.

I regret my own lack of foresight, wisdom, and understanding in failing to see pitfalls before I walked into them.

If I'm being really honest, I'll have to admit that given the chance I probably take back every single one of those mistakes. Fortunately, however, that is one mistake that the

very design of life will prevent any one of us from ever making. I can't take back my mistaken words, ideas, and stories, and in being robbed of the chance

...