Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Blog posts that caught my eye on Twitter last week:
Blogging Tips: 6 Types of Twitter Tools That Come in Handy: http://dld.bz/K247 (more Twitter, less writing-focused)
Publishing Perspectives’ Dirty Girls and Self-Publishing: The Tricks of the Trade (fascinating…how a million-selling author went to self-publishing) http://publishingperspectives.com/2011/02/self-publishing-the-tricks-of-the-trade/
Joseph Finder’s (and other authors’) writing desk at Joseph Finder’s blog: http://bit.ly/h52RhR
Adventures In Children’s Writings’ Writer’s Tools: Worksheets & More: http://dld.bz/cXmN
Elizabeth Gilbert’s discussion on creativity (a video–and I don’t do videos. But this one challenged my thinking. Well worth the time) TED Talks http://bit.ly/hYnRcE" target="_blank"> http://bit.ly/hYnRcE
Andrew Jack’s Writing: Ten Websites for Writers Ten Websites For Writers http://wp.me/pyMqx-cR
Monday, February 14, 2011
Market Monday: Paying Personal Essay Markets
Today’s market listing is actually a past post from The Writer Abroad’s blog. I really like how she injects bits of herself and her own writing/submitting process to the markets. And I really love the idea of pitching your own essay series to a publication currently not running essays. Might have to give that a try…
The Writer Abroad’s Paying Personal Essay Markets
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Writing, Zen and You
A friend of mine has been going through a lot of complicated relationship issues (non-writing) and has been struggling with emotionally distancing himself from a situation he’s not likely to ever resolve the way he wants to because of a multitude of factors. I picked up on the pattern of how he is forever obsessing either about the things he did in the past or the fact that he doesn’t feel much hope for the future of the relationship, and this lead me to ask how often he lives in the moment.
Years ago when I worked at a Yoga studio, I had the extreme fortune of working with a gifted zen meditation teacher and through discipline, incorporated several of her meditation techniques for living in the moment into my daily life (and writing process) and somewhat take for granted that I am able to shut off/shut out the real world when necessary to get things accomplished–including writing. I wanted him to think about living in the moment, about blocking out all those painful emotions and thoughts to get through the hard parts of life, or at least give it the old college try.
His reply–this is a person I’ve been friends with since the age of 11–really surprised me: “I have never lived for the moment for one single day of my life.” He said he’s always mentally reliving the past or freaking out about the future but has never stopped to see the beauty of the moment right now.
Naturally, as I processed this, I started thinking to writing–and I wonder how many writers suffer from this inability to just suspend themselves in the beauty of the moment(s) they are given to write and …well…just write…instead of wasting that time worrying about what they finished in the past, what they can’t do as writers, what they’re not doing as writers–or filling themselves with a fear about the future of their writing.
Do you spend your daily writing time ( you *do* have a daily writing time, don’t you?) lost in thought over things that have nothing to do with the work in front of you? How often do you face the page and find an inability to focus because of something else going on in a different area of your life? To be successful (however you define success for your own self and career, not just in terms of selling lots of books) in writing–or any creative endeavor, really–you have to train your mind to create a safe, comfortable, warm, nurturing space IN YOUR MIND from which to work on a regular basis. If you show up to the page and allow the worry, fear and just general life-junk to clutter your thought processes while you’re trying to create, you’re going to end up on a fast train to nowhere. That fast train–aka life–will derail you quicker than any writing obstacle can. If you never allow yourself the luxurious necessity of creatively absorbed moments, you’ll be stuck in those past vs. future thoughts.
And writing happens in the now. There’s no two ways about it.
If you’ve never thought on this before, what are your thoughts now? Or, if you’re successful at leaving the real world at bay while you create, what advice would you give writers who have a hard time suspending themselves from reality to write? I’m curious to see what you think on this. Writing is much a state of mind as it is a physical act–so how do you get yourself into that creative frame of mind?
