Crankiness + Growth
For the last few weeks, I’ve been go through what my colleagues at the Berkeley Psychic Institute call “a growth period.”
For the last few weeks, I’ve been go through what my colleagues at the Berkeley Psychic Institute call “a growth period.”
Arguably, the most popular episode of the 1950’s sitcom “I Love Lucy” was the episode “Job Switching” in which friends Lucy and Ethel took a job in a candy factory. In that episode’s celebrated scene, they had to hand wrap individual chocolates moving along a conveyor belt into a packing room. They were able to keep up until the belt sped up resulting in a hilarious scramble to prevent any unwrapped candies from getting by.
This is the first year in the three years that I’ve been doing NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writer’s Month) that I didn’t “win”. In case you don’t know, NaNo is where you write 50,000 words in the month of November. I started my fourth novel for NaNo this year and then life got in the way. I’ve been disciplined enough to write a novel outside of November in the past but having that month to completely focus on word count has always been ground breaking. Being competitive with yourself works for some people but not for others. It works for me.
I took the decision not to do NaNoWriMo this year. I’m so far behind with other writing projects; I could not contemplate starting something new. However I did enjoy the last couple of years and learned a lot from it. Hopefully for next November I’ll be ready to try it again.
Many authors and students have difficulty starting their projects. For students, often the problem is they aren’t terribly inspired by the topic. I don’t blame them for feeling stuck. It’s difficult find motivation in broad topics like, say, global warming. Once you’ve created a slide showing that poor polar bear swimming in the melted waters of the Arctic, there isn’t much else to say.
Does your writing sometimes feel dead? Perhaps your words stare vacantly back at you like lumps on the page? Or do you feel like a lump as you write? How can you inject passion and danger back into your writing?
I hope your November is starting out well! Over here, Ezra (my husband) and I have started National Novel Writing Month, (Nanowrimo). He’s started with a bang. I’ve started with a crawl, then a...
Here’s where we talk about plotters and pantsers. If you don’t know the definitions – a plotter is a writer who outlines their book before beginning to write it while a pantser writes from “the seat of their pants” with no outline. Kind of like writing from the stream of consciousness. I don’t think a survey has been taken but from what I’ve seen, most writers are plotters. Yet there are many famous pantsers too.
Did you see that blur? Were you able to make out the bits of green of Spring 2015? Or the shimmery waves of heat of Summer 2015? Did you miss the burnished coppers of the impending Fall 2015? I sure did. As a matter of fact, when I bothered to poke my head up lately, do you know what was staring back at me?
I was stuck thinking today, as I am most days and I realized that when I began writing I could have really used a tutorial, someone else’s experience – kind of like a step-by-step guide. I had plenty of seasoned writers trying to help and I’m so grateful to all of them but the beginning is just plain hard. So I wanted to write a guide for those of you who are about to start or who have just started or who want to start and are afraid or lost or confused or all of the above….
Hello novel writers and those who really want to write a novel: If you wanted to join us for this week’s special webinar we gave on Tuesday, Plan Your Novel for NaNoWriMo: Essential Plot...
Even to the most experienced of writers, pounding out a book in a month can seem crazy, but as many NaNoWriMoers can attest, it’s doable. And therein lies the contradiction of any marathon.
There are days I just don’t want to write. Actually, most days before I begin writing, it’s hard to pick up the pen (or put my fingers on the keyboard, depending on which stage of the writing process I’m in) and just go. I don’t want to. I’d rather distract myself with pointless internet surfing.
Every scene you write should have a purpose. It should move the plot or develop a character. To keep your scenes active and give them some energy, think about the values that are at stake in each one.
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