In a podcast about writing, the speaker said, “All my life I knew I wanted to be a writer, but I wasn’t writing.” I’ve met many people like this. They call themselves “aspiring writers.” Some have a dream of writing but will never pursue it. Others, in reality, wish to have written but don’t want […]
It’s important to set goals, both for our work and for our self. Goals move us forward Without goals, it’s easy to drift from day to day, week to week, month to month, and year to year—and nothing really changes. One of my goals is to attend two writing conferences each year. This helps grow […]
River Jordan’s book The Messenger on Magnolia Street (which I highly recommend) is not a book about writing, but one of the secondary characters does flirt with the idea. Regarding this person, River writes, “She had once thought about writing a book and naming it … To the Pacific and Back Again. But she didn’t. […]
There are some who think you can either write well or write a lot, but you can’t do both at the same time. I disagree. Just as it takes practice to write well and practice to write fast, it likewise takes practice to turn out good work quickly. However, I wouldn’t recommend pursuing both at […]
In my writing journey, I recently submitted my completed dissertation for review and comment. This had been a concerted effort for several months and once achieved, I took a needed writing respite. This didn’t mean completely ceasing all writing activity, as I continued blogging and whatnot, but I intentionally took a break from big projects. […]
I recently blogged about the 10,000-hour rule, which postulates that it takes 10,000 hours to master any craft, including writing. In parallel fashion, I recently read a post by Kaye Dacus, who wrote, “I’ve heard it said that no one can consider himself a “real” writer until he has written at least one million words.” […]
Malcolm Gladwell, in his 2008 book Outliers, advances the “10,000-Hour Rule.” He asserts that to be successful in any field, it is largely a result of putting in a requisite amount of time practicing a task and honing that skill. How much time? Ten thousand hours! I have no idea how much time I’ve logged […]
I’ve been wanting to talk about writer’s block for quite some time, but I don’t know what to say. Actually, I do know; it’s just that I don’t want to irritate readers because I don’t think I’ve ever truly had writer’s block. That doesn’t mean everything I write flows effortlessly and without delay. It doesn’t […]
Over the years I have written many formal papers, including two theses and two dissertations. In doing so, I have been required to follow various writing guidelines, such as the Chicago Manual Style, the MLA (Modern Language Association) style, and now “Turabian.” Nicknamed after its author, Kate L. Turabian, the book’s real title is “A […]
I’m not sure if this is a malady common to all writers or the fact that I’m a recovering perfectionist, but I am never completely satisfied with what I have written. Regardless of how clever my sentence constructions, profound my insights, or delightful my vocabulary selections, there is always that nagging inner voice whispering that […]