Personal Achievement Badges to which I Pay Too Much Mind

As I mentioned on Twitter a few days ago, I managed to mess up my left hand.  So there’s been a lot of awkward one-handed/hunt-and-peck sort of nonsense going on, which has just more than chopped my daily average in half.  (We’re not gonna talk about how long it took to type this post up. *weeps*)  It’s not too bad so far.  I had a reasonable buffer by that point, so I hadn’t slipped beneath the goal bar until just today.  The doctor said to wear the splint until next Wednesday, and then I can start using my hand again in little bits.  But I’m pretty sure I’ll still pull off NaNo without too much more drama. *crosses fingers*

NaNoWriMo always has a great website.  So beautiful, so cheerful.  There’s always tons of encouragement, and I’m half in love with the daily word graph.  But they added something new this year.  Personal Achievement Badges.  Behold!

I know this is normally the week in which I post a sample chapter, buuuuut… yeah, this is possibly the ugliest first draft I’ve ever pounded out, haha.  Definitely not fit for human eyes just yet.  So in lieu of burning your eyeballs out of your sockets, I’m going to give you a little tour of how I earned my PABs.

Planner.  I was pretty torn on whether to give myself the planner or the pantser badge with this project.  Normally, I come into these things with a pretty thorough outline and beefy packet of notes and sketches.  This year, I got the idea a week before NaNo started and plowed ahead with about four pages of notes.  Hardly the blank page I needed to qualify as a pantser, but a far cry from the reams of notes I usually head into this with.  So it’s a little scary, but is its own kind of fun.

Tell the World.  This is probably definitely my most boring badge.  I made an announcement on Twitter that I would be doing NaNoWriMo this year.  Again.  Like I always do.  … Yup.  I guess I did tell a bunch of random people and bullied a few of my friends into doing it with me, which, although much smaller in scope, was probably also much more meaningful.  So I’ll take it either way.

With Gratitude.  I’ve earned this one several times over, but never enough.  Nano is gloriously fun for me, but it takes me away from my family a lot, especially my kids, and my husband picks up a lot of the slack.  So I thanked my husband first and foremost for all his help.  I thanked my kids for their patience.  I also thanked my writing buddies here in Fairbanks for putting up with me all the time and being so darned encouraging.  I thanked @NaNoWordSprints for all their tireless- you guessed it- sprints on Twitter that keep me motivated and entertained.  And there are probably a gajillion others who deserve my thanks as well!  Everyone- you are fantastic!  Thank you!

Wrimo Spirit. This one’s kind of related to the one above, but the coin has been flipped.  This badge was earned when I helped support other writers.  So when I cheer-lead on Twitter, when I set up lunch write-ins, when I walk to my kid’s school to ask his librarian how her Nano project is going, when I keep an eye on my friend’s kid at the church activity so she can scribble in a few more words… then I get good karma and this badge.  Huzzah!

Secret Noveling. Okay, so when I’m honest with myself, I probably write most of my novel in less than ideal places. My kids know all my hiding places by now: in the van, beside the potted avocado tree, in the bathroom, in the laundry room, in the guest room that is about forty degrees this time of year.  Heck, I’ve even hidden behind the rocking chair in the baby’s room just to sneak in those few awesome lines before I forgot them.  But I can make these things work.  We’re all used to it.  So I wasn’t sure if that really counted for this badge.  (I spend a lot of time thinking about what really counts to earn these badges.)  But then I earned it definitely-for-sure on Saturday.  I was at a kids’ birthday party at the local children’s museum, and it was a lot of fun and we had a blast.  But then my boys wanted to stay late and I thought, ‘Oo! My golden opportunity!’  So I slipped out my laptop (because who doesn’t bring their laptop to a kids’ birthday party complete with water tables, cheese puffs, and fluorescent cupcakes?) and tried to figure out where I could hide from my children, but still be able to see them without too much trouble.  After much poking around (and very nearly settling on the bathroom foyer), I ended up hiding in the craft corner, wedged between the Lego table and the animals/continents diorama on a tiny tiny stool, but if I leaned out I could see most of the main room.  And there I sat, startling every staffer trying to get back to their offices, for a solid hour. Bliss!

