Creativity

How Do You Know You’re in Flow?

You’ve probably heard before about writers reaching that sublime state of “flow” where nothing exists but the story they’re telling, and they feel a deep satisfaction when they’re done. But if you’ve never reached that state of flow yourself, you might not be sure about what it really means.  I can reach a state of […]

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A Big Bat for When You REALLY Need Help to Write

Quick.  Yes or no?  Have you ever had to wait for something exciting–a live concert, a movie, a favorite meal, a new purchase–say, a new piece of technology, or new clothes or a grown-up toy like a new car? Something that you really, really wanted, that you had to wait for, and while you were

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How to Reset and Recover from Life Rolls, Disasters, and Bouts of High Resistance

I found myself in the ER of my local hospital early last week.  It ended up that all the really scary possibilities hovering over me while I waited to see the doctors didn’t happen (and my lord, ERs in the middle of a pandemic are scary places!!).  What did happen was that I learned…I suspect

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Why You Might Want to Start Moving More

This is not a post to harangue you and make you feel guilty because you don’t exercise.  But it IS about exercise and movement, and some of the unexpected benefits for indie fiction authors.  I’ve ducked writing a post of this sort since I set up the Productive Indie Fiction Writer site, mainly because I’m

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What Your Daily Word Count Should Be

Michael Crichton is my hero.  I only just found out.  Here’s why: I get a lot of email from authors asking how many words a day they should be writing.  I confess that the question puzzles me and I’ve hedge and hummed and fumbled to find a useful answer because the real answer is:  “Whatever

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Another Factor That Might Change Your Mind About Writing to Market

There is a class of Indie author mindset out there that promotes prolific writing, using Kindle Unlimited, launching hard, making sure your Amazon Also Boughts are clean, and writing absolutely to market as the only way to make serious money writing fiction. I did buy into that approach for a year or so.  It seemed

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Diaries, Journals, Notebooks. What’s the difference?

“I write because I don’t know what I think until I read what I say.” ― Flannery O’Connor From <https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/315733-i-write-because-i-don-t-know-what-i-think-until> There’s a lot of hype around journal-writing for authors.  Julia Cameron, in The Artist’s Way, calls journaling ‘Morning Pages’ and credits them with nothing short of creative miracles. In the early twentieth century, authors and writers

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Deep Focus While You’re Writing (or Plotting!)

Only a short post this week as I’m seriously behind. Cal Newport has a long and interesting post about the use of ASMR in Immersive Single Tasking. (Along with a retro image of Bob Ross painting, which was what caught my attention in the first place.) Immersive Single Tasking is the new sexy in productivity,

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