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Twitter Tuesday 2/8
I come across links to some of the *best* blog posts on writing via Twitter. Instead of hogging them all, like I did with that bag of Hershey Kisses last week, I think I’ll start sharing them on Tuesday. (Blog posts, not chocolate. Sorry…)
Here, in no particular order, are some of my favorites:
from Darcy Pattison’s Fiction Notes Blog: Character checklist: http://tinyurl.com/yzwo9op
from Freelance Folder.com’s Blog: 7 Tips for Using Your LinkedIn Profile to Land Great Projects http://bit.ly/hsBCnP
from Liz Michalski at Writers Unboxed blog: Full Boil or Slow Simmer? (on the writing process) http://bit.ly/ej875o
from Natania Barron’s blog: Six Ways Twitter Can Make You A Better Writer: http://t.co/CcP7gPI
from Kristen Lamb’s Blog: Non-Fiction and Using Your Uniqueness to Become an Expert http://bit.ly/fLe0fq
from Julie Isaac’s The Writing Spirit blog: How to Write Daily (Or Meet Whatever Writing Goal You Set) More Easily http://blog.writingspirit.com/2010/11/write-daily-part-1.html
Stop by these great blogs. Read one, read ‘em all. Tell ‘em I sent ya. Then, get yourself on Twitter to find more great reading of your own! (and Tweet me up while you’re there: @Buckeye_BethM)
Any of these posts really strike a chord with you? Which ones? Why? I’d love to hear your thoughts…
Monday, February 7, 2011
Monday Markets: Women’s Memoirs contests
I love planning ahead–that’s why I love this listing of 2011 monthly memoir contests at Women’s Memoirs. Each month’s contest and deadline is listed so we can work those into our writing schedule–nice. If only all editorial calendars were so organized!
If you’ve got a memoir, they’ve got a contest. Stop by and check it out:
While you’re there, check out the site as well. Great food for thought if you’re a memoirist/essayist. Let us know what you enter!
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
5 Ways to Become A Better Writer In 24 Hours
I love infomercials. My personal belief is that it’s a genetic quirk. If you’ve met my parents, you’ll know exactly what I mean. If there’s something new, improved or promises to give you a better life in an unrealistically short period of time, my parents will try it. Some people call them suckers, I call them adventurists. (I’m just glad I didn’t end up with a leopard-print Snuggie this Christmas).
In all the hype over get rich, get skinny, get beautiful quick schemes, I thought I’d jump in the mix with an infomercial of sorts for writers. Don’t worry, I’m not pawning anything off on you. No promises of writing more and publishing more, no insider secrets guaranteed to earn you millions. Just a couple of points to move your thinking in a more holistic way toward being a better writer regardless of genre and level of writing experience.
But wait, there’s more! If you act now, I’ll throw in a free post on Wednesday, too. How can you pass that up?
I think I’d better stop while I’m ahead. Besides, I just spilled my coffee. Where *is* that ShamWow?
5 Ways to Become a Better Writer in 24 Hours
Eliminate all whining, excuses and negativity
Life is too short and writing time is even shorter. When you continually bemoan your lack of a) published works b)money made from writing c) ability to finish a particular work d) time, energy, focus, …whatever it is you’re whining about, you immediately send your brain into negative mode. Negative mode is a time stealer and the real enemy to being a productive writer. Stop giving yourself excuses for not writing. Granted, real life loves wreaking havoc on your writing time (see below on how to plan for reality), but learn to simply accept setbacks and move on, not let them form like jagged ice crystals in your mind. When you let negative mode have its way with you, you preclude yourself from any type of writing success before you begin.
