How I did it: I am making writing into a daily practice.  I write every single day now...anywhere from 20 to 100+ minutes per day.  I do "morning pages" every day, and have for quite a few years.  I read about them in Julia  Cameron's "The Artist's Way".  Then I read books like "The Right to Write" and "Writing down the Bones"  and I make sure to complete at least one or two of the exercises every day.  In addition, I use art as therapy and try to write down any difficult or overwhelming emotion, positive or negative, all throughout the day.  I write prayers, lists, poems, single lines that just "come to me"...I record my dreams.  I keep a notebook with me at all times, and try to keep in the writer's mindset at all times by writing whenever I have an extra few minutes.  I go to Starbucks a couple of times per week before class, and I write for an hour or two there.  Now I am trying to write for 10 minutes every night before I go to bed, in addition to all this.  They are like morning pages, but done late at night, right before sleeping.  I read about them in "The Right to Write"...

Lessons & tips: Get good advice from good writers.  I highly recommend anything by Julia Cameron, as well as "Writing down the Bones" by Natalie Goldberg.  Schedule your writing in every day, and make it the strongest, most set-in-stone commitment you have.   Do your morning pages every day, and do your artist's dates every week...make your health and happiness and creativity your top priority above all else...a little narcissism never killed anybody ;)

Nov 05, 2008, 04:01PM PST | 4 comments | 18 cheers