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| Inspirational blooms in my garden |
If you're anything like me, you might be ready to push back your writing chair and do something different for a few weeks. Spring fever always has me wanting to get outside and work in the garden. The last thing on my mind is crunching out a daily word count for a novel.
Maybe the outdoors is exactly what your writing life needs to replenish a surge of creative energy. There's nothing like a change to make the imagination bloom again, and what better place than outdoors where nature is bursting through the warm soil, sending up new shoots and flowering bulbs?
I love when the days warm up and I can get outside for long walks and photo sessions to record all the changes around me. By the time I'm back in my writing chair, I usually have a few new ideas to explore or directions for online research that I might be able to use in the book.
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| A long country walk |
I also find connecting with new friends and projects can help inspire. Most recently, I joined
Colorado Writers and Publishers on Facebook, and have participated in several live write-ins. Just last week, I joined the
Seven Sentences blog as a book reviewer; connect with them so you can read my short and pithy book reviews soon!
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| Special writing tools |
What ideas do you have for regenerating? Maybe changing routines a bit? Drinking sparkling water while you write, instead of coffee? Lighting a special scented candle just for intense outlining sessions? How about recording some ideas while you soak in a warm bubble bath? Or maybe some heavy weightlifting is your thing. Leave a comment and share how you make your work blossom in new ways.
Sometimes you just need to leave the writer's cave for a while. There is something magical about springtime and watching nature wake up after a long winter's nap that inspires me.
ReplyDeleteAnd not just for a day or two - a couple of weeks mental vacation sometimes has me salivating to get back to my writing desk.
DeleteHi Dani -- I set aside the new project (the one I started for Camp NaNoWriMo) and went back to my main wip to add scenes, fix the timeline, and do major revisions. Sometimes just changing direction increases my interest and productivity.
ReplyDeleteI find the A-Z Blogging Challenge helped my WIP focus. I blogged about the novel all month, met met a new character, and discovered a red herring for the murder. I've never had an actual personal "book" blog before, and I think I'm going to like it.
DeleteA change of pace has worked for me. After several years of dedicating long hours to editing and then semi-retiring, I found a renewed energy for my own writing. However, the editing experience left me with me some wonderful gifts. For example, errors I never saw in my own stories stood out like sore thumbs in the manuscripts to which I was not emotionally bound. After helping other writers to recognize and overcome them, I can see and fix them in my work. Now everything's coming up roses...almost.
ReplyDeleteI have that exact experience after ten years of editing and beta reading for other authors. I enjoy editing, but did it mostly just for income - now I'd discovering the same double-reward you mention, Linda.
DeleteIf I'm stuck, I'll go back and search for all my [XXX] placeholders and fill in names of characters, places, etc. I know I'm working on the book in my head even if I don't have much of a uptick in my word count some days. A walk with the dog is great, but the real motivator is realizing that if I'm not writing, "someone" will expect me to do the housework.
ReplyDeleteI sometimes think if I had less free time and more expectations from other people, I'd get more writing done.
ReplyDelete