Category: Resistance

What is Your Writing Goal for Today, for This Project, for Your Life?

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

[image: what are you aiming for?]A subtle theme, more a motif, runs through my conversations with authors. When they talk about their writing, there’s one thing they don’t mention:

When it will be done.

There’s a reason this site is named Someday Box. A reason I chose Getting Your Book Out of the Someday Box as the title for that book.

“Someday” is not a goal. Someday is a dream, a vague notion. Sir Ken Robinson tells the story of chatting with a brilliant pianist whose name I can’t remember. Robinson said “I wish I could play like that.”

The pianist said something like, “No, you like the idea of playing like that. If you really wished you could, you’d be doing something about it.”

Do you want to be a writer or do you just like the idea?

… more … “What is Your Writing Goal for Today, for This Project, for Your Life?”

Write Drunk. Edit Sober. Is That Right?

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

Apparently Wednesday comes a day late this week. Still sorting this new posting schedule. Glad you’re here.

Papa H famously said, “Write drunk. Edit sober.”

Just to be totally clear that I’m not advocating alcohol abuse, the point is that made by Gustave Flaubert in a letter to Gertrude Tennant (her daughter Dorothy married the explorer Henry Stanley.)

Flaubert wrote Soyez réglé dans votre vie et ordinaire comme un bourgeois, afin d’être violent et original dans vos œuvres.

Be regular and orderly in your life like a bourgeois, so that you may be violent and original in your work.

[image: solid old tree in the wild weather]

There is a natural balance between order and chaos. You will have a certain amount of each in life, in your personality, in your art. … more … “Write Drunk. Edit Sober. Is That Right?”

Willpower Won’t Power Emotional Writing

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

[image: pick that shovel]Emotional writing connects with readers. But you’re not going to produce it simply by trying harder or longer. You can’t will yourself to an emotional outpouring. I’d like to chat more about ways to increase the amperage in our writing, but I’d like to be sure you understand that “trying harder” isn’t one of them.

Here’s your homework: read any or all of these fine articles on the limitations of willpower, and understand that this is how your brain is wired, not some failure on your part. While these articles are, in general, talking about persistence, problem-solving, and self-control, the principles affect your efforts to produce emotionally evocative prose.

… more … “Willpower Won’t Power Emotional Writing”

Macabre Dance with Your Unconscious

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

Have you ever done something, or thought something, you’re ashamed of?

Uncomfortable as it is, dredge up that memory. We’ll be using it for today’s exercise.

The purpose of our experiment is to demonstrate the effect on our conscious when we try to write something our unconscious doesn’t want written.

Find a place you feel safe. Sit by the fire, if you can, or if that’s not possible, have a shredder under your desk. You’ll want access to methods of rapid complete destruction.

Are you sitting uncomfortably? Good. Let’s begin.

[image: this is where the wicked writing goes]

… more … “Macabre Dance with Your Unconscious”

Where Art Comes From When You Don’t Know Where It Comes From

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

[image: fear needles us]Sometimes art is ground out one step at a time. I’ve done that, and even produced things I’m proud of that way.

Sometimes, art spurts out like mustard from the sun-stricken picnic table. When this happens to me, it always produces something I love.

Once we have the basic skills, writing is a combination of persistence and getting out of your own way. More precisely, getting your conscious, the prefrontal cortex which usually drives the bus; er, your brain, out of the way of your unconscious, including the limbic system where your emotions live, the amygdala where your fears live, and other scary medical terms where other important truths hide out.

To be sure, it is the job of our conscious mind to navigate, to step in when unconsciousness won’t do.

For a writer, that stage is editing, not writing. … more … “Where Art Comes From When You Don’t Know Where It Comes From”

Where’s the Order, Where the Habit?

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

My unconscious is apparently toying with me. Write a post Monday about being orderly and habitual to reserve mental and emotional energy for art, and then don’t write posts the next two days.

This comes, perhaps, from not having specific goals, either targets to aim for or purposes for the actions. “I should write a post every day” isn’t meaningful. “Engaging with readers regularly builds loyalty” is a bit better.

[image: running the maze]

This year, my goal has been to write more mysteries. Our 3 businesses, Spinhead Web Design, Someday Box, and Chief Virtual Officer, are all doing what they do without much input or marketing effort from me.

After writing a 60,000-word mystery, one chapter a day, over at my personal blog, I may not post much there until there’s a specific reason. … more … “Where’s the Order, Where the Habit?”

How an Orderly Life Benefits Your Art

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

[image: rock paper scissors]You’ve seen the common perception of “artists” — disorganized, flighty, not always entirely in touch with reality. Mess and disorder, partying ’til all hours and sleeping in, drink and drugs and bad behavior of all kinds. Artists aren’t expected to behave like “normal” people because, y’know, they’re artists.

Truth is the more habits you institute in your life the better it is for your art. Here’s why.

Using Up Willpower

Exercise strengthens muscles. It also strengthens willpower.

Muscles get tired and have to rest.

So does willpower.

… more … “How an Orderly Life Benefits Your Art”

Writers and Their Emotions

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

I’m going for a 60s health-ed movie feel in the title, in case you missed it.

[image: sunrise” width=”222″ height=”189″ class=”alignright size-full wp-image-3959]Writing without emotion is pointless. If you don’t move your readers to feel something, you accomplish nothing. Even with non-fiction, teaching a topic requires moving your readers to care enough to latch on.

With fiction, emotion is everything.

It’s no wonder, then, that we fiction writers are a moody lot.

I have days of euphoria. I also have days in the doldrums. (Like when we have the rare phenomenon of 10 gloomy days straight here in the frozen north.)

A dear friend commented this morning that they were feeling down about their writing.

Steven Pressfield posted about the pure unadulterated panic induced by the research for his latest book.

It’s gonna happen. … more … “Writers and Their Emotions”

Taking a Break Without Breaking Momentum

Posted on by Joel D Canfield

[image: sea the pause]All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. It can make writers collapse in a gibbering heap in the corner, which might also be dull.

Yesterday I was telling you to keep your momentum. Today I’m telling you to take a break. Coping with conflict is part of the writer’s life. Here’s my perspective on how to balance these opposing needs.

… more … “Taking a Break Without Breaking Momentum”