Forgive yourself
Life happens. Really. There are times we have grand plans to write, feel the urge to further our plot long into the night, have a second wind and the energy to do great things with our WIPs…then something pops up to derail our plans. It isn’t something strong enough to send us into negative mode, but it is strong enough to keep us from executing our writing goals for the moment. With that, we often subconsciously harbor guilt that we’re not paying enough attention to our writing when, in fact, simply through the act of deliberately planning to write we’re paying enough attention. When a stumbling block deters your moment, forgive yourself for the time you have to take from writing to focus on the real-world and forgive the time offender who took you away. Mindfully set your intention to get back to the writing as soon as humanly possible, then let the worry go. You’ll free up the feeling of guilt as well as freeing your mind to play with ideas from your WIP–a win/win on both accounts.
Show Up To the Page
I hear you–this is a no-brainer. But for some, this is the most difficult part of writing. At one time or another, some more than others, we set aside time in our days to write, to take time to focus our efforts on furthering our stories. But when the time comes to sit and write, a strange sort of fear paralyzes us into inaction. Personally, I’d often rather dust baseboards than start writing. I don’t know where to start or where to go, I feel apathy or frustration at my story. Whatever the reason, when you’ve set aside the time and have the ability, you MUST learn to face the page. For me, it takes the form of a journal where I do sit down and write, just not immediately on the WIP. I face the page of the journal and begin listing reasons why I can’t write or can’t begin. Within a few lines, I have strangely primed the pump for writing and immediately move over into the realm of working on my WIP again. Just like paying extra to have my infomercial purchases shipped faster, I have come to accept this resistance as a part of writing I don’t like but have to deal with–I may as well find a way that works to get me out of that mental fear.
Set a reasonable goal
This one takes time to do well. If you don’t learn to set reasonable, flexible goals, you won’t be going anywhere fast with your writing. We don’t want writing to take time. We want to crank out a story in a week, revise a manuscript in a weekend, sell 20 books each year and spend all the time we can immersed in creative thought. Sorry, but the world don’t work that way, sugar. Train yourself to be ultra-aware of the things going on around you so that you can set your goals accordingly. Know that at any time, you can reset your goals to honor your time and mesh with reality, but it takes practicality to do so. Setting goals too high will only lead to negative mode when you can’t meet them, and it spirals downward from there. Think of the smallest chunk of work you can do in the period of time you have, then set the goal and work upwards from there. Build for success.
Do what you CAN and don’t lament what you CAN’T
When one of our intentionally-set writing goals is rendered impossible to achieve by something we can’t control, it’s natural to feel a letdown, a loss of interest or just plain anger. Rather than letting negative mode have its way with your mind–by keeping you angry about what you can’t do because of something–retrain your thought processes to focus you energy and a new intention on what you CAN do. If you’ve got hopes of finishing the last 8 pages of a chapter but something unforeseen steals your time from you, think to what you can accomplish towards your original goal. If your writing time is completely vaporized, the best you can do is move on and look forward to a new day–but journal it first to release all that anger and frustration so you don’t carry it around and it doesn’t cloud your writing time tomorrow. If you’re lucky enough to have a chunk of time with which to work, say, 15 or more minutes, think backward from your original goal and break down the work into steps you could take in pieces of time–then go do the first, most logical piece. Maybe it’s just scratching down the outline of the end of your chapter or writing down the last paragraph. Maybe you know the end of the chapter well and can use the time to contemplate where to start the next chapter, or even back up a step and read over the first part of the chapter to keep your mind fresh. There’s a huge fallacy out there that we writers need enormous chunks of time in which to work. While that’s nice, it’s not practical. Learn, through practice, the ability to chunk your work to keep you moving forward on tasks you can complete when you might otherwise want to whine about what you can’t complete.
Becoming a better writer isn’t about having more and doing more. It’s about living more intentionally in the writing moments you do have. We can waste our lives away wishing for more writing time, but that ain’t gonna happen anytime soon. Refocus your wanting more time into believing you already have enough of the time you need and silence that negative mind mode with action and progress toward your writing goals.
Do you have any tricks to share about when life deals you a lemon in terms of writing time and focus? How do you get your mind back into creative mode when something throws you for a loop? I’d love to hear it. Wait, let me find my Snuggie first…this is gonna be good stuff! 
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Where To Start Your Weekend Writing?
