Tag Archives: novel

August 27, 2011

Your Displacement or Mine?

By suehealy

Writing is the only thing in the world that makes me want to do housework.

So, what’s your favourite displacement activity?

 

Weird, huh? I hate housework, I love writing, so how come every time I’m part way through some writing I suddenly get the urge to do the washing up, tidy, iron, arrange my bookshelves? It’s because my brain is searching for a ‘displacement activity’ apparently.

‘Displacement activity’ is a posh phrase writers have for all the stuff you do that is not the stuff you are SUPPOSED to be doing. Avoidance is probably a more readily understood term, but doesn’t sound half as writerly. What happens is a little ‘displacement monkey’ in your mind distracts you from the task at hand, by urging you to ‘make another cup of tea/check the TV guide/your bank account/ebay/post on this blog : ) rather than crack on with that piece of dialogue you’re trying to get down. Displacement activities can sabotage your writing, they say – though I’m not wholly convinced. I think they sometimes happen for a reason. Perhaps what you’re working on needs time to settle, or percolate in your mind and after you’ve bought those gloves on ebay, it will all come together. However, I admit, I think I’d get a lot more writing done if I didn’t have an Internet connection in my office…

I know a few writers who keep their displacement activity on hand – as another creative hobby and they believe one such activity complements and feeds the other. So, they may start painting and then half way through THAT activity they’ll turn back to their writing as a displacement activity for their painting and so on…

Apart from this blog and the Internet, my favourite displacement activity is taking long walks, which can’t be so bad. What’s yours?

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August 27, 2011

Good MORNING! Good Writing!

By suehealy

There is a theory that the brain is more creative in the morning, especially in your waking moments. For this reason, many writers keep their notepad by their beds and make sure that the very first thing they do when they open their eyes each morning, is write. The resultant notes are called “morning pages”. I’v e only very recently become a fan of this morning exercise but I’m finding it fruitful. I don’t believe it would have worked for me ten years ago when I didn’t ‘do’ mornings, at all, ever. Now, I’m 41. I do mornings and I do them well.

 

Anyway, enough about my aging. Morning pages might contain what a writer remembers of their dreams or perhaps the writer will simply jot down the very first words that come to mind that day. Some writers say that this exercise helps them ‘slip’ more easily into what writers’ call the “writing rapture” when a writer feels ideas are pouring into their mind. When writers write in the morning, so the theory goes, they are closer to their sleeping state and the mind is more imaginative and/or receptive to ideas.

 

Having said that, there are plenty of writers who write late at night – for the same reason that they say the closer to sleep they are, the more creative their ideas. Then there are other writers who find their most productive hours are in the middle of the day (the Harry Potter author, J.K. Rowling is a good example. She wrote her first book in a busy Edinburgh café).

 

Different times of the day work for different people and it is really of no consequence whether you are a morning, day or night writer. What is important is that you write and that you find your ideal writing time. Experiment. Find what works for you and then set an hour aside each day at that time and write.

 

Likewise, writers have very personal tastes regarding an environment conducive to writing. There are those who like music or TV buzz in the background and those who can only write in silence. Find whatever works for you.

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August 26, 2011

Stories from the 11th Dimension?

By suehealy

I’m told many writers feel ideas are sometimes fed to them from “somewhere else”. That “somewhere else” is a very vague concept and means different things to different scribes. Nonetheless, writers who hold such beliefs say it is very important to allow your mind to be open to receiving these ideas – wherever they come from.

Certainly, I have had moments when I felt plugged into a conduit, receiving stories, characters and ideas. This is a rare enough event – I can never conjure it but if I write often it’ll roll around every now and again. And when they do, they are really magical moments when stories and characters come swimming to me, all done-up, pre-packaged and ready to go.

So who knows… one thing’s for sure, if you keep on working those brain-gym exercises, freewrites and the spidergrams – you’ll get something of the ‘writing rapture’ soon enough. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this….?

A friend sent me this Elizabeth Gilbert TED talk in which she “muses” on this topic. I think it’s must view for all creative types.

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August 18, 2011

For da gurls…

By suehealy

http://www.mslexia.co.uk/whatson/msbusiness/ncomp_active.php

I’m going to try this one, at least it will give me a focus while I collate and process all the new novel ideas I worked on in Krk…

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August 16, 2011

On a Roll, Baby

By suehealy

I’m on a roll – roostered again this morning. My new story is taking shape and it is the first really new piece of work I’ve crafted in months and months. I’ve been working on the novel (not sure what is happening with that at the moment, rather a sore subject) and editing stories but I haven’t really written any new material in aaaaages… and now I have. This roostering rocks! And I’ve become a morning person in my middle age and I believe this is all too normal : )

I’ve got new characters in my head and new setting to disappear into when I hit the keyboard – the question is where to send it. Am busy compiling a list of new competitions and will post when ready. Thinking of sending the (half abandoned) novel into the Mylexia comp…

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August 15, 2011

I’m a Rooster.

By suehealy

Gittin' ideas on a Croatian isle...

I’m finally a rooster,I’m a rooster – and no, that is not Chinese astrology (where I’m  dog, woof woof), it’s getting up at the crack of dawn type rooster person.

This morning, I got up at 6pm and I sat down and wrote uninterrupted for an hour before heading to work. You may now applaud.

I am not a morning person. Like Bart Simpson, I was blissfully unaware that there was a six o’clock in the morning too, at least the only times I’d ever stumbled upon it were at the end of long stumbling nights… And when people spoke of ‘morning pages’ I scoffed – not for me, I said, I’m rather more the Keith Richards close to the witching hour kind of artist, innit.

There was the occasional,well intentioned morning when I set my alarm clock – but nothing came of it. And all the better, I mused, as I’m awful before the first caffine injection of the day and still carry a warning sign up to two hours afterwards…

So.. what happened? Age, a job, life I guess – and mostly because these evenings I’ve been promising myself that I’d spend writing,  I’ve been too tired post work to do anything more than answer a few emails and edit a few stories (if I’m lucky). The result is that the first half of this year has been remarkably unproductive. And there i was, on my Croatian isle, kicking back on Krk for a few days with my Croatian buddy Marina when I started to think aobut how I was going to get the writing done… and it came to me in one fell divine flash swoop ‘Get thee up early” …

And so, a week on, I set my alarm for six this morning. Woke and sat at my laptop and wrote 1,000 words of a story – sketched out the plot of an idea that had been buzzing around my head for a couple of weeks. Now its on paper and I’ll visit it again tomorrow morning  at 6pm and expand.  And I’ll have it in some sort of shape so I can edit it at the weekend and then start on another idea I have next week.

Moreover, I was so pleased with my little achievement – I was buzzing for the rest of the day.

Lets hope I can keep this up!

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