Last fall I did a bunch of posts on journaling and gave a way a great hand bound journal. I just stumbled upon a challenge that I thought I’d share with you because it’s a great idea. Over at Cloud Productivity, they’re throwing out a challenge starting March 1 (that’s this Friday) to start journaling. It gives you some time to decide whether you want to write or type, to pick up a fresh journal or buy an app or just open a new window in Word.
Have you recently started journaling? Have you tried before and quit? What did/didn’t you like about it? Do you think you’ll give it a shot this time? Comment here with your thoughts.
I haven’t really written much since Nanowrimo (which I’m so glad I did, by the way). I’m trying to figure out a project to work on to help me develop my writing, save this blog that keeps me at the keyboard a few times a week. I have one small project on the go that I’ve been really enjoying. I was about to write “I need to find a project to do this year” without acknowledging that I’ve been writing this ebook for the past few months. It feels weird to say that. It feels weird to make it real by talking about it here. A few people know I’ve been writing out some vignettes of my life since I’ve moved to Montreal, but talking about it on the internet feels a lot more official. I’m not entirely sure what will come of it save that I have been writing it with the intention of sharing it with people. I do have a specific audience in mind, which is a lot more than I can say for most other things I’ve written. So that’s exciting.
Ok so I’ll tell you a little more about it: a little hope I have is to publish it for Kindle. If you’re familiar with my Bucket List, publishing an ebook is on that list. Wow, I can’t describe how scary it is to talk about this. Now you might ask me about it. Now you might want to read it!
So maybe it isn’t any more scary than me announcing I’m going to do my best to run a 5K in April. Or a 10K in Sept. Those are scary announcements too but they’re far, far less personal.
Anyways, that’s what’s going on in terms of moving towards my writing goals. I may never speak of this again until it’s about to get real. We shall see.
I’m a little embarrassed by how easy it was. I guess my life is not really all that busy or I can write like a machine compared to the first time I did Nanowrimo 8 years ago. But it was quite easy. Then I surprised myself by accidentally finishing two days early! These are not meant to be brags! I’m honestly shocked and like I said, embarrassed. I’m embarrassed because I’m hearing ‘ooh’s and ‘ahh’s about how I’m writing a novel (which isn’t a big deal because people do it all the time with Nanowrimo) and people make it sound like it’s hard when it’s just not. Not because I’m special, but because people are just making it out to be bigger than it really is. I think? That’s why I want people to do Nanowrimo. So they can see that it’s not that hard. Just like anyone can run a 5K, anyone can win Nanowrimo with the conditions in their favour.
Having cheerleaders helps make it fun and actually get it done.
This year I got to know a group of Montrealers who were doing Nanowrimo as well. I had a lot of fun encouraging them via twitter, writing with them in real life (the one time I was able to make it to a write-in), doing word-wars with them where we’d compete to see how much we could write in 10, 15, or 20 minute time slots. The first time I did Nano, I was keeping it a secret from basically everyone because I didn’t want to be embarrassed by my own failure if that was the case. Being open about it helped so much! I would never do it alone again. That’s torture.
StayFocused was hugely helpful for my focus (thanks, Di!)
My friend Diane suggested the browser plug-in StayFocused. You input the sites you want to block and what days/hours you want them blocked and it will simply not let you on them at those times. It was really revealing how in a split second I could open a new tab and be on Facebook, completely subconsciously! Even after I would just close the window, I’d lose my train of thought and be back. It was actually kind of eerie a few times. StayFocused helped me, well, stay focused.
It turns out I have a lot of free time in the evenings/weekends.
This semester with my husband having to leave by 5:45 every day for class, it means that we eat early. It also means I can get a lot done if I actually have things to do and energy to do it with. I can only think of three days where my story was hard to write and it took me 2 hours to write my 1667 words. Otherwise, I pumped out my word count in an hour and then did other things. The main thing is having motivation to do things with people since I find myself pretty tired from hanging out with people all day long at work.
My favourite thing about Nanowrimo
My favourite thing is the freedom in writing to let the story tell itself. If you sit in on the NanoMTL chat room you’d daily hear someone say “I have a block” and then someone else say “KILL A CHARACTER” with much viciousness. Both times I did Nano seriously, I was shocked at how the story ended up telling itself almost better than if I had painstakingly planned out every scene. I just planned broad stroke ideas. It did the rest. I love that. And no, I didn’t kill any characters (though in my first novel, I burned down an old folks home. Everyone that was healthy made it out safe because I couldn’t bear anyone actually dying.).
Finally: “Can I read your novel?”
