December 29, 2009
Setting New Year goals instead of making vague resolutions can kick start your writing process this new year 2010. Before establishing a goal, a writer needs to evaluate where she has been. What have you done this past year that enhanced your writing or hurt your writing? Are there projects you want to continue to work on or has the sizzle left you bereft of ideas and energy? Decide what you want to keep from your previous year’s work, then begin drafting your goals for this new year to include the old projects and add new ideas.
According to Audrey Shaffer of the Writers Chatroom, “Goals are exciting and motivating all by themselves. They are targets that draw you and inspire you. State what you want, and by when, in specific terms.” Read Audrey’s complete notes and feedback at the Writers Chatroom forum.
Another tool for helping you to state your goals in black and white and keep a record of your progress is the Bylines Calendar. This handy little book includes inspiring, funny stories from working writers like you and me. It also has lots of extras. Check it out.
I wish you a fantastic, productive, story/article writing, publishing experience in this New Year 2010.
December 21, 2009
Avatar, the new 3-D, sci-fi/fantasy movie premiered this past weekend loaded with lots of fantastic animation and special effects, but at the heart of it is a love story. The production is the brain child of John Cameron who worked as a high school janitor and at precision tool and die manufacturing company. He said he was a blue collar worker. Then he went to see Star Wars, the movie, and was blown away because what he saw on the screen was similar to the stories he could envision himself. He knew he wanted to write themand make them into movies. And he did! Big time including the hit movie, Titanic.
There would be no hit movie without that small kernel of an idea of a love story that developed into a full story. Stories and thoughts spring from writers’ brains. A writer is the one who gets the ball rolling on so many levels. Advertisements, marketing, legal documents, bills in Congress (okay I won’t go there), books, poems, instructions for setting up computer programs or operating the Wii game system. All the technical writing and news stories have to be put down on paper. And we do that. Our writing touches every part of life.
At this time of the year, I think what would have happened if the writers of the Bible didn’t take time to write the stories, the lessons, the history. The story of the love, peace, and joy brought by Baby Jesus would not reach so many people in the world. Christmas is a worldwide event celebrated by many cultures. These writers have played their part in touching the people of the world.
Give yourselves a gift this season, the gift of time to write. Do it for yourself. You can contribute to the literature in this world. You can make a difference.
I wish you all the blessings of this holiday season. Merry Christmas to All!!
Tags:
authors,
christmas,
writers,
writing
December 7, 2009
Pirouette
We are close to the beginning of a New Year…2010…which always brings on the decision of whether to make a New Year’s resolution(s). Personally, I don’t make resolutions as I know I won’t keep them and then I hate the guilt trip after breaking one. But this year, I am planning on renewing my committment to writing daily or weekly in my journal. This is a practice I have done since sixth grade recording all the angst of adolescense and continued through college years, then infrequently after marriage and family. Life kind of gets in the way. Too bad.
Have you thought about journaling? Oh, woe is me, you think. I am trying to finish my novel, article, blog, and now you want me to add writing in a journal? Well, yes, because when you record your thoughts and feelings and events in your journal, you are actually planning your next story or novel because the pages of the journal will be fodder for all your writing.
Below is a post from the blog www.womensmemoirs.com contributed by Susan Wittig Albert, the author of Writing from Life: Telling Your Soul’s Life Story, one of the books I use in the How to Begin Writing Your Llife Story workshop. She has journaled all her life.
If you don’t have a journal, now is the time to start one, in preparation for the memoir you’ll write three or thirteen or thirty years from now. Write every day, or as often as you can, about the life you’re learning with. Write with the full awareness that you are documenting your life. Write down all the details of people, events, activities, results, feelings, so that later–when you want or need to recall what happened, these will be available to you. Don’t avoid the hard stuff, for that’s the very material of memoir: what’s challenging or frightening or anxiety-provoking, as well as what’s fun, interesting, enlightening, expanding. And do get into the habit of reviewing your journal on a regular basis. I review mine once a year, on my birthday. It’s my way of rewarding myself for living my life–even the hard parts–as fully and completely as I can.
Click
here to read the entire guest blog by Susan Albert Wittig.
I have resolved to begin journaling anew for 2010. No, I am not going to make it a chore or have a guilt-trip if I miss a day. But I am going to try to do it, just do it, again.
Tags:
journal,
journaling,
new year resolution,
writing,
writing life
Janet • 
10:23 am • 
