Day 140: C’mon folks we’re all adults here right?

Diversity (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I was browsing through the blogs I read when I came across something sad. Some of the blogs I  read are more personal, some are more topic centered and some are somewhere in between. I read Courage 2 Create to remind myself that’s ok for life to get in the way of writing sometimes, my life does that a lot. Recently the author of the aforementioned blog suffered discrimination because of something which had nothing to with his ability to write. (He was asking to be a guest blogger , the link is to the post on his blog,it gives more details.) I understand that is a blog keepers personal choice who to allow to write guest posts and whether or not to allow guests at all. I can only assume that this blog has had guest bloggers before .though I’m not exactly sure since Ollin has more class  then to trash this person  and her blog in his. If, for some strange reason, something I write here prompts you to want to write a longer response than can fit in the comments section feel free to ask to guest post. I will be putting up a Non-Discrimination Policy Page to Writer’s Desk and Gideon’s Golden Way soon because, no matter if anyone chooses to use the opportunity discrimination is wrong  and if my small stand against makes a difference then I’m happy.

Day 122 :the technology bound writer

A blinking cursor and a blank page:the bane of all writers. So when all else fails write about the blinking cursor. Most writers have had the option of using a simple pencil and spiral notebook at some point. I have never had that option. My handwriting (if somebody feels kind enough to describe the graphite squiggles that somehow appear instead of the script I wish I could manage. So the blinking cursor has been my personal for longer than most. The cursor appears to be taunting me, laughing at my more than occasional bouts of writer’s block, I suppose for someone who writes on pen and paper a blank page is just as bad but somehow a computer cursor seems to almost develop a personality, one that seems to reflect the tone of the writing itself.  Then again, it is quite possible that I just spend too much time with text documents open on the screen.

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Day 93: morning writing exercise

Image by rosefirerising via Flickr

I have heard that if you write three pages of writing in the morning (approximately 750 words)  you will find that your mind is less cluttered and it may be easier to focus because your brain is not bouncing around as many unrelated ideas. The original exercise was meant to be done in longhand, with pen and paper. Fortunately for me because my handwriting is worse than chicken scratch and if I actually wrote three pages I would give up before the second paragraph someone decided to create a digital version. 750 words.com  you can login using your Facebook account info as well as Yahoo or Google if you prefer. Just make sure that you stick with the one you initially login with because apparently the account verification is completely different for each site. Your 750 words are completely private and the various ways to connect are used only to monitor site statistics. When I first heard of the 750 word exercise I admit I scoffed at it but it is actually helpful .  There are even badges that you can earn for instance a picture of a cheetah appears when you reach the 750 mark particularly fast, the criteria for the rest of the badges remains a mystery you find out what milestone you hit when the badge appears. I would like to know what everyone else thinks of this site’s actually pretty simple.

day thirty eight:more reasons why I personally keep a blog, and why it has saved my book

Image by texasgurl via Flickr

I am still surprised at how much this attention this blog has gotten  in the fairly recent past.  I started  it is nothing more than a repository for my thoughts.  It was a last ditch effort to keep writing fun for me, a place where I didn’t feel obligated or under pressure to write and with the pressure and overhanging sense of obligation gone I write.  What I never expected was for other people to write me back.  When I began I wrote out of desperation now I write in the hope of hearing even just one small voice cheering me on in the distance.  Even constructive criticism has that effect.  If a person offers constructive criticism I don’t take it negatively because the person’s comment is in effect saying to me, “I believe in you and I want to help you become someone greater than you are at this present moment.”  Some of the people reading this might be aware that I have a half written manuscript gathering dust on my hard drive.  To be honest, I haven’t touched it in months, every time I have tried I am overwhelmed with a horrible case of performance anxiety and anything I managed to write sounds stilted and two-dimensional and therefore gets scrapped almost as soon as I write it.I have discovered that the comments and even just the simple views that this blog accumulates are slowly helping to rebuild my confidence in myself as a competent writer, for that simple gift I will never be able to say thank you enough.

New Year’s resolutions and a little bit of a retrospective thrown in

Image by macetech via Flickr

I have noticed in the past year that while I call myself a writer I lack consistency.  I allow things like depression provide me with a ready-made excuse not to write.  I tell myself that I am”too busy” to write that morning or what ever time of day it happens to be.  I’m 25 years old, still living with my parents, without a job and most of the bills are not my responsibility.  I’ve heard many people say that if only they lived my life, were one very similar to it, then they would be able to write to their heart’s content. The question that may occur to you at this point is why if I live in what some would consider a writer’s paradise why don’t I write more?  The honest answer is… wait for it… I’m lazy.  Well no more.  Starting today, this the second day of January in the Year of Our Lord 2011, I commit myself to writing at least one post a day in this blog for the next year.  I also promise that not every post will start off sounding like a English history book penned in a monastery!

I’m not proud of too many things that have happened over the past year, it has definitely not been the year I hoped it would be at the beginning.  That being said the thing of which I’m most proud in the past year is my Little Man, he is the light at the end of the tunnel and despite a few rather annoying setbacks I know we will go far.