Habit comes painfully, slowly over a long period of time. Writing daily is discounted by so many who often state that a mind has to be in a proper place before a writer can pour out his best.
I’m of the camp that daily attention to the writing is the only way to become a solid scribe. That frequent effort to sit before the blankness and not rise until the page is full is what exercises muscles into the shape they need to be to produce efficiently, effectively.
I know. We want to think of writing as art, not confined to the rigors of a left-brained world with its structure and logic, but art takes a huge amount of discipline to become beautiful.
The daily investment of writing teaches your brain to keep stories, phrases and plots in the forefront of your mind. Knowing that you will tap that well of words from just yesterday, they don’t stray far, so that when you take your seat, they are there, waiting.
The first week is hard, the second week harder. The second month gives you a slight sense you have so much invested you don’t want to break your stride. But into the second month, you begin to feel it. An eagerness.
You go through your day listening to dialogue, noting sunsets, and wondering what someone is thinking because it might be worthy of noting. Life becomes richer. And so do your stories. Write daily.
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C. Hope Clark is author of The Carolina Slade Mystery Series published by Bell Bridge Books. Her newest release is Palmetto Poison, the third. Hope has also published The Shy Writer Reborn, an introverted writer’s wake-up call, aiding the promotional trials of writers. And she’s the editor of FundsforWriters.com, chosen by Writer’s Digest Magazine for its 101 Best Websites for Writers for the past 13 years. Her newsletters reach 45,000 writers.
Are peanuts capable of murder? Carolina Slade will bust this shell game. Big money, big politics, crime, greed, and big farming—Slade, an agriculture department investigator in the steamy state of South Carolina, once again finds herself planted in a dangerous mystery.
Click on the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page.
2 comments:
This is absolutely true. However, life comes between those daily writings. Ankle surgery, a family death, a sister w/cancer, a five-year-old nephew with epilepsy with his younger brother needing caring, etc. Maybe others don't have these troubles, especially best-selling authors. Many of us others do. We deal with them lovingly AND THEN we continue the daily writings.
This is absolutely true. However, life comes between those daily writings. Ankle surgery, a family death, a sister w/cancer, a five-year-old nephew with epilepsy with his younger brother needing caring, etc. Maybe others don't have these troubles, especially best-selling authors. Many of us others do. We deal with them lovingly AND THEN we continue the daily writings.
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