Game On. Word wars are my lifeblood.  I can write without them.  I’ll still plink out words in my one-handed turtle’s pace.  But nothing gets me going like sprints.  I haven’t been reporting in my pathetic word counts as much since I hurt my hand, but I still do them nearly every time I sit down to write for more than twenty minutes.  I even make my writing friends do them with me during our lunches.  Last time, I had prizes!  I handed out little packets of candy and you got to eat one candy for every hundred words you got down.  And then the person with the highest word total at the end went home with the giantest candy bar I could find.  (I would have gotten a lot more candy throughout the whole affair if one of the kids didn’t run up in the middle of a sprint and make off with half my candy in a grab-and-dash maneuver.  Well played, little beast. This is why I hide from these monsters while writing.)

So how about you guys?  Any fellow Wrimos out there?  What’s your favorite Personal Achievement Badge and how did you earn it?

Character Cosplay

Do you need more creativity in your life?  Then hang out with the ever amazing Madison Dusome!  She always has the best ideas.

A few weeks ago, she suggested that some of us on twitter do a character cosplay for Halloween, where we draw our characters dressing up as each other’s characters.  Having the crazy schedule that I do, I only spared myself the time to do two of them.  So, in lieu of this month’s comic, here they are!

My character:

Sylragorl (City of the Dead) He is an ice dragon, a bit stunted as far as dragons go, but still big enough to bite your average human in half.  He is a silvery pale blue, with sapphire eyes and seven headspikes.  Four legs, two wings, tail, this sort of dragon.  Sylragorl is desperate to be liked and will do stupid things for even the semblance of affection.  But if he decides he doesn’t like you, prepare to be disemboweled.  He has a self-deprecating sense of humor and can be pretty sarcastic.

Dressed as CM Schofeld‘s character:

Ruaridh Carver (Twyned Earth)  Five foot nothing, messy black hair, unhealthily thin human(ish). Always wearing very baggy black clothing, band hoodies, jeans with chains, black studded/spiky wrist accessories. Grumpy, easily scared, anti-social chain smoker.

My character:

Princess Aerinthe Darinsvale, although she prefers the nickname Snow White (Blood and Ebony)  A slender, pale girl with long dark hair and bright green eyes, Snow is fifteen years old, but with a much, much older soul.  She prefers rich/dark colors and heavy fabrics, and always wears a small glass-and-ebony bauble on a silver chain, containing a drop of blood and water. (For clothing style, think Anne Boelyn-ish, but with a tiara instead of the headgear.) As Aerinthe, she is a charming girl and a doting daughter.  As Snow White, changeling child of the Fey King, she is ruthless, manipulative, and sadistic.

Dressed as Madison Dusome‘s character:

Adrien (Half a Man)  Messy, long-ish blond hair, missing his left arm from the shoulder.  Clothes are of mixed medieval France/Morocco inspiration: fitted tunic, loose pants, beaten shoes.  His military “uniform” involves a black-and-yellow checkered sash that can basically be tied however you like; some pin it like a cape, some wear it like a scarf/hood, some wrap it across the back/around the shoulders.  There’s a “proper” way but most prefer to rebel ;D  He might be seen with (a) a longsword that’s too big for him (b) apothecary tools (c) books! (d) magical golden strings, which would be a hilarious/horrible thing to cosplay.

You should take a minute to check out Mads’ and Cat’s blogs as well, where they will also be posting their own versions of character cosplay, as well as their thoughts on writing, the universe, and everything.  (I’ll put up links to the art itself as it gets posted.  Hopefully soon!  The suspense is killing me!)

(Madison’s first batch is up! Clicky!)

(Madison’s second batch is up! Hi-ya!)

Have a great week!  Next time you hear from me, it’ll be while I’m knee deep in another month of NaNoWriMo– see you then!

Traveling by Coach

Greetings, humans! I just got back from the Alaska Writer’s Guild Fall Conference (and am exhausted out of my mind), but I haven’t gotten all my notes and thoughts together enough to form a coherent blog post. That will come later, I promise. (Spoiler alert: it was awesome!)

