Writing
10 Empowering Quotes About Writing and Living the Creative Life
From Writing FAST by Jeff Bollow
“And the reason you hate writing so much is because you start analyzing your work before you’re done pouring it onto the page. Your Left-brain won’t let your Right-brain do it’s job … Your Right-brain gets the words on the page. The Left-brain makes them sing.”
From Escaping Into the Open by Elizabeth Berg:
“There are people who have never studied writing who are capable of being writers. I know this because I am an example. I was a part-time registered nurse, a wife, and a mother when I began publishing. I’d taken no classes, had no experience, no knowledge of the publishing world, no agent, no contacts … Take the risk to let all that is in you, out. Escape into the open.”
Stephen King’s Advice on Being a Writer
Who better to take writing advice from than Stephen King.
How Well Do You Know Yourself?
“We will discover the nature of our particular genius when we stop trying to conform to our own or to other peoples’ models, learn to be ourselves, and allow our natural channel to open.” – Shakti Gawain
Most marketing gurus will tell you how important it is to know your market, and I completely agree. You need to have a thorough understanding of the wants, needs, desires and problems of those you serve. Without that information, how can you hope to make a difference in their life?
Further, no matter what type of product, service or information you offer, the bottom line is you are compensated in direct proportion to the amount of value you provide to your market, so you’d better know what your market finds valuable.
But here’s something the marketing gurus often overlook. It’s also important to know yourself. You may wonder why I say that, and to explain it, I’ll use myself as an example.
How to Work Less & Make a Bigger Impact; Abe Lincoln Style
On November 19th, 1863, the great American president, Abraham Lincoln, stood before a group of citizens assembled in a small, southern Pennsylvania field.
With his country deeply entrenched in the brutal and bloody Civil War, Lincoln gazed out at the traumatized, war-torn faces gathered before him and delivered a brief statement composed of no more than 300 words.
Clocking in at just under three minutes in length, Lincoln’s remarks paled in comparison to the two-hour, 13,700 word oration completed just minutes before by Edward Everett, a well-known and highly regarded politician of the times.
Chances are, unless you’re a student of American history, you’ve not heard of Edward Everett before this moment. Nor do you have a clue about the content of his speech that day.
However, you’d be hard pressed to find a single American citizen who’s never heard of Abraham Lincoln or this brief, but historic speech, which he delivered at the dedication of the Soldiers’ National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
Despite it’s brevity, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address is regarded as one of the most famous speeches in American history. His words not only helped to re-unite a nation ripped apart by civil war, but they also now serve as a cornerstone of American government and democracy.
“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal … that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government: of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
As for the two-hour long speech of Edward Everett, although originally intended to be the actual “Gettysburg Address,” it seems his words merely drifted away on the gentle breeze of that cool, November day. Irony aside, when you imagine the amount of work likely needed to compose and prepare for a lengthy presentation like Everett’s, the inequity is palpable.
Still, there are lessons to be learned here. How is it that one person can work for hours, days or weeks on a project and achieve little impact, while another can – seemingly – invest a fraction of the effort and produce results that change the course of history? Here’s how Abe did it.
12 Tips to Overcome Writer’s Block and Become a Faster, More Prolific Content Creator
1. Get Your Mind Right.
Much has been written about the power of your mind to inspire or dis-empower you. I won’t say much more about it here other than to say your mind can be your biggest obstacle or your greatest ally as a writer.
Holding onto thoughts like “writing is a necessary evil” or “I’m just not a writer” don’t serve you. Release those beliefs, and adopt some new ones.
My core limiting belief was “I’m not creative.” It was based on my misunderstanding of what creativity really is and the creative process. So I let it go and adopted some new beliefs. First, I now energize the belief that “writing is my path to freedom.” Second, I believe “each day, I’m becoming a better, faster writer.”
Pick some new beliefs, and write them down somewhere you’ll see them often. Choose beliefs that are empowering, inspiring and believable. It does no good to try to convince yourself of something when you know deep down you don’t believe it.
Morning Pages: 8 Lessons Learned
Today is day four of the morning pages exercise. Here’s what I’ve learned so far.
