Ten Things to Do When You're LOSING YOUR MIND During NanoWriMo

If you are still hanging in there during NaNoWriMo, CONGRATS! (you are seriously amazing. To make it this far is really really hard) This is also often when it gets even more challenging to push through and keep going so here are some ideas to help you refresh and make it to your goal. 

10. Breathe. Seriously. Inhale, count to ten, exhale. Repeat 5-10 times.

Face mask reward= good for sleepless skin

9. Bribe yourself. What will you get when you hit your word count? Bubble bath? McDonalds drive-thru french fries? An episode of The Big Bang Theory? Finally try out that soothing facial mud mask you got in Birchbox last month?

8. Take a ten minute walk around your block, and notice your setting. Dostoevsky took long walks most days when he was writing Crime and Punishment, and it turned out pretty well for him.

Walking at sunset isn't a bad idea

7. Find a picture of your someone who looks like your ideal reader and put it next to your screen so that you can look at him/her and remember why you're writing the book to begin with. What does he/she need to hear? Why does he/she need you to complete this book?

6. Read one paragraph from the writer you most admire. Notice what you love about his/her writing, and get excited about trying to infuse that in your draft.

5. Chocolate. That is all.

Or get a hot chocolate in nature :)

4.Throw something. If you want to be mature, you can play a bit of catch, but when I'm really frustrated, I like to find a blank wall and throw unbreakable objects at it until the frustration turns into comedy.

3. Get in nature. Look at beautiful pictures of nature. Watch a web cam of nature. If the Pandas are sleeping, check out wolves or birds or something else beautiful from one of the cameras on these sites  Maybe consider the ways your characters are animals and the ecosystem in which they operate and riff on that for a bit.

2. Go on Twitter and challenge someone to a one-hour word-count write-off. Use the hashtag #amwriting or #nanowrimo and see if anyone bites.

1. Dance Party!!!!! This is by far my favorite. I throw a record on (yes. I like my T. Swift better on vinyl) and jump around in socks as much as I can for the duration of a single song. It gets my blood flowing, and makes me feel like I can do anything in life if I choose the right song. By the time the song is over I'm ready to dive back in.

Good luck, and remember, YOU CAN DO THIS. For every page you've written so far, I'm proud of you, I believe in you, and I wish you all the best. 

XOXO,

Lauren

Jump Starting Your Writing After A Break

The other day I was chatting with a friend whom I hadn't seen in awhile.  We had the usual catch up. Work, kids, vacation.  Then the dreaded question "so, how's your writing coming along?" I stumbled through it as usual.  Have a few ideas on the go, the kid (just turned 9 months Saturday) takes up a lot of time.  We meandered onto other topics and had a grand old time. 

Truth be told though, aside from a few premises and a page here and there, I've pretty much been on hiatus since I was three months pregnant.  Life, just got in the way. 

So now, the kid's a bit older, life's more stable and I'm itching to get back into writing.  Only problem is I'm rusty. The noggin just hasn't been exercised in that way in awhile and I'm in desperate need of a recharge.

So where to start? I've got a few ideas I'm noodling on and the manuscript I left part way through in early 2014.  I'm like a deer in headlights.  

Just write. Right? That seems the logical starting point.  Getting those words on the page is half the battle. Unfortunately, I'm one of those people who just needs a bit more.  I need a little inspiration. 

The first thing I did was check meetup.com to see if there were writing groups in the hood.  I'm new to San Diego, so this was a great way to find some kindred spirits.  I signed up for one called "Shut Up And Write". With a lack of material, I'm not ready for critiques so this is the perfect way to be in the same room with other writers, no distractions and just write. 

The second thing I did was check on some refresher courses.  Something to remind me of what baby brain forgot.  I was lucky to find San Diego Writers, Ink. A great resource for our community with great workshops that have just enough to push me along. 

Finally, I reached out to my writing buddies and they are awesome.  Hopefully, we'll be reviewing each other's writing again soon!

So have you taken a break from your writing?  How did you jump start your writing? 

Writer's New Year's Resolutions

We're back after our short holiday hiatus! The beginning of the year is traditionally when people take stock of their lives and figure out what they'd like to change. Although I've made resolutions in the past to improve my health, career, and love life, I've never done a list specifically for writing. So without further ado, here's a list of some writer's resolutions you might want to consider.

