Angela Booth's Writing Blog

How to write when you've got no time: write for five minutes

Writing doesn’t take free hours. It takes free minutes. This means that everyone has time to write. Yes, even you, because everyone has five minutes:-)

 

How much can you write in five minutes?

 

Let's find out. You may not have time to do this exercise immediately, but do it in the next couple of hours. You can even do it in your lunch hour, or in the car before you set off for home this evening.

 

Write for five minutes about the writing project you've committed yourself to.

 

"Writing about" is just talking to yourself on paper. It's free-writing, writing stream-of-consciousness style, without lifting your pen from the page. Just keep on writing. If you can't think of what you want to write, then just write that: "I can’t think of what to write next, look at that little boy over there with an ice-cream cone, I can't" etc.

 

How much did you manage to write in five minutes? A page? A page and a half?

 

If you write a page a day for a year, you've written a book.

 

If you've honestly got NO time, you still have five minutes here and there. Snatch five minutes from your lunch hour or get to a meeting ten minutes early and use five minutes to write. If all else fails, lock yourself in the bathroom and write for five minutes.

 

How do blogs work?

Blogging is still a mystery to many writers. I've covered Blogging Your Writing in our workshop of the same name.

  

But I still get email enquiries about blogging. :-)

 

Blogging is:

 

* instant publishing;

* a way to get people to know you and what you do;

* the new honest PR;

* a creativity tool;

* a writing generator:

* a confidence builder;

* a way to build a platform as a writer;

* communication: building a conversation with your readers;

* and much, much more.

 

Read the item "Business: How Does This Blog Thing Work? Or . . . The Zen of Blogging . . ." for more.

  

You get to understand blogging by blogging. There is no other way. :-) Will it work for you to achieve your writing aspirations? I don’t know. But hey, it's writing, and writing is what you do. Blog. See whether it works for you.

 

Create story people for your fiction: who are you?

In this month's Your EveryDay Write (available on February 28), our theme is Creating Characters. New writer or experienced, creating characters is a vital skill to acquire when you're writing fiction.

  

Some writers spend a lot of time on character questionnaires. I'd rather eat glass.

  

I prefer working with images as a character-development tool.

 

I grab a magazine or newspaper and muse over the ads. If the ad is for clothing, I ask myself questions like: Who would wear this? When? Why? Where did she buy it? Etc.

 

Whatever the ad is that's caught my attention, I use the item as a gateway to discovering character.

 

You can use paintings in exactly the same way. Muse over a painting, and see whether you start to get the impression of a character.

 

Useful creative tool: Morning Pages

Julia Cameron popularised Morning Pages in her book The Artist's Way.

  

Morning Pages are three pages, written in longhand, the first thing every morning. Read a description of how to do them here.

  

I've had periods of writing Morning Pages over the past ten years, and periods of not writing them. It occurred to me a few days ago that the periods that I did my MPs each morning were MORE CREATIVE. I felt that I was writing what I should be writing at that particular stage. I had fewer doubts, and got more writing done.

 

So I've gone back to writing them, primarily because they help me deal with my inner critic. Here's what Julia Cameron says about her critic.

  

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JC: I call my critic Nigel. I picked a sort of snooty name because my critic is always telling me that he has better aesthetics than I have. Nigel is alive and well and vicious. Nigel picks what I'm afraid of with each particular piece of writing and tells me my worst fears are true. What I have learned to do is cohabit with him and write around him.

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Try Morning Pages.

 

Giggle of the Day: "Somebody writes that?"

Lee Goldberg spoke at a writers' conference. His conversation-snippets are superb. And scary, when you consider that the people he spoke to weren't joking. Read the whole thing.

  

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"I write screenplays," I said.

 

"Which is what, exactly?"

 

"The story, the action, the words that the characters say," I replied.

 

She stared at me. "Somebody writes that?"

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Make the most of your Hipster PDA

Forget your palmtop. It's back to simplicity. What could be more simple than a clutch of index cards and a bulldog clip?

 

I've been resisting writing about 43 Folder's Hipster PDA trick because I thought everyone carried around index cards anyway, and so what.

 

Well, it appears that everyone doesn’t carry them around, or have them stashed in books and on every flat surface. The index cards trick got coverage in The Bulletin. Go figure.

