The Relaxed Writer

2 Tips for Happier Writing (for freelance journalists, copywriters, creative writers & others)

You are so lucky to be a writer.

You're powerfully endowed with creative, investigative, analytic and/or expressive abilities.  (Not so, you say? Then try this: "I'm actively developing my creative, investigative, analytic and/or expressive potential, and have a vast array of free instructional resources available to me whenever I log onto the internet.")

Given your writing abilities and potential, how can you enjoy your writing more today? 

My suggestions are simple.

1. Find silence. 
2. Use your words for good.

Find Silence

"Go to where the silence is and say something."  - Amy Goodman, journalist

I love the sense of the sacred invoked by this quote. I also love its utility, its global usefulness to creative writers and journalists and technical writers and copywriters...you name it.

If you're writing creatively today, read "silence" literally.  Still yourself with meditation before you write, or preface your time at the writing desk with a long, ambling walk, a la Brenda Ueland.

If you're thinking about new stories to pitch, train your investigative eye on the silent spaces in the culture at-large.  Give voice to an under-examined trend, an overlooked causal relationship, a neglected-but-important population, region, cause or initiative.

If you're writing copy or content or white papers, "find the silence" by looking at your audience's needs with fresh eyes today.  Discard your assumptions and ask your audience directly what they need.  Find out if there's an angle or an important question you've overlooked, and address it.  

Use Your Words for Good

The journalist I quoted above has devoted her career to activism.  Whether you share her progressive stance or drive, you can still use Amy's words and example to inspire your writing.

See if you can set an intention to direct your talents to "good" today. 

When you draft a fiction piece or examine your experience in memoir or essay form, you're expressing your individual stance and serving others.  Good, creative writing is a form of service and has the power to bridge gaps between people.  (Ever read The Help?)

When you publish a newspaper or magazine piece, you're directing attention to a particular subject.  As you formulate a new pitch this week, challenge yourself to tackle a subject you care deeply about. 

When you sit down to write copy, content or white papers, consider what skillsets you're using.  (Marketing savvy?  Analytical or creative thinking?)  Dream up a small and meaningful project you can take on this holiday season.

• Could you offer a 1/2-hour brainstorming session to that friend who's struggling to launch a non-profit? 
• Could you outline your own instructional e-book?
• Could you offer to generate infographics or give one-hour copy review by phone to a favorite organization you belong to? 

I know you're busy, and the point here isn't to add more projects to your workload. 

I'm simply asking you to consciously acknowledge your gifts and recognize that you have a choice in how/where to use them.

Find silence.  Use your words for good.  Two simple practices to help you enliven your writing career and enjoy yourself more.

What do you think?  Leave your thoughts in the Comments section below.

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Don't forget: "Two Days to Write," my step-by-step, virtual writing intensive, begins with a kickoff call this coming Wednesday, December 7th.  Check it out & join us!  http://www.twodaystowrite.com

 

 

 

Writing Lesson from Photographers: The "10,000 + 1 Principle"

Now that you've mastered the "3% Rule," let's move on to the second of three posts in my "Writing Lessons from Photographers" blog series. 

Today's lesson is a powerful antidote for anyone who struggles with an overactive inner critic.  Enjoy!

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Last week a writer I know excised herself from cozy home and family to go to a nearby cafe to work on her novel.  Hot beverage on hand and comfortably seated, she opened her laptop and began to write. 

It wasn't long, though, before my talented writer-friend sent me this missive:

writing life coach! what do you do when your brain tells you that you can't write a book and that everything you type is a boring cliche that no one will ever care about?!

Oh, writer's block.  Who among us hasn't been in that very stuck place?  

Today's photography-inspired writing lesson addresses just this kind of creative paralysis.  Read on to learn about what I call the "10,000+1" Principle.

The "10,000 + 1" Principle

Readers, meet my one of my favorite photographers:  Henri Cartier-Bresson.

Over the years, this French photographer's spontaneous images, taken with his hand-held Leica camera as he roamed the streets of Paris, remain among my favorites.  (For fun, I'll include here my 1994 street portrait of a young boy in Mexico City.  Not too tough to see how much I was influenced by Cartier-Bresson's "Rue Mouffetard, Paris 1954," is it?)

A former painter, Cartier-Bresson believed in a concept he called "integrity of vision."  He didn't believe in cropping his photographic images to improve their composition.  Instead, he held himself to a self-imposed standard of "what you see is what you get," and printed most of his photographs with a thin black line around them, indicating that what you see on the print is exactly what he saw through the viewfinder. 

No cropping.

"Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst."   - Henri Cartier-Bresson

Given Cartier-Bresson's "get it right all at once" aesthetic, it's not surprising that he was well-aware of the fact that as artists, we tend to start out..."so-so," and that with time, we improve.  This is a simple concept, but one that, perhaps because drafting a new chapter takes us writers a heck of a lot longer than the "decisive moment" Cartier-Bresson needed to compose a photograph, is often very hard for us writers to remember. 

• We forget that the piece we're working on is simply one project among many.
• We forget that our current work represents a single blip in time in our life cycle as writers.
• We forget that sometimes progress is incremental and hardly perceptible, and that, if we're alert and mindful, with each page we deepen our expressive powers and learn more (and more and more) how to do our chosen craft well.

Cartier-Bresson's quote is one of my favorite reminders that we develop our writing talent in stages.  Consider this the "10,000+1 Principle:"  over time we improve.  If we log in the hours and practice our craft, we are bound to produce our first "plus-one" piece.  Until then, our job is simply to show up and to pay close attention as we work.

