Show and Tell through the 5 Senses

Do you remember when you were younger and you had a show and tell day at school; a day when you were asked to bring an object in that was of particular importance to you and share it with your class? Sharing involved showing them the object, and often passing it around so that everyone could get up close and personal, while you talked about what it was, and what it meant to you.

At school, the ideas of show and tell were combined in a simple exercise. The show part allowed us to relate more fully to the object. We could feast our eyes on it, pick it up, turn it over in our hands, and feel its weight, shape, and texture. Depending on what was being shared, it might have given off sounds, or scents, or perhaps we were able to taste it. Gaining an experiential view of the object, we could relate more fully to what our classmates told us about it. We didn't just hear about how it made them feel, we got to experience those thoughts, feelings, and emotions for ourselves.

Let's stop for just a moment and imagine that someone had brought in a rose for show and tell. As it was gently passed around, everyone would have been able to smell the intoxicating bouquet from its sweet petals. They would have felt the juxtapositional sensations of its woody stem, coarse leaves, sharp thorns, and soft smooth petals. They would have been able to admire the beauty of the flower blooming in all its glory. They may have sampled a taste of its petals if they were adventurous! In short, they got to understand and relate to the thoughts and feelings of the speaker, about the rose, through the lens of first-hand personal experience. The show part of the presentation supported and complemented the tell, allowing the audience to be more fully immersed.

As writers, we sometimes forget that even though we only have our words to share with our readers, we can still give them the show experience if we use our words well to immerse the reader into our own experience of the scene we are writing about. Words are powerful and we have such rich and descriptive language available to us. We can show how much we love and appreciate the beauty of roses without actually uttering the words: love or beauty. Through sensory-based descriptions, we can relay the feelings and emotions of our characters by sharing how our characters perceive and understand the world around them, and how they respond to the sensory inputs they experience. Whether it be an object, character, action, or experience we are describing, we have so much artistry at our disposal.

The human body receives sensory information through 5 primary senses; namely:

1. touch - including skin sensations
2. sight
3. hearing
4. smell/scent
5. taste

If we want to immerse our readers, we don't want to tell them everything and leave nothing to the imagination. Rather, we want them to experience the scene for themselves and draw their own conclusions. When it comes to wanting to connect them with how our characters are feeling and to evoke specific responses from our readers such as empathy or sadness, frustration or anger, we need to place ourselves inside our characters, walk their walk, talk their talk, and see the world through the lens of their perspective. We need to describe how every sight, sound, smell, taste, or touch impacts them. Share what effect those sensory interactions have on their body, mind, heart, and soul, and how that may dictate or guide their character's responses, through their decisions and actions. You need to make the reader feel as though they are right there in the scene, seeing, feeling, hearing, touching, tasting, and experiencing your character's world alongside them.

You can find a great little article by @jayna written for @theinkwell that will help you understand how to use show in your writing to create more impactful stories. Top tip: After reading and assimilating the short article, read the comments too!

Show Don't Tell

Magical Realism

Magical realism is Reedsy's writing genre of the week and I thought it would be a great one to tackle this month for dreem-wotw. Shaelin Bishop, from Reedsy.com explains magical realism in a way that makes it understandable to most. She says:

"Fabulism, also known as magical realism, is the inclusion of magical elements in an otherwise realistic story. The catch — and what makes it differ from fantasy — is that here, the magical elements are never explained. They don’t need to be logical, but are instead symbolic: a way to explore themes or emotions by bending (or breaking) the rules of reality. The result is uncanny, strange, dream-like, but also human and tender.

Fabulism asks you to be wildly imaginative, creative, and to dig into emotions and themes that are so profound or bizarre that they can only be expressed through a little bit of magic. The need to be logical is removed, and you can let your imagination run wild. Let this be your chance to write something strange, experimental, or unexpected. Think about possibility, rather than limits. _{Shaelin Bishop}

You may come up with any story of your choosing provided it showcases both Magical Realism AND Show don't tell.

