Jump Back into Writing With a Hop

Holy moly! A new year. A new decade. Both come with excitement, motivation, and promise. But they also come with stress. If you’re like most people, you didn’t get a lot of writing done during the holidays. Either you were enjoying a house filled with friends and family, filling someone else’s house with holiday cheer, or hanging out at home stuck in a sugar rush-crash-rush-crash … Continue reading Jump Back into Writing With a Hop

How to Survive Your Toughest Draft

For the last couple of years, every time one of my writer pals would ask me what I was working on, the answer was the same breezy, “Oh, I’m still plugging away on that rockstar mom book I told you about ages ago.” I’m pretty sure that more than a few of them wondered if I shouldn’t just give it up and move on to … Continue reading How to Survive Your Toughest Draft

My Month of Poetry

I recently found myself in a writing rut. A hectic home life, a stressful and stressed-out world, and somehow writing became both trivial and inaccessible. I could not connect with my creativity, and it felt self-indulgent even to try. Over dinner, a wise friend suggested a poetry challenge. Write a poem a day for thirty days, to clean out the spiders of doubt and despair, … Continue reading My Month of Poetry

Breaking Through Writer’s Block

Last month, one of my editing clients emailed me a panicked plea for help with writer’s block. And although we’ve talked about this a bit on the blog already (How Do You Tune Out Online “Noise”?, Ideas to Hack Down Writers’ Blocks, 4 Ways Winged Pen Writers Get Words, Perfectionism and Pomodori), it can’t hurt to share the tips I gave my client for breaking through writer’s … Continue reading Breaking Through Writer’s Block

Perfectionism and Pomodori

If you suffer from writer’s block, you’re not alone. Most writers I know have faced that wall many times and surmounted it. Some people find themselves at that wall over and over again. Sometimes this happens because you’re not sure how to move your story forward. Sometimes this happens because you’re terrified of failing. If it’s the latter, you may be a perfectionist. One understanding … Continue reading Perfectionism and Pomodori

Keeping the Words Flowing

Back when we were the age of the kids we write for, summer used to mean long, hot, lazy days filled with reading, outdoor fun, and friends. But for writers, summer can be a huge time of distraction. Schedule changes like vacations and having kids home from school for the summer months can really eat into my writing time. So I asked my fellow Winged … Continue reading Keeping the Words Flowing

Unlocking Our Creativity

As writers, we spend so much time developing our craft, but at the end of the day we still need something we can’t seem to control—our creativity. Or maybe we can. At least a little. Author Jarrett J. Krosoczka said in his keynote speech at the recent NESCBWI conference that you need to be bored to spark creativity. He’s right, but maybe it’s more than … Continue reading Unlocking Our Creativity

Up Your Game with the Write Fashions from THE WINGED PEN

Can the right clothes inspire writers? In a word, yes. My Winged Pen fellow, Michelle Leonard, pointed me to this article about how clothes affect our performance. Get your red sneakers now before there’s a run on them! So what do productive writers wear? Lucky socks? Writer’s baseball cap? NaNoWrimo Winner t-shirt? I once had a beloved writing sweater with a monk-like cowl with pom-pom … Continue reading Up Your Game with the Write Fashions from THE WINGED PEN

Writing Prompts to Spur Creativity

When I get blocked on a project, I sometimes use writing prompts to spur my creativity. It helps me come back to the daunting task of drafting with a sense of energy and purpose. Free writing like this often starts with something that happened in real life. For example, this week I wrote a flash fiction piece about anxiety after spending a nerve-testing hour in the … Continue reading Writing Prompts to Spur Creativity