1. Make Morning Pages a Priority
I almost skipped morning pages today. It wasn’t something I consciously chose to do. I just let myself get side-tracked. I started surfing around reading other peoples’ stuff, looking for inspiration, and before I knew it, an hour had passed, and I’d still not started writing.
I may have to change my morning routine, which typically looks like this. I roll out of bed and hit the bathroom. Then I grab a coffee. Next, I turn on my computer and check a few things. Then I finally sit down to write my morning pages. I think tomorrow I won’t turn on my computer until my morning pages are done.
2. Let Go of Results
When we start some new course of self-improvement, whether an exercise program, a spiritual practice or morning pages, we tend to expect immediate results. At least I do. And If I don’t see results pretty quickly, I tend to find reasons to stop doing the exercise. I decided this morning that I’d commit to doing morning pages for 30 days without any expectation of results.
3. Make Morning Pages a Special Ritual
Get clear about the reasons you’re doing this. For me, there are several reasons. First, writing is imperative to my business. Any successful online business is driven by relevant and informative content, and that starts with writing. Second, I’m doing this to become a better writer so I can write more, and touch more people with my writing.
Third, this has become a spiritual practice for me. Through this process, I’m reconnecting with myself; with my inner spirit. It’s a form of meditation. I’m reconnecting with my true self and the divine within me.
When I sit down to write, I have a hot cup of coffee or tea, and turn on Gregorian Chant Radio on Pandora. The music is soothing and relaxing and it sets a mood that reflects the special and spiritual nature of my ritual. Of course, if I don’t turn on my computer tomorrow, I’ll need to find a new source of music. Fortunately, I recorded some Gregorian chant music that I can download to my iPod.
Want to Make Writing Easier? Try Morning Pages.
As I mentioned yesterday, writing is often a chore for me. With that in mind, I’ve undertaken a new morning ritual called “morning pages.” Morning pages is a writing exercise devised by Julia Cameron and popularized in her book, The Artist’s Way.
The morning pages exercise is designed to help you recover (or discover) your creativity, and silence what Julia refers to as the Censor. The Censor is that critical inner voice that criticizes each and every word you write and makes it brutally painful for you to write anything.
“The morning pages are the primary tool of creative recovery. As blocked artists, we tend to criticize ourselves mercilessly. Even if we look like functioning artists to the world, we feel we never do enough and what we do isn’t right. We are victims of our own internalized perfectionist, a nasty internal and eternal critic, the Censor, who resides in our (left) brain and keeps up a constant stream of subversive remarks that are often disguised as the truth…The point is to stop taking the Censor as the voice of reason and learn to hear it for the blocking device that it is. Morning pages will help you to do this.”
Interestingly enough, one of my clients wrote me this morning after reading about my struggle with writing. She said: “I really did think that writing came so naturally that you had no problem putting pen to paper and the words just flowed out of you. That is a wake up call for me.” I think the same thing when I read other peoples’ writing. I think writing must be so easy and natural for them, when in reality, that’s likely not the case. It’s very possible they struggle with writing nearly as much as I do.
I’m Learning How to Write. Again.
I don’t know about you, but very often, writing is a chore for me. Since I started working online, I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve sat down to write an article, and the words simply flowed out of me easily and effortlessly.
One recent article took nearly an entire day to write, and it really wasn’t that long of an article; only about 900 words. It’s a brutally painful process, and it has to be remedied lickety-split.
After doing a bit of research this morning, I’ve discovered what some of my problems are. The first issue seems to be around my expectations. See, I expect to be able to sit down in front of my computer and just start typing out an article easily and effortlessly. That’s not really a bad expectation, but I expect to do it without any sort of preparation before sitting down to write. I expect that the information is already in my head, and all I need to do is get it out of my head and onto the screen. Apparently, that’s not how real writers work. Real writers actually do a bit of preparation that makes their writing much easier and effortless.
Hi there. I'm Michael Pollock. I inspire and teach creative entrepreneurs how to use the Web to make a difference in the world, make more money and live a bigger life ... 