If you need some inspiration, here are a few prompt ideas for Magical Realism from the Reedsy site that you could use:

1. Write a story where a regular household item becomes sentient.

2. Start your story with it raining... anything but rain (eg: flowers, cutlery, seashells, running shoes).

3. Write a story where the laws of time and space begin to dissolve.

4. Write a story where your character is traveling a road that has no end.

5. Write a story about an artist whose work has magical properties.
   _{Shaelin Bishop}

_{(Note: If you would also like to enter your finished piece into Reedsy's contest, see note at the bottom of this post)}

IT IS THE ONLY DATE AND TIMEFRAME WITHIN WHICH SUBMISSIONS WILL BE ACCEPTED FOR THE S3 R5 CONTEST IN DREEMPORT.

_{The curation/submission cycle starts and ends at these times so there is unfortunately little room for flexibility. All valid submissions to Dreemport will be reviewed and ranked by public curators the following day.}

_{Part of the grading process includes an allocation of points for engagement... but engagement is only assessed if you do Dreemport curation of the contest posts in Dreemport on the day following the contest submission date. Simply log in to Dreemport on Monday 4th March, curate (ie: read and engage😜), and rank the 5 random contest posts assigned to you.}

_{The top 5 in Dreemport will automatically be shortlisted for grading for dreem-wotw prizes, alongside other entries of merit put forward by members of the grading team. We will also be able to access the top 5 Dreemport staff entries in the background and will run two contest pools to keep staff and public entries separate 😊}

_{The dreem-wotw team will then use a Merit grading system that incorporates some aspects of the ORIGINAL Merit Grading Model developed by @scholaris and others added by @juliamulcahy in order to determine the winners.}

_{If there are fewer than 5 entries in the staff contest pool, the dreem-wotw grading team reserves the right to award prizes only to those staff entries that are clearly amongst the top-scoring entries, considering all entries in both pools.}

How to use Dreemport
_{If you have not used Dreemport before, you will need to register on dreemport.com, which is a quick and easy process.
You may want to start by taking a look at these videos by @dreemsteem ...}

_{Getting started on dreemport}

_{If anyone has any difficulty registering and trying out the platform, please tag me or @wrestlingdesires here on this post and we will help you to get this little piece of admin out of the way as painlessly as possible 😊}

_{This month we are thankful to the following sponsors:}

@dreemsteem and @dreemport for Dreem tokens

@melinda010100 and @ecency for Ecency point sponsorship

@dibblers.dabs and @jfuji and The Scholar and Scribe creative writing community for Scholar and Scribe tokens.

@amberkashif for Ecency point sponsorship

This month Dreem-Wotw sponsors Dreemport Featured posts, Hive, and HBI, and adds to the Ecency point prizes.

Scholar and Scribe Sponsorship

_{Feel free to post your entry in the Scholar and Scribe community. All entries (no matter where you post them) can use the #scholarandscribe tag if you wish—this will help you earn both SCHOLAR and SCRIBE tokens.}

Learn more about S&S here and consider joining the community if you haven’t already.

Official Prizes will be as follows:

Public:

1st: 500 Dreem Tokens, 1 Dreemport Featured Post, 5 Hive, 350 Ecency points, 100 Scholar, 2 Scribe

2nd: 300 Dreem tokens, 2 HBI, 200 Ecency points, 50 Scholar

3rd: 150 Dreem Tokens, 1 HBI, 150 Ecency points, 50 Scholar

4th: 150 Ecency points

5th: 150 Ecency points

Dreemport Staff:

1st : 300 Dreem tokens, 5 Hive, 350 Ecency points, 100 Scholar, 2 Scribe

2nd: 150 Ecency points

3rd: 150 Ecency points

Miscellaneous prizes:

For using the Ecency front end:
Each entry made using the Ecency front end will receive 25 Ecency points sponsored by Dreem-WOTW.

Promotion draw:
Anyone who tags at least 2 new people (not already tagged in the post) who they think would like to take part in the contest, will be entered into a random draw where 1 person will win 250 Ecency points. So get tagging people who you think would be genuinely interested in taking part, and lend them a little encouragement to write and submit their posts.

Good luck folks and I hope to see lots of people taking part this month🤗

All new entrants each month will be added to the list.

Please let me know if you would prefer not to be tagged and you will be removed from the list, and if you are reading this and would like to be tagged going forward, please comment below and I will add you💗.