People have been asking me if they can read my novel. At this point, I’m probably going to say no – mostly because taking the time to read through it to make sure there are no major plot holes etc. will take time. Writing in 1667 word batches makes for a lot of forgetting what was said/done in the previous section! But I might be persuadable as long as people don’t expect anything close to literature.
Today is the FINAL DAY of the Soundless Soliloquy journal giveaway! Click here for details if you haven’t already put in your entries! You have until midnight tonight EST to enter.
First of all, I’m done my novel TWO DAYS EARLY. I have no idea how that happened. Anyways, I’ll post on that later. You’ve been hearing me talk all week about writing things down. Blah, blah, Jess, I get it. Here’s one last thing while I’m busy finishing this novel and trying to have a life. This article is from The Positivity Blog that I found while Googling about writing. You can go ahead and read the whole thing here.
7 Powerful Reasons Why You Should Write Things Down
If your memory is anything like mine it’s like a leaking bucket.
Ideas don’t stay for long.
Written goals are very important.
To remind yourself of what to focus on.
Unloading your mental RAM.
Clearer thinking.
Get to know yourself and your life better and improve long-term focus on what’s important.
Have anything else to add? What works for you? Leave your thoughts by clicking here.
Today is Day 3 of the Soundless Soliloquy journal giveaway! Click here for details if you haven’t already put in your entries!
As I was writing out the title I realized, this is odd, Jess. You’re a self-described technophile, yet you keep pushing writing with an actual pen and paper. What gives? This is true, but one thing I’ve been forced to accept about myself is there is something different about writing down on paper. Somehow my brain thinks it’s more legit. Part of me resents that because I want to live my life completely in technology (why I don’t know), but it’s just the way I am and so I’ve come to accept it. I write things down and then digitize them by taking pictures and sending them to Evernote. Somethings, though, just stay on paper.
Creativesomething.net has these great reasons why you should actually write things down. In the spirit of the journal giveaway week, I wanted to share them with you. See the whole article here.
Writing down your ideas makes them nearly impossible to forget.
Sure, you could rip out the page you write your idea on, or you could lose your idea notebook, but writing down your idea is a pretty certain guarantee that you won’t forget it later. Even if the idea seems pointless or stupid at the time you think it up, you may want to recall it later, and if you don’t write it down somewhere… you probably won’t ever remember.
Writing down your ideas makes them more than just ideas.
An idea is just a mental thought, until it is written (or typed) down. Writing down your ideas takes them from being just a thought, into being a real, feasible idea. In this way the creative ideas you have also become expandable; you will be able to physically see the idea, rather than just imagining it in your mind (seeing is believing). Being able to see your idea is the very first step in acting on that idea.
Writing down your ideas puts them all in one place.
If you find yourself bombarded with a lot of creative ideas often (or if you’re a creative professional), writing your ideas down in an “idea notebook” makes it easy to keep track of your ideas. An idea notebook means you always know where to look when you want to recall an idea (or when you need some creative inspiration). Don’t want to buy a notebook? Then try to collect all of your ideas on your computer or in a pile of scrap paper. Anything to put your ideas all into one, easy to find place.
Writing down your ideas makes it easier to think up new ones.
Once you are in the habit of writing your ideas down, you’ll quickly develop a knack for thinking up, and tracking, ideas. Before you know it you will have notebooks full of great ideas. The more you write the more you will have to write about.
Try and discover ways in your everyday activity to keep track of your ideas until you can get them together in one place and in one format.
I really buy into #1. There’s something about closing loops in my brain that just works when I write ideas down. But then I have to go back and review them in order to put them into action.
How about you? Do you need to write things down like to-do lists etc? What things have you kept on paper and what things have you moved digital? You can comment by clicking here.
Today is Day 2 of the Soundless Soliloquy journal giveaway! Click here for details if you haven’t already put in your entries!
This is the last week of Nanowrimo. I’ve crossed the 45,000 word mark so I’m in the home stretch. I’m just focusing on seeing a few friends and finishing up writing. These last 5000 words are the hardest as I’m closing story loops and trying to make sure I’m not giving away all the mysterious details thus making it too obvious for the reader! And by “the reader” I mean “no one” since no one save maybe my husband if he’s desperate for reading material will be reading it because it’s really nothing special.
If you have that writerly bend, have a thing for paper goods, but wouldn’t know what to use your free journal for, check out this tumblr for some inspiration.
Last fall I did a bunch of posts on journaling and gave a way a great hand bound journal. I just stumbled upon a challenge that I thought I’d share with you because it’s a great idea. Over at Cloud Productivity, they’re throwing out a challenge starting March 1 (that’s this Friday) to start journaling. It gives you some time to decide whether you want to write or type, to pick up a fresh journal or buy an app or just open a new window in Word.