In the meantime, I attended another AWG monthly meeting last week and learned about a writing profession I’d never heard of: writing coach. Since I’d never heard of it, I was eager to figure out the dealio, and even to do a little sniffing around before the presentation.  To do that, I got to hassle our presenter, a local writing coach named Amy Jane Helmericks. (She also published her first book, Lindorm Kingdom, earlier this year. Congrats, Amy!)

So what is a writing coach? What do they do?

To help me figure that out, Amy was kind enough to stage a twenty minute session she might go through with a new client. We emailed beforehand to set it up, and she sent along a list of questions to think about in preparation for our session.

Amy was incredibly fun to work with, and asked super helpful questions. (In fact, her very first question completely stumped me. I’m still working out a good answer.) She raked my story idea over the coals (in the kindest, gentlest way possible) and then turned to my synopsis. I actually had given her three things: a logline, a 100 word pitch, and a half-page synopsis. She talked about what worked in each of them, and what didn’t work, and how each of those things could be tightened up even further. But above all else, she asked questions, questions, questions. And without fail, the questions that I was the worst at answering correlated to the weakest parts in my story.

But Amy never gave specific advice. As precise as her questions were, her advice was very broad. As Amy herself put it in her presentation later that week, “I didn’t tell him what to do… We stir things up and then we hand it over.” If I had a bad answer, she wasn’t going to fix it for me. That was my job. She just pointed out where the work needed to be done.

I have actually had very similar sessions in the past with writer friends of mine, where we pick apart each other’s ideas and tune them up. And I always found them hugely helpful, even vital. I never have good story ideas until I’ve chattered them to death with fellow writers. Amy was able to echo that same feeling of cozy friendliness, but to imbue it with professional quality questions, prompts, and guidance.

As Amy mentioned later in her presentation, what a writing coach does is based on what the writer needs. “It depends on what you want help with,” she said when someone asked at what point to bring in a coach. “I help with organizing ideas, editing, querying…” Likewise, her presentation ran the gamut from finding inspiration to writing and organizing, on through editing and pitching. And she knew her stuff on all those points. It was a great presentation, folding together several posts’ worth of themes and how-to’s, most of which can be found on her website. We even talked about the value of NaNoWriMo and how to prepare yourself for it so you can draft effectively!

In short, it was a great session and presentation. Amy is very thoughtful and thought-provoking, and incredibly generous with her time and expertise. If you’ve found that your writing has stalled, maybe even before you’ve had a good run at it, consider bringing on a writing coach. It could be the jumpstart that you need.

To learn more about Amy and what she does, visit her website at WritingHope.com. Happy writing!

10 People to Follow on Twitter

(A quick aside to those of you not on twitter- the same general principles can be applied to whichever social media you prefer- whether that’s Facebook or Reddit or whatever. If you’re not involved in any social media… well, why not? Assuming you’re a writer, you’re missing some cool opportunities to interact with new faces and places. So give it a shot already!  *climbs back off soapbox*)

When I first signed up for Twitter way back when, I was pretty irritated with all their inane suggestions for who I should be following. (Seriously, I’m not here to stalk Lady Gaga, please stop asking if I want to.) But it didn’t take me long to figure out who I really should be following. A lot of goofiness and guesswork later, I’ve come up with a good starter list that I really wish I could just quietly slip to Past Jill and save her a lot of silliness and trouble. Behold!

News Outlets More than one. I also think it’s important to have them vary in their sizes and/or scope. This way you get the great big global stuff that affects us all, as well as the teeny little slice o’ life stories. And don’t limit yourself to news that only applies to you! On a more temporary basis, I also like to sign on for local news in other places when I’m trying to get into the setting of a new book, or just to broaden my horizons. But for purposes of this list, I’ll keep it to my permanent news outlets. For my global news network, I use @BBCBreaking. For the local stuff, the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner’s very own @newsminer.

