Transitions are tricky. Even when you know you’re headed into one, the ramifications and reverberations can surprise you. Tricky and tough as they are, transitions are essential – we don’t move through the creative process without them. Writers face transitions as we go: from nowhere-in-particular to the out-of-the-blue glimmer of a new idea, character or … More Are Transisitons About to Derail Your Writing?
If you’re a regular reader, it’s your turn. If you ever wanted to write, needed to write and struggled to write, you’re qualified. If you found your way, even just once, around writer’s block, through distractions and past procrastination, we want to know how you did it. This Is Our Blog This isn’t a blog … More It’s Your Turn to Write About Resistance
Most writer’s resistance can be traced to the fear that we might get hurt. Let me reassure you. You WILL get hurt. Your writing will be flawed. Some people will criticize it and you. More will ignore it. The vast majority of the 7.6 billion people on the planet will never know or care about … More Want to Write? You Gotta Trust!
Why do you do that? Waste an hour with email or social media? Or find another way to distract yourself away from writing? Why do you wait to write? Or edit the same paragraph again and again? Why is so hard (at times) to do what you love? It might be time for a reminder: … More What Conscious Writers Need to Know About Writer’s Block
What’s your point? What’s your purpose as a writer? Why do you write? You don’t have to be able to rattle off your “artist’s statement” for someone else. You don’t even need to be able to clearly articulate it for yourself. But you do need a sense of why you write that will sustain you … More What’s the Point of Writing?
It’s day 10 of NaNoWriMo or November 10 for those of us not doing NaNoWriMo. So it seems like a good time to revisit this, my most popular post. Even if you aren’t doing NaNoWriMo, you can still play with the Random Scene Generator. Random Scene Generator It takes about a half-hour to create your … More Random Scene Generator: 10 Steps to Solve the “I don’t know what to write” Problem
FOMO is real – both the fear and the missing out part – and is particularly risky for writers. The Fear Like any fear, FOMO will activate your limbic system, which evolved to react fast to tangible, immediate danger. In the face of imminent life-or-death threats, your brain doesn’t waste time contemplating the pros and … More How Scratching the FOMO-Itch Blocks Your Writing
“The best is oftentimes the enemy of the good; and many a good book has remained unwritten… because there floated before the mind’s eye the ideal of a better or a best.” – R. C. Trench, 1861 In 1861, people had the luxury of contemplating ideas in elegant language like this. Today, we consume … More Writing Your Best is Your Worst Idea
In response to the previous post, Block Your Saboteur Before It Blocks Your Writing, Glynis Jolly commented that her saboteur was showing up as annoying health problems: “Being flexible is about all I can do to fight it. Nevertheless, I do have a schedule in place for my writing. Some days are good and … More Too Sick to Write? Maybe, Maybe Not
The Saboteur has many faces: Attacker, Enticer, Innocent, Protector and Unlucky. Different routes to the same goal — to block our writing. Just when we think we’ve figured out how to identify the Saboteur and avoid the roadblocks it sets up, it morphs into a different form and uses different techniques to invade our thinking. … More Block Your Saboteur Before It Blocks Your Writing
Bane of Your Resistance 