Does perfectionism keep you from getting started on your writing? Does trying to write your best create pressure for you? If you, you’ll be encouraged something in Art & Fear: Observations On the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking by David Bayles and Ted Orland. It’s about being a perfectionist–and how to deal with the pressure […]
writing life
A No-Guilt Writing Life
Does taking time to write make you feel guilty? In her book Writing as a Way of Healing, Louise DeSalvo said, “Many people…have told me that taking time to write seems so, well, self-indulgent, self-involved, frivolous even.” Does that describe you? Do you fight your own guilty feelings that say you should be doing something […]
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 […]
Jane Austen and Me
I’ve been thinking about Jane Austen a lot since visiting her home in Chawton, England, in September. Another time and another place, but some lessons to learn that apply to me as a writer today. Kinship of Writers Jane’s home in Chawton was where she revised Sense & Sensibility and Pride & Prejudice for publication. […]
Successes and Setbacks
“The only copy of your manuscript is stolen from your car. Articles and stories come back with unfailing rejection…Finances grow ever more perilous. This is, with variations, the script for the first ten or fifteen years of many successful writers’ careers. But they hung on.” This quote comes from one of my favorite book of […]
Writing Momentum: the Unexpected Bonus
During the six weeks so far of running the October-November writing challenges, I have rarely missed writing daily. My goal for putting my writing first each day was to accumulate more pages. Despite a couple of personal setbacks, that has certainly happened. I’ve logged in anywhere from twenty minutes to four hours, depending on the day’s […]
The Completion Stage
The past two weeks, I’ve talked about the stages we go through in our writing projects, including the challenges at each stage and ways to keep from derailing. After we have prepared the work-in-progress, let it germinate, worked on it, then deepened and shaped it, we are ready to complete the work. “There is a completion […]
The Deepening and Shaping Stages
In this series we’re discussing the seven specific stages you go through from beginning to end with a writing project. There is potential for both growth and failure at each stage. (First read about the preparation stage, the germination stage, and the working stage.) Deepening and Shaping At the beginning of the deepening stage, you’ve […]
The Working Stage
(Last week we started talking about the seven specific stages you go through from beginning to end with a writing project, and the potential for both growth and failure at each stage. First read about the preparation stage, then the germination stage.) The Work-Out Next we have the working stage, the one we’re probably most […]