1. Write what you love.

This one might sound trite, but it's something I hope to be better about in the coming year. How many of us are guilty of writing what we think might get us an agent or sell rather than the books that we love? If you're passionate about what you're writing, that's going to come across to the reader.

2. Write even when you don't feel like writing.
"There's no such thing as writer's block. That was invented by people in California who couldn't write.” ― Terry Pratchett

I'm not saying there aren't days when you don't feel inspired or excited about writing. Everyone has those. But I've read an innumerable number of blog posts, craft books, and articles saying that the key to being a successful writer is as simple as BICHOK: Butt in Chair, Hands on Keyboard. If you can't figure out a good direction for the next scene, put down anything. It doesn't matter if it's good.

And that segues nicely into the next one:

3. Don't rush things.

It can be really, really tough to keep editing and rewriting a manuscript when you're sick of it and just want to move on to the next shiny idea. But disciplining yourself to revise until it's as good as you can get it and then waiting to hear from trusted critique partners is the smartest move.

4. Read what you're writing.

That is, other books in the genre you're writing. If the last YA book you read was Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret or books in the Babysitter's Club series, don't even think about sending your manuscript out until you've brushed up on your modern YA reading. Pacing, content, conventions, and a host of other things have changed completely over the past thirty years. Try to choose popular books published no earlier than the past year or two.

Do you have any writerly New Year's re

Getting Out of a Writing Slump

Before I get into today's post, I want to say a huge congratulations to fellow Thinking to Inking blogger Lauren, who signed with Kevan Lyon of the Marsal Lyon Literary Agency! If you haven't read her "How I Got My Agent" post, go read it. I'll wait.

I hit a writing slump recently.

As anyone who's ever experienced a writing slump (or writer's block) knows, it's not a fun state of affairs. I don't know if everyone does this, but after about a month of not writing a word, I started withdrawing from my writer friends. I didn't check in with them as often as I normally do. I wasn't on Twitter much either, because it just kept reminding me I wasn't writing.

But last week, I met up with a group of writer buddies. We had a six-hour conversation about writing and life and lots of stuff in between.

That was the kick in the pants I needed to jump back into my WIP. Now I'm rolling again!

This points out two things:

1) The importance of having writer friends.

Even if you have other people you talk to about your writing (your best friend, your spouse), it's different to talk to people who are also writers and know what you're going through. This holds true even if they don't write what you write. Writers get other writers.

Meeting up with one, two, or even ten other writers periodically is also a great way to keep yourself accountable. Do you really want to be the one showing up at every meeting and saying you haven't made any progress since last time?

2) Sometimes you just need a little time off.

I've been writing continuously for years, and I have to say--taking the time to focus on other things for a few months wasn't necessarily a bad thing. I'm coming back to my WIP with fresh eyes, and I'm already seeing things to fix that I didn't notice before.

This post from Write it Sideways has another good tip on how to break out of a writing slump: have multiple projects to work on. When you're blocked on one, you can switch over to another. Bonus points if it's in a totally different genre or format (a short story instead of a novel, for example).

Have you experienced the dreaded writer's slump? How did you get out of it?

Writer's Resource: Write or Die

A few weeks ago, I talked about programs like LeechBlock, Freedom, and Anti-Social and how they could increase your productivity by forcibly removing you from social media sites.

Here's a program that takes it a step further: Write or Die.

From their website's About section: "Write or Die is a web application that encourages writing by punishing the tendency to avoid writing. Start typing in the box. As long as you keep typing, you’re fine, but once you stop typing, you have a grace period of a certain number of seconds and then there are consequences."

The consequences can be toggled from Gentle--a box pops up when you haven't written for a little while, reminding you to keep writing--all the way to Kamikaze, where the program will start unwriting the words you've written if you don't keep typing!

Their tagline ("Putting the 'Prod' in Productivity") says it all. The website touts WOD as the best cure for writer's block around, and I have friends who swear by it. To be honest, I don't suffer from writer's block much--writer's extreme wordiness and need of editing is more my problem--so I haven't tried it.

But if you're someone who often sits in front of a blank screen, wishing you had some motivation to make the words come out, WOD might be just the thing for you.

The program costs $10 and is available in both desktop and iPad versions. If you've tried it before, or you decide to give it a shot, come back and let me know how it went!