Industry Pundits There are all manner of industry pundits you can be following. You can stalk the literary agents and editors you’re thinking about querying. You can listen in on industry news or find tips. You can follow publishing houses, literary agencies, writing coaches, freelance editors, whoever- they’re all here. When putting together this list, I again decided to limit myself to two. So I chose two literary agencies that also do advice and answer direct questions. Plus, they’re just super nice people! I give you New Leaf Literary & Media Inc, @NewLeafLiterary, and Fuse Literary, @FuseLiterary, formerly Foreward Literary.

Sprint Runners I’m often on twitter because I have a hard time forcing myself to be doing the things I know I should be doing, and so I like to lurk around and see if I can find anyone willing to run writing sprints with me. (Or giggle over dancing cat gifs. There’s that, too.) So it’s important that I also follow some good sprint runners, accounts that I know can get me motivated to write. My favorite is @NanoWordSprints, the official sprint account of NaNoWriMo; they only running during Nano months, but during those months, they are present an impressive percentage of the day. I also have a special place in my heart for Friday Night Writes, @FriNightWrites, although they don’t do sprints as much as they used to, so it’s hard for me to catch them anymore. (If you’re looking for them, though, hang about on the first Friday of each month.) But I also seem to run into @TheSprintShack pretty often, so between those three, I get a fair amount of sprints in.

(A little different, but related, I recently found the following article at the Sprint Shack useful- Twitter for Writers: 3 Ways to Make Meaningful Connections. I came across it while researching (aka playing around in twitter) for this blog post and thought, ‘How timely!’. Among other things, it taught me about the much feared hashtag.)

Real Humans I Adore So to fill in the gaps between sprint runners, I also have a big batch of personal accounts that I follow.  This actually makes up the vast bulk of the people I follow.  Even if we don’t get around to sprinting, I enjoy being surrounded by like-minded writers who are always willing to kick me in the rear if I ask them to. Also, it’s nice to have people that will actually interact with you when you reach out to them- who are personal persons rather than some organization’s faceless primate who happens to be at the keyboard that day. This list of my well beloved internet buds could go pretty long, so I’m limiting myself to three. I narrowed it down to non-US folk, limit one per country, who are always full of writing encouragement, and who I run into frequently online. And here they are! @melindrea, @SchofieldCM, and @TanteWillemijn. These folks are all fantastic and have kept me going on days when I would have been otherwise lame!  Go check out their coolness!

Other useful accounts to follow would be anything that inspires you. Want pictures of cool abandoned structures? There’s an account for that. Ever wondered what Darth Vader would have to say if given a Twitter handle? There’s an account for that. Want nonstop fluffy cuteness oozing out your feed? There’s an account for that. Whatever gets your creative juices flowing, that’s what you should be seeking out in your social media.

Social media is super cool in that it is all about the connections we make, connections that probably wouldn’t have been possible fifty years ago. Having a healthy social media life (Healthy– don’t sit around doing this all day every day. Not healthy!) is an easy way to connect with other writers, potential readers, maybe future collaborators, publishers, agents, etc. Writing and publishing are tricky, and often lonely, but social media can help it be just a bit easier.

How about you guys? Who do you think I should be following? Let me know in the comments! Pleeeeease! And until next week, happy writing!

How My Writing Has Changed Over Time

This week, we have a guest post from the ever-fantastic Melanie Francisco, known in the Twitterverse as @blacklily_f.  This gal is one mean beta reader, a drill sergeant of a sprint runner, and a fount of endless online hilarity.  A no-nonsense kick in the pants, Melanie is full of snark and sass, and if you aren’t already pals with her… what the heck is wrong with you?

Jill and I were having this discussion the other day, about how our work has changed over time. I know yours will too. I gave it some deep thought, wrote a blog post, edited it and thought very seriously about sending it to Jill. It’s a self-indulgent piece about my emotional state. It seems most of my writing is like that these days. So….here’s something a little bit more serious.

I started writing very young, in the 5th grade. I had a mentor who wrote a play at my church. I was in puppets and I was supposed to perform the work with others. My parents, who were already well on their way to ruining me, had raised me to debate the merits of literary work. I opened my mouth, inserted foot and said something extremely rude. Thank God I had an awesome mentor. He just sat me down and said, “Well Melanie, if you don’t like it, why don’t you write something better?”