  

If you're an index-card-newbie:

 

* index cards are ideal organisers for writing projects. When you start a new project, start a card collection. Put ONE thought/ scene/ quote/ idea on a card: this makes the cards easy to organise so you can structure paragraphs, scenes, chapters, books, etc.

 

* zip-lock baggies are handy for card collections. For longterm projects, I zip the baggies closed and toss the baggies into a box with the project's name on it.

 

* keep the cards. Years later, you can go through your card collections to get fresh ideas.

 

* slip cards into the books you're reading so you don’t have to hunt for a card to make notes. (Remove cards from library books before you return the books.)

 

* write must-do reminders on cards. Scrunch up a card and slip it into your pocket, or into your purse. It's bulky, you'll notice the bulk and remember.

 

* to keep important cards, scan cards into Microsoft OneNote. Use OneNote's Insert/ Picture/ From Scanner or Camera menu item. I cluster (mind map) and doodle on cards, and often scan them. You can just scan a card, of course, and save the image file on your computer.

 

Free associate your way into your writing project

Can't get started writing? Make a list of words.

 

Here you go: "Summer, hot, rain, sun, sound, tree, highlight, neglect, glass---"

 

Make a list of words at least half a page long, if you're writing by hand, and 100 words long if you're using a computer.

 

Any words will do. You're just free associating, so who cares what comes out?

 

Pick any three of your words and use them in a paragraph.

 

You should be feeling much more relaxed and inspired now. If not, wash, lather and repeat.

 

Dealing with page fright --- performance anxiety

I hate starting a new writing project. And it doesn't matter what kind of project it is, whether it's a six-line classified ad, or a 100,000 word book.

This page fight performance anxiety syndrome is similar to an actor's stage fright. It's a subtle form of writer's block. Not disabling, but it leads to procrastination which leads to low self-esteem.

Here are some ways I've found to get around it:

* I tell myself that I'm playing --- I won't use this page at all, it's just a warm-up;

* I write 20 opening sentences. The first 15 are awful, which is fine. But by sentence 20 I've broken through and page fright has gone;

* I write the beginning of the project away from my office on my Palm PDA --- this makes it more casual, and I feel as if I'm on holiday. Or, I write the first few pages on thick, luscious paper with a fountain pen;

* I do the housekeeping for the project: open a file, create a template, make a list of research sources --- busywork, but it breaks page fright;

* I give myself ten minutes to play Chess Tiger on my Palm --- no longer! (After ten minutes I feel so guilty I leap into the project);

* I promise myself a treat (chocolate works for me) when I've written the first paragraph;

* I write one sentence every hour. I set a timer to make sure I don’t forget. After a couple of hours of this, I'm acclimatised to the project and page fright is gone.

 

Daydream to enhance your creativity

When you want to become creative, your first step is slow down. Relax. Play some calming music, or simply close your eyes, take a few deep breaths, and daydream for a few minutes.

 

Don't try to rush this initial slowing down. You're aiming to drop out of the world of your usual concerns. Fantasize. Imagine you're living on tropical island, where your every wish is catered for. Make this daydreaming scenario as real as you can. Hear the waves, let the sand sift through your fingers, and feel the warmth of the sun on your skin.

 

If you feel guilty because you think you're wasting time when you take a few minutes to daydream, your own experience will show you that you're NOT wasting time when you daydream, you're increasing your productivity. Our rush-rush lifestyle chokes off creativity. Only relaxation will allow your creativity to bubble up and will get you into a true creative state. (Note: such a state is also called a "peak experience" or "flow state".)

 

Connect the dots in your writing with transitions

Writing is building. Like Lego. You're building with pieces of information.

 

You take the pieces, and join them together with connectors.

 

Prepositions make good connectors, because they give additional information.

  

In this sentence, "in" is a connector.

 

Pay attention to connectors in your reading.

No time to write? Write where you are

You've always got time to write if you make writing part of your everyday life. Stop and write at: the supermarket; at work; in the park --- wherever you happen to be.

 

Simply describe what you see around you in at least 100 words. This gets you started. You'll be itching to get back to your writing for the rest of the day.

 

When you stop and write during your daily activities writing is integrated with the rest of your life. It's just something you do, as naturally and easily as breathing.

 

Over time, this write-where-you-are process will go a long way towards making writing a stress-free activity for you.

