I got some news last Tuesday that took my breath away. In the past two years, I’ve written (among other things) four mysteries for adults. Three were part of a historical series. One novel featured Jane Austen. This week I got an email from a woman in charge of collections at the Jane Austen House […]
Kristi Holl
Beware! Burnout Ahead
“Writing is not everything,” says Lisa Shearin in Writer Magazine. “And if you want longevity in this business, play isn’t just important–it’s critical. We get so intensely focused on having achieved the dream and working so hard to keep the dream going, that we’re blind to the signs that if we keep going down that […]
The Gift of Time
It isn’t my birthday or Christmas or Mother’s Day, but it feels like it today. Why? Because I’ve decided to give myself a wonderful gift now. The gift of time. I’ve been writing and publishing since my kids were babies. They’re in their thirties now, with their own children ranging from toddlers to teenagers. During […]
How the Chunky Method Saved My Life
A couple of months ago, after being sick and traveling and meeting two book deadlines, I stalled when given some unwelcome health news which required tests and more tests. I got really, really behind on an adult mystery, and for hours I would struggle to write, only to throw it all out at the end […]
Resting and Reflecting Before Re-Aligning
Since I last posted regularly, I’ve written three books (two adult mysteries and one juvenile nonfiction book), traveled, and been sick. The holidays blurred by, to be honest, because one of the book deadlines was December 20th. Two days ago I finished the second adult mystery. One good thing about being sick is all the […]
Just Keep Showing Up
This quote is from one of my favorite authors, Henry Cloud, co-author of the Boundaries books. The last few months have been challenging, and I’m behind where I wanted to be on a deadline. So this quote is appropriate today. I won’t obsess about the deadline. I will show up at my desk early every […]
The Power of Intermittent Recovery
HAPPY NEW YEAR! From the book The Power of Full Engagement: To be an effective energy manager, you need to spend nearly all of your time fully engaged in the high positive energy quadrant or recovering your energy by spending time doing things in the low positive energy quadrant. Definition of Terms The low positive […]
Striving for Contentment
Would you call yourself a contented writer? Are you happy with your current situation and writing progress? Or are you a dissatisfied writer, striving to better yourself and always pushing hard toward your goals? It’s something we are faced with all the time, but especially at goal-setting time. Embrace Opposite Traits To be honest, if you want […]
Happy New Year Tomorrow!
Self-Care for Writers Series
If your year has included sickness and/or a lot of deadlines, and you’re dragging yourself into the New Year, I want to point you to a series on self-care for writers. I am making self-care my “push goal” for 2016. (Michael Hyatt calls a push goal the one goal that, if you met it, would […]