Why indeed? So I did. I had a certain set of rules. I had to cover a certain topic. I had to have a certain setting. I had to have parts for all of my comrades. I wrote it over the next week. Sure, it needed to be edited, cleaned up a bit, but I got it done. And my mentor said, “This is good, Melanie. We will do your play.”

We didn’t. We didn’t do the performance at all. It fell through, but my love of writing began. I started writing stories. I started writing science fiction novels. I was incredibly naive. It showed. I wrote mostly about external forces. I had no clue about characterization. I wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote. It was my outlet.

I needed one. Life in my house was…complicated. (I know what you’re thinking, aren’t all families complicated? Shush, I’m sharing here.) I didn’t have a voice at home. My little sister was really sick all of the time with Type 1 diabetes. Both of my parents are visually impaired. My grandmother, who lived in the house to be our driver/babysitter had early onset Alzheimer’s. Problems at home never, ever stopped. Compared to those problems, who was I?

But then something horrible happened. My dad read my work. He called it “wordy”. GASP! I quit. I was thirteen years old. I couldn’t handle it. I left it alone until I went to college. But I got lost in books. Books of all kinds. Literary works, romances, science fiction, fantasy, romance…I read them all. (Yeah, I know romance is in there twice. I read twice as much of it as other stuff. Go ahead, judge me.) To this day I love nothing more than getting lost in a really good book. Especially if it’s one of my own.

But what that complicated home life taught me was that sometimes life is really complicated. And it drew me, when I finally got serious about my writing to epic fantasy. I frequently weave at least five, if not eight story lines together. Getting a good story, good plot twists, in depth familiarity with the whole life-is-not-fair concept I know how to deliver a twist. My mom was an English major in college. She’d wanted to teach high school English so we sat at the dinner table and took stories apart. So I know how to spot a plot hole. I know about characterization. I was ready to begin writing.

My weaknesses are prose and daring. I really pushed myself last year to get over the daring issue. As I’ve gotten older, more mature, I’ve consciously worked on taking more risks. I mean seriously people, where in the world is it safer to take a risk than on the page of a work no one else can see? Be evil. Kill characters. Make your readers hate you. Make your characters hate you. Make your characters have sex with their worst enemy and enjoy it. Write it raunchy. Write it bloody. Write it shocking. Just write it, Mell. My mantra last year.

It worked. Suddenly I had a richer world, a more dynamic story. I had characters hurting, reacting, and going all crazy. It was glorious. (And still my CP hated it.) So this year is about prose. Considering the words I use to tell the story. And just when I thought I knew what that was about, I realized I was wrong. I went back to the drawing board. Scene selection. What’s going on in the story? Why this scene? What has changed? What’s interesting? Now, what are the most interesting words I can use to bring my reader to the edge of his seat? It’s hours and hours of work. I’ve spent a week getting a scene right before. I ask for help more readily these days. And I enjoy it.

Now go back and look at your work and ask yourself, what’s changed? Do you know why? Ask for help if you need it. Look your weaknesses in the eye. Face down your doubt monster. Let other people read it. Be humble. Get better. Love the process. Enjoy it. Life is meant to be enjoyed. Love your work. Treat it as you would a child. Do what is best for your story no matter how badly it hurts you. At the end of the day, you will be exhausted. I am. But you will put your head on your pillow each night knowing you gave it your best. That’s what we all want from life. Just do it.

Love,
Melanie

Finishing and Fear

A few months ago, I asked my Twitter pals “What keeps you from finishing a project?” There were the usual chuckles about energy, holidays, ADD and shockingly fecund plot bunnies. But the real touchpaper of the discussion came from Melanie Francisco (AKA @blacklily_f, who is totally worth the follow): “Fear, Jill. I’m terrified of failing my story.”

We all have our pet excuses, but fear factored into many of the reasons writers pegged with impeding their ability to end: fear of judgment, fear of running out of ideas, fear of imperfections, fear of not doing the premise justice. Fear factors into many of the things we do. Fear can motivate us, or paralyze us.

