Archive for the 'Writing Hints' Category

With the vast majority of jobs you actually have to turn up at your place of employment in order to complete your work for the day. I experienced that scene for over 35 years in another life – when I was an elementary school teacher. Increasingly people are working from home which I believe is a very positive move.

The good thing about writing is that you can basically do it anywhere. I am constantly aware that everything I do and everywhere I go there is potential writing material staring me in the face. I usually carry with me a small notebook mainly to write down lists of birds that I see. But this little notebook also doubles as a writing notebook. Sometimes I just jot down ideas, impressions of a place, experiences and so on. Sometimes I will jot down ideas for stories and even the occasional poem or haiku slips its way into my notebook.

The good thing about holidays is that your writing goes with you. I am currently on holiday visiting my son and daughter-in-law in Sydney. We see them about once a year so it is a precious time. My faithful little notebook came along for the ride (actually I have a supply of them with me). But I also brought along my laptop. It usually travels with me and in the evenings I can get on with recording the day’s events and I can be working on writing projects as well.

The importance of taking a break from writing cannot be emphasized too much. While I take the means of writing with me when I travel I find that it is important to take time out from it frequently. This gives me fresh insights, renewed enthusiasm, new ideas, inspiration – especially when in the Australian bush which I love so much – and renewal for the body, mind and soul.

So – take time out to smell the roses, go for a walk, look at the clouds, watch the birds or sit in the sun. Your writing will benefit from the short break.

Good writing.

If you are like me, far too many things can get in the way of our writing. Sometimes there are seemingly far more interesting things to do. Sometimes the pressure to get things done around the house – like cleaning, and washing, and reading the mail or paper or whatever can hinder progress on that writing project.

The key to getting that writing done is to actually schedule the tasks to be done in the day. Sounds simple? It is – but putting it into practice can take discipline and practice. I have a standard list of things I try to do each day. Writing is one of those things. I make it a high priority that some writing is done every day. I set goals for each day, week and month and work hard at achieving those goals, but I don’t try to reach the week’s goals on the first day of the week. I stretch them out over the whole week. Sure and steady, small steps every day, little by little the writing gets done.

I plan each day carefully, but unplanned emergencies do happen and the schedule goes out the window. For example, a few weeks ago I wanted to attend a funeral. It was two hour’s drive away in another town. I took the day off from writing, attended the funeral, met many people I hadn’t seen in years, spent time with my widowed sister-in-law and then drove home in time for the evening meal. The time out actually refreshed me and gave me time to think while travelling that gave me plenty of writing inspiration.