 

Kudos to Gmail's spam filters: just amazing

Gmail is AMAZING. I don’t know what they've been doing with their spam filters, but I haven’t had a single spam message in over a month.

  

If you hate spam, get a Gmail account. Need an invite? Contact me at angela.booth(AT)gmail.com

 

(Replace the (AT) with an ampersand.)

 

I've got 50 invitations to give away. Just put GMAIL INVITE PLEASE in the subject line.

 

Thank you Google.:-)

 

Content's back: About.com sold for $410 million

The New York Times' purchase of About.com makes it official, content is back in charge on the Web.

  

Internet.com's article, "NY Times: It's All About.com", states:

  

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About.com's model is a precursor to blogs. Its 500 paid experts manage topic-centric Web portals that combine original content with Web links. Primedia, the publisher of 300 products, brought in $1.3 billion in revenue in 2003. But it failed to find synergy between the Web product and its magazines.

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It's nice to know that someone's making money with About.com, because the Guides (content mavens) certainly aren't:

  

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Q. Do I get paid for this?
A. Guide compensation is based on page views. Each Guide is assigned a unique page view rate for each thousand page views the site gets each a month. No matter what their page view rate is, Guides get paid a minimum of $500 for their first full-month on the network and are guaranteed at least $500 as long as they increase page views each month.

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If you want to be a Guide, the time commitment is NOT small:

 

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Q. What's the time commitment?
A. Most Guides estimate that it takes them between 10-20 hours per week to keep their sites up to our high standards. Many Guides put in additional hours because they tell us it is hard to make a clear line between "work" and "play". We make it as easy as possible for Guides by providing tools that are structured and easy to use, yet flexible enough to let your creativity shine through.

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Unpalatable writing truth: Selling your writing is often a matter of luck

New writers like to believe that editors and agents are super-human beings who know everything. They certainly know better than writers. Heh. The truth is, selling your writing is often a matter of luck.

 

Editors and agents have problems even as you and I do. They have jobs to do, and they want to do them as easily and as quickly as they can, with the least amount of hassle. This means that when you send an article proposal to a magazine and another writer sends a similar idea, if the publication has worked with him before, he gets the job. It may not be fair, but to the magazine he's a known quantity. They know what to expect with him. On the other hand, if there's a book on the topic and the agent calls to offer the serial rights for less than it would cost to hire either of you, you both lose out.

 

Rejection is a fact of the creative life. Many genre novelist have written ten complete novels before the first one sold, and that sale was often a matter of luck. That novel was in the right place at the right time, so to speak. Let's see, at 80 to 100 thousand words per novel, that's close to a million words, before a single word sold. Of course, once a novel sells, the editor and the writer's agent will encourage the writer to dig out those past efforts, revamp them, and chances are they will be published too. (So if you're filling a couple of filing cabinets with unsold manuscripts, take heart. Look on them as your retirement fund. :-))

 

Many writers have to continue for years, doing what isn’t working. They have no guarantee that it will EVER work. But if they stop digging that hole, they'll never strike gold.

 

Discover how to sell your writing in "Help – My writing's not selling."

 

  

The Art of the Writing Pitch: new Pro Write workshop

Watch for our latest Pro Write workshop, "The Art of the Writing Pitch". The first lesson will be online within the next couple of days.

 

Here's an excerpt:

 

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Why write a pitch?

You write a pitch to get attention. Your pitch lets a potential buyer know that you have a particular product that you're offering for sale. A pitch saves time. You can pitch projects fast, and get turned down fast. (Yes, turned down. Marketing your work is always a numbers game. You've got to kiss a lot of frogs before you find a prince.) The benefit? You get commissions and contracts faster.

 

You also get commissions BECAUSE you pitched. A pitch introduces you to a person who can buy your work. Your pitch is indicative of your writing style and ability. Many, many writers pitch projects to editors and agents, and are then contracted to write something different: a project that needed a writer.

 

I like to think that a pitch has more in common with an ad, than with anything else. A well-defined ad, that is, that tells you exactly what the product is, and has an emotional quotient as well. The emotion comes from you. If you're writing a pitch, get fired up. Your emotion will come through, and it will sell the project.

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Not a Pro Write member? If you're serious about writing, Pro Write membership is an investment in your writing career.