Alas, I am but a poor victim. And so I turned to Faye Kirwin (penname Skye Fairwin, also a follow-worthy twitter peep at @Writerology). Faye is amazing. A wearer of many hats, Faye splits her time between writing, blogging about writing and psychology, running sprints on twitter, and delving deeper into the fantastical workings of the human mind. And granting interviews!

What is fear and why do we feel it, even when we’re in no danger?

Fear is something we’ve all felt, something we all recognise yet struggle to put into words. We know how it makes our hearts pound, mouths go dry, stomachs squeeze into tight balls, but defining fear and identifying the reason for it can be more mystifying.

Psychologically speaking, fear is that feeling of dread before something negative happens, prompting us to defend ourselves. It is a reaction to a perceived threat and evolved to be part of our bodies’ defence systems, so that we can respond immediately to danger—usually by escaping from it. In a world where we can be hit by a car or mugged while walking home or trapped in a burning building, it’s understandable to feel fear. Our physical well-being is being threatened by something and our bodies react to that with fear.

Danger doesn’t just have to be of the physical kind, though. It can be emotional too. We can fear damage to our sense of worth and competency, and fear things that can threaten us socially, like rejection. It’s this fear of failing, of being criticised, of feeling worthless and incapable, that can cripple writers the most.

But writers are so often told to edit and edit and edit again. Sometimes it’s hard for us to see the line between another round of edits because the story needs it, and draft after draft because of fear. I, especially, have a hard time telling one from the other. What can I do to differentiate?

Start by asking yourself whether you’re editing because the manuscript needs it or because you’re scared to show it to someone else. Fear of rejection can lead us to sabotage our efforts. No one can judge us if we don’t finish that novel, we can’t be criticised if no one reads it, and so we keep rewriting ad infinitum.

One way to differentiate between necessary editing and fear-fuelled editing is if you lose sense of what’s good and what’s bad. Are you changing things without knowing whether you’re making the story better? Are you continually tweaking sentences in search of the perfect wording? Are you reading and re-reading to forestall sending the manuscript off to your beta readers or editors?

If you think the answer is yes, take the plunge. Send it. Submit it. Get feedback on it. Then you can move forward.

So if fear of rejection can lead us to sabotage ourselves, are there any ways we can turn fear to our favor? Can fear ever be used to increase productivity, to be more creative, etc.?

Fear can be a great tool for building a deeper emotional connection between you, your characters and your readers. Sit down with a journal for 10 minutes and write about your fears. What’s causing you worry? What are you afraid will happen? How do you feel, physically and emotionally? Acknowledge your fears and reflect on them, then channel them into your story.

By writing about the emotions you’re feeling, you can make your characters’ own emotions more poignant, sharp, raw and real. Pour your vulnerability into a story to create a far more meaningful connection between you and your reader—because, in all likelihood, they’ll have felt something similar at some point. If they can relate to it, it’s that much easier to craft an emotional experience, one that will resonate with them long after they’ve finished reading.

Channelling your fear into your writing also has the added benefit of helping you to sort through your emotions. Only when you’ve acknowledged and thought clearly and honestly about something can you begin to do something about it. That’s one reason writers get stuck—they’re afraid of rejection or failure and are afraid to confront that fear. Get it out in the open, use it to deepen the emotion in your writing, and free yourself up to be more productive and creative.

After my last manuscript was ready for beta readers, I sent it out and then… had a panic attack a half hour later. I was monitoring the internet constantly, waiting for anyone to say anything. I felt sick. I couldn’t sleep. I ate way too much. This continued until I started to hear back from readers. For many of us, even after getting up the courage to click ‘send’, the fear remains. Is this normal? Healthy? Do you have any advice for dealing with it?

It’s completely normal to feel anxious after opening yourself up to criticism like that. It’s when you start to dwell on it and it causes you problems that it becomes unhealthy.

It’s around this point that fear can turn into anxiety, which is a related but slightly different emotion. Anxiety involves anticipating a threat, something unknown that poses a danger to you. In our case, that might be the anticipation of rejection that causes us anxiety. When we’ve sent off a manuscript and are waiting for responses from readers, the situation is out of our hands. We can no longer control it, we’re expecting potentially negative responses, and so anxiety builds up.