Try This

Let's take the 10,000+1 Principle literally for a moment. 

Assume that you're a photographer, and you shoot rolls that are 36 frames long.  Using Cartier-Bresson's prediction, you'd need to shoot about 278 rolls of film before you move from "ugh" to "decent." 

Let's say you're shooting about 3 new rolls a week.   If my math's right, at this pace it'll take you a year and ten months to move your craft forward.

Consider that: 

if you were to start your work in August 2010, you could expect to shoot your 10,001st photograph right around July 2012.  And with that 10,001st photograph, you'll be moving into a discernibly better stage with your craft.  If you really want to be a good writer, isn't your long-term goal to evolve your craft worth this relatively brief investment of time?

Here are a few more ways to apply the "10,000+1" Principle to your work as a writer.

• If you're writing in a new genre, what would happen to your writing if you gave yourself a year-and-a-half to simply be apprentice:  to show up on time, to log in the hours, and to learn, learn, learn?

• What would happen if, just for this afternoon, you allowed yourself to focus on craft and creativity - not how your work will be received in the future?  I tried this today while writing this blog post, and this simple mindshift allowed me to finish up in record time.

What Do You Think? 

How will you apply the 10,000+1 Principle to your own writing?  Shoot me a trackback if you blog about the 10,000+1 Principle elsewhere, or share your ideas with us in the comments below.  (You can also leave a comment on my Facebook page by clicking here.)

Next Up:  "Never Shoot a Sunset"

Stay tuned for the next and final installment of this three-part Writing Lessons from Photographers blog series:  "Never Shoot a Sunset." 

Thanks for reading and enjoy working at your craft today.

A "Take-Action Challenge" for Writers (on MLK, Haiti & Your Novel)

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."  -Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

I'm no historian (and certainly no King scholar), but Dr. King's life, to me, is a luminous example of what it's like to really live.  Brave and vibrant, King's empowered engagement in the world sprang from his compassion for others and a deep, personal spirituality.

Music affected King profoundly.  (The Guardian reported that King's last words, spoken to the saxophonist, Ben Branch, were: "Ben, make sure you play "Take My Hand, Precious Lord" in the meeting tonight. Play it real pretty.")  Martin Luther King, Jr. left behind a legacy of social change and inspired oratory.

What Writers Can Learn from Dr. King's Example

Like us, each day King made choices. 

Given his accomplishments, King seems to have chosen again and again to "speak out" about what mattered most to him.  Sometimes Dr. King spoke with silent and deliberate actions.  Often he chose to voice himself in conversation, prayer or song. 

He spoke his mind out loud and on the page.

In honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday, this week I encourage you to enliven yourself by engaging more fully with what matters most.

Introducing "The MLK Take-Action Challenge"

The MLK Take-Action Challenge is two-fold:

1. "speak out" this week for others' benefit, and
2. "speak out" this week on behalf of yourself

Part One:  "Speak Out" for Others
If you've been stunned into inaction by the aftermath of Haiti's 7.0 earthquake, act now to voice your concern and compassion. If you haven't done so already, please take a moment to donate to Haiti earthquake relief efforts.

Need ideas?

Today on LinkedIn, Randy Hecht, writer and a former consultant with the Points of Light Foundation, offered these suggestions:

Donate money.

Hecht recommends checking out these relief organization and supports their work herself:

• OxFamAmerica
• Doctors without Borders
• Grameen Foundation

According to Hecht, each organization is rated highly by the American Institute of Philanthropy (indicating  that more of your donation goes to direct services vs. funding administrative and overhead costs).

Donate frequent flyer miles.

If you're short on cash, Hecht suggests you consider donating frequent flyer miles to relief organizations.  "Contact the airline for a list of non-profits supported by donations via any given mileage plan," Hecht says.  You might also want to visit the LA Times Travel Blog to learn where to donate your travel miles and hotel award points.

Another option to consider:

Donate proceeds from selling your professional services or creative works.

Consider joining Kelly Diel's "Help Haiti Blog Challenge."  Diel, creator of Cleavage and a weekly contributor to ProBlogger, is asking other bloggers to join her in generating relief contributions in exchange for goods or services. There donating professional service fees or proceeds from the sales of  creative work (crafts, music, art objects or ___[your idea here]__.  To contribute (or get ideas for your own offerings), click here.

Part Two:  "Speak Out" for Yourself

Let's say that you're a busy freelance writer with a novel-in-progress. The manuscript may be perched on the corner of your desk, filed in the filing cabinet or still lodged in your imagination. 

Alternately, let's say you're a busy working writer with a book proposal in-progress.  A day-job holder with a blogging dream.  [Insert Your Project Here]

Part two of your "MLK Take-Action Challenge" is this:  each day this week, take one simple action to reconnect with your creative work and further your dream. 

If the novel's not yet started, a few suggestions:  do a ten-minute freewrite on what entices you and what scares you about writing this story.  Spider-diagram your characters, or sketch your plot. 

If you've got a work-in-progress, a few suggestions:  reread the last few chapters you wrote.  Revise your synopsis. Organize your research.  Sign up for my free "How to Finish What You Write" teleclass.

I'll be offering you lots more tips and thoughts on how to reconnect to--and finish--your writing projects  later this week.  Please subscribe now to be sure you don't miss a thing.

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I'll leave you with a two-minute musical offering, for those who'd like to hear Mahalia Jackson singing Dr. King's favorite hymn:

Enjoy this Martin Luther King, Jr.-inspired "Take-Action Challenge."  I'd love to hear about how things go for you this week.

-Marla (@MarlaBeck on Twitter)