The more writers I meet, the more writers I meet who have day jobs and aren’t fortunate enough (or so we think) to be able to devote all day, every day to writing. (You do know that’s a fallacy/fantasy, don’t you?) So we do the next best thing we know how: we try to squeeze bits of writing in our daily schedules as much as time allows, and plan for big chunks of writing to take place on the weekends.
Whether it’s giving attention to our blogs, cranking out another entire chapter or editing half of our WIP, those weekend hours devoted to the art and craft of writing are where we find our passion rekindled for creating–where we find the mojo to keep us focused on writing through yet another hectic work-week from which we often have to take time away from pursuing our passions.
Here’s where the question lies: are you just hoping your weekend will be full of writing? or are you actively planning your writing projects during the week? If you’re a weekend pantser (writing by the seat of your pants) and you actually get work accomplished that way–KEEP IT UP! That approach works for some, not others. If you plan for writing and actually sit down and write–KEEP IT UP! The strength of your planning is working for you.
So, I’m talking to all the rest of you who are wanting to write and have the time/space/energy/mental power to write but just never quite get your writing done (this excludes those of us taken from writing to put out fires that need attending. That happens). If you’re a writer who looks forward to your weekends for furthering your craft, and your time slips by without pen to paper, here’s a question:
Why?
What’s going on that trumps your creative wishes? One of the most common issues I hear writers discuss is that they don’t know where to start. They want to do this at the same time they’re doing that, and they want to start this chapter but need to edit this. Essentially, they’re spending all their time in procrastination, not creation.
How do we defeat this? You’re going to slap yourself in the forehead for this one, but it’s a simple solution: write. When you can’t focus your writing energies to know where to start, write about it. I guarantee, 1000%, that in the process of writing down what issue you’re facing with getting back into your writing, you will unlock the key to starting. I promise. Instead of thinking and dwelling in the land of thought, move your fingers into the land of action. We’re writers. We think with our pens and paper, right? So if you’re stuck there in the middle, attempting to find the starting thread, write about the confusion.
This advice has served me well. It’s how I get things done. We’ve all heard writing begets writing. It doesn’t have to be a lengthy piece to get us going, either. A few short words journaled in a notebook will often bring a clarity that hours of mental chasing cannot. Get out a pen and get down to what you want to be doing–writing.
How do you get yourself into action when your brain would rather procrastinate about writing? Do you write or have some other trick up your sleeve? I’d like to know (wouldn’t we all!) how you solve that dilemma. Share!
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
In a World Without Books, Would You Still Write?
I’m a big believer in the value of dreams, and the one I had last night is no different:
I dreamed there were no books. No magazines, no print material, no papers or Kindles or eReaders on iPhones, no internet browsing, nothing to read. Period.
After a quick stumble in the dark to my Kindle, which was still happily charging, I stopped hyperventilating and thought about this for a while.
No books meant no reading. That part made me almost hyperventilate again. That dream was far worse than the one I get when I eat chocolate right before bedtime and inevitably dream of a devil chasing me, or a devil in my closet of the room at my mom’s house where I grew up. Not good stuff. You can take the ‘no books, no reading’ whereever you’d like in terms of reading (oddly enough, I just recalled my post from yesterday on writers needing to read. Hmmm…)
But what my mind really played with was the idea that if there were no books, there would also be no writers. (No *published* writers, I should say. I believe that anyone who writes completed work is a writer and those who publish are published–I don’t believe you have to be published to be a writer) Sure, folks would still write–I also believe that’s a part of our spirit and our essence, stronger in some than others, and to deny it is to put ourselves through misery–but would YOU be one of those?
Think about that (the former statement, not the latter): if there were no books, what would you do? Would you continue to write? Or just find some other way to engage yourself in the world? What I really mean to ask is this: do you enjoy the process of writing enough WITHOUT the potential for publication to simply write for the sake of writing, to immerse yourself in the process?You know I’m a huge proponent on enjoying the process of writing as much as the publication aspect. After all, you’re spending twice the amount of time (or more) in the process of writing–you’d better enjoy it (given fluctuations of mood, of course. Even I who love writing have crappy writing days) because you’re not always guaranteed a publishable product.