Learning to deal with fear so that we’re no longer overwhelmed by it is the first step towards banishing those unpleasant feelings of panic and anxiety. Reach out to others, write about it in a journal, do an activity that you know calms you—anything that distracts you from thoughts about your beta readers’ responses. Remember: you can’t change anything now so don’t waste your energy worrying about it.

If you continue to feel anxious even after that, identify when you’re having thoughts that focus on failure—like receiving negative feedback from readers—and replace them with memories of your past successes and positive thoughts. We tend to forget about the fun moments we had while writing, the scenes we nailed and the good responses we’ve had in the past. Instead we brood over our lowest points, even when the positive times outweigh the negative. Remind yourself of your achievements, that your beta readers are there to help you to make your story even better, and use that built-up emotion to propel you forward with the next part of your project.

(Interested in learning more about tricking your brain into working?  Faye recently published an awesome workbook that teaches readers how to use psychology to master the art of daily writing. You can find out more about it here!)

The Motivation Station

I have got to finish writing those Star Daughter books. I really do.

Except that I don’t. Even when I pretend that I do, I really don’t.

For those of us who can’t yet consider ourselves professional writers (as in the paid-to-write-by-strangers variety of professional), it’s all about self-motivation. This is true whether you consider your writing a hobby or a compulsion. There’s no editor breathing down our necks. There’s no rabid fan base absolutely demanding we deliver a new installment as oh-so-naively promised. Heck, most of us don’t even have a significant other that intimately aware of where our manuscript stands and eager to see its conclusion. In short, nobody outside of you is making you do this. So why do it at all?

Unfortunately, that’s sometimes a tough question to answer. We’re all busy. We all have a thousand other things we could be doing. And writing isn’t always super fun times. For me, the dip in motivation usually comes right around editing time. Drafting isn’t usually that hard. But cleaning something up to make it presentable feels more like… work. *shudders* So what’s a girl to do?

Turns out I’m a pretty unmotivated loser all on my own, so I’ve come up with a series of tactics to get me through my more lackadaisical moments.

Announce Your Intentions Let others know about your goals, especially if they’re people with similar goals. Especially especially if they can pester you about it when you’re sucking. Writing forums? Let them know what you’re working on. A few close writing buddies on Twitter? Give ‘em a timeline. Kids, parents, teachers, the crazy-cat-lady next door? Anyone will do in a pinch. But keeping it mum is like handing yourself a Get Out of Jail Free card to grab that TV remote instead of your laptop.

Join A Group Local critique circle? Perfect. World-wide movements like NaNoWriMo? Great. Any group will do. People you have to look at on a weekly/monthly/etc basis can be a very powerful motivator. (And while you don’t have to explain your lameness to anyone at the Office of Letters and Light if you fail at a month of NaNo, you don’t get your winner goodies. Or bragging rights. Which, for me, is also powerful.)

Treat Yourself Reward yourself when you hit your goals. Split your project down into manageable chunks and give yourself a treat for each chunk completed. And if you really don’t trust yourself not to tuck into that quadruple decker ultimate sundae supreme early, get someone else involved. When I’m really pinched for motivation, I have my husband come up with a list of rewards and I have to go through him to get them.

Develop Good Habits This is more of a preventative measure, but it’s still worth mentioning. Good habits make things so much easier. Don’t have them established just yet? Get started now. Ease yourself into it. Just ten minutes a day. Then fifteen. Bit by bit. Like starting a healthy diet or an exercise regime, allow yourself a developmental period of less-than-awesomeness, but build it up a little further every day. And when you eventually have that solid habit of daily writing/editing/blogging/whatever, it’s easier to beat off the inevitable apathy when it comes a-callin’.

Be Reasonable Because nothing will sap your motivation faster than unrealistic goals. The most awesome reward in the world will mean nothing if it’s unattainable. So when you’re writing up your goals, take a look at your abilities and obligations. You want challenging, not impossible. And if you get into your goals and find you were maybe a little too optimistic? There’s no shame in making adjustments to your timeline. Change what needs to change and keep moving forward.

How about you fine folks? What do you do to motivate yourself?