If your response was yes, that’s a good thing. If you replied no, or you’re not quite sure, the real question for you is: how can you get it to a yes? What would you need to change in your writing process to get you to find it a more enjoyable way to spend your time if the possibility of publication didn’t exist.
I’m curious what you think. No, not about my ability to remember my dreams with crystal-clarity or that crazy chocolate devil (never eat before you go to bed!), but if the process of writing is enough within, in-and-of-itself for you to find pleasure in, if there were a world without published works–and how that would affect your writing process.
Leave me a comment & let’s see what you think
Monday, January 24, 2011
5 Reasons Writers Must Be Readers
Somewhere along the line, in the course of writing, we’ve heard that writers should also be readers. I’ve personally heard it from other authors, in agent speeches and editor workshops. But to this time-crunched society, adding one more thing to the “to-do” list can send some almost to the breaking point.
I hope you’re not one of those. If you’re a writer, you NEED to be a reader. You don’t have to finish a novel a week or even read an entire chapter in a weekend if your schedule doesn’t allow, but you do need to keep your nose in a book when the opportunities present themselves–or, god forbid–even schedule into your day a little reading time.
And I’ll give you five solid reasons why you’ll be a better writer for it.
1. Help keep your finger on the pulse of what’s popular.
Some authors read “popular” to mean “what I should be writing to sell”, but that’s not the case at all. We all saw the explosion of teen vampire lit after the introduction of the Twilight series, but trend-setting is not what I’m talking. I’m talking more about reading to know what’s popular in a cultural sense, to be able to be that knowledgeable author folks associate with someone who knows what’s going on. If you want others to take you seriously as a writing insider, you have to keep abreast of what’s going–impossible to achieve if you don’t know the work in current favor.
2. Makes your writing work better by noting what’s worse.
I got my start in romance fiction writing. I devoured everything I could get my hands on, but when I started writing more seriously, I let reading fall by the wayside. I needed to get back into it because losing myself in language I loved was one way to help me get into the mindset of writing regularly. One author I had not read (and who shall remain nameless despite her obvious mega-superstar career) was recommended and I picked up a few of her books.
I never finished a single book of hers. Her writing was choppy, her characters shallow, her plots contrived. I often heard her brag that she never liked rewriting and did it very rarely, if at all, and to me, it was glaringly obvious. She is, as I said, a major author with a major house, so she’s obviously doing something right with the readers. But in my writer’s mind, I learned more about what *not* to do with my heroine to make her stronger by reading her work than I ever could have if someone had explained the same ideas to me in conversation. If you’re reading something you hate, don’t pass it up for a better book. Suffer through and dissect the reasons why you hate it.
3. Frees up our subconscious to create.
How often have you been in the middle of reading and somewhere in the back of your mind, a bit of your own story bubbles up? I don’t mean you’re thinking you can tweak this author’s plot to use as your own here–but the act of having your mind engaged in something aside from your own life and writing frees up your subconscious to work on your own stories. Yes, I often have similar experiences while folding laundry or scrubbing a toilet. But those aren’t nearly as enjoyable as reading…
4. Gives us a sense of style.
Not ‘style’ as in snakeskin or leopard print, but the way words are wrought together in a book-length piece. People who read a lot fall in love with the sound of the words, the poetry of the piece and the way words are combined to create more than just a “story” on the page. We all want our work to have a lyricism all its own, and by reading others, we can see how style really works–and with any luck, be able to translate that to our own page.
5. Pleasure
With all this talk of business, let’s not forget the reason we became writers in the first place: we loved reading. Reading is our escape mechanism, and if you’re as busy as you said (or thought) you were when you read the title of this post and thought, “I don’t have time to read!”, you’re in more need of reading time than you thought. Get back into reading a few minutes before bed or during lunch. Tuck a book into your backpack or briefcase to peek at during lulls in your day. You have plenty of time to read, whether you think so or not–it’s all in your mindset. Do yourself and your writing a favor and have something on hand when the mood strikes or the opportunity arises.
Monday, January 17, 2011
Writing in 2011: How Ya Doing So Far?
So we’re starting the third week in the new year, and it’s time to pause to take creative stock:
Where are you in your writing goals?
Are you still running whole-hog into the new year, smashing your word count goals, pushing forward your plot, adding more freelance work to your schedule? Conquering the demons of facing the blank page and finding your groove?
Or are you getting bossed around by the universe and obligations, being told what to do instead of taking the bull by the horns and moving in to claim more of your day and devote more precious time to what moves you creatively, what speaks to your soul?
You have one of two ways to spend each minute of each day: doing something you love or just wasting it away with obligations and thinking. The choice? Entirely yours.
I’ll admit that I’ve spent time between both polarities. For the first week, my writing flew off the keyboard. Every waking thought was aimed toward my goals of the year, every spare minute spent mapping out what I’d write when I got the time. My creative mind was working on all cylinders, my muse happily occupied with helping me work toward those goals. Life was started early each morning full of creativity and wordplay and meaningful creation.
And then the second week hit me like a bag of nickels. I had afterschool activities every single day, obligations that kept me away from home until 9 or 10 at night, away from paper, away from typing, away from waking early to get my writing down. My daytime free time was at a premium as well, with the end of the grading period at school, which, if you don’t teach, requires fast and furious grading sessions to get all the papers you’ve assigned for the quarter graded to enter by Friday. Only my lunch time was my own–planning period was consumed with grading and meetings and common planning. Even had I been blessed with an aha! idea, I would not have had time to even text it to myself (you do text yourself story notes, don’t you? Beats writing them down and losing the scraps of paper!). Not to mention I began both (that’s right, both–implying ‘two’) of my new graduate classes in the week, one online and one in-person.
And I paid the creative price for the frantic pace of last week’s life. I lost much of my mojo for my current WIPs. Not the vision and intention, mind you. I am excited by what I’m working on, working toward. I just lost the impetus to sit down and write. It was easier to avoid the blank page by ignoring it. Back to the old trick of knowing I needed to write but feeling like the toilets needed scrubbing more. (Don’t tell me you haven’t been there–I know the writer’s mind all too well!) Instead, I forced myself into the chair and back to the laptop to do a bit of journaling (I’ve named my journal “Sparkles” because I inevitably get a sparkle of inspiration or ideas when we work together!) and found the seed of my resistance: the big book proposal I’ve been working on is really meant to be two separate books. The ideas have some commonalities but the content is two separate entities. And one should definitely come before the other, not integrated together.
Once I discovered where my resistance came from, words flowed. I didn’t want to get up. I gave myself a renewed vision to get things back on track, to work out my writing schedule between my graduate classes and basketball games (the hubby coaches) and the start of a new nine weeks, which is always a challenge in and of itself. I am going to be modifying my morning routine until spring break, except on weekends, and am integrating more writing into my evening hours (when available) to make up for missed morning time. This time of year, sticking to 4:30 sessions is just too tough when faced with not getting into bed until between 11 and 12. I will just have to modify writing times (not writing itself) until my schedule is more my own, that’s all. A little forethought can go a long way!
This brings me to the reason for my post: What about YOU? What about your writing, your schedule, your goals for the year? How are you meeting them, and how are you quashing demons that threaten to get in your way? What have you had to change in your life to make room for writing, to make room for keeping true to your goals? Most importantly, how are you working to keep writing in your daily schedule? We’d love to know!
It's pretty simple, really. I'm a writer who loves writing about writing, and sharing all the tricks of the trade with other writers. And when I'm not writing, I'm thinking about writing. I have a hunch you know what I mean :)