Writers - 4 Powerful Steps to Breaking Bad Habits

Habits are pretty much who you are.

Are you a positive thinker? Are you ambitious? Do you work hard at your writing? Are you a compulsive cleaner? Do you procrastinate? Do you fear jumping in?

Some of the items above are traits, but they are also habits created – they reflect your actions and reactions. They are part of the things you do each and every day, consciously or subconsciously.

Have a habit you don’t like? Or, one that is getting in the way of your writing success?

Well, you’re in luck.

According to WebMD, you can break bad habits in three easy steps.

1. Analyze the habit you’d like (need) to break.

Maybe, you spend too much time on social media, even if it’s to work it. If you’re not getting the ROI on your efforts, you need to change things.

Maybe, you don’t get enough writing in.

That story that’s been on the back burner is still there. You keep saying you’re going to get to it, but you keep procrastinating.

Or, maybe you need to write two articles a week for your blog, but barely manage to write one. Not for a real lack of time, more because you’re not prioritizing your work.

Maybe, you’re not using video as much as you should in your content marketing, simply because it’s easier not to.

Figure out what it is – put it in front of you. This strategy may help you change things for the better.

2. Write it down.

Actually writing things down adds another element or layer to the consciousness of the habit.

Psychologist James Claiborn, PhD, and the co-author of The Habit Change Workbook, explains, “Write out a list of the pros and cons of this behavior and keep a record of when you do it. Measurement of anything tends to change it and makes people much more aware in the first place."

This is similar to number 1, in that it allows you to analyze the habit.

3. Put a temp in.

Once you realize the’ whens and whys’ of a habit you want to break, try substituting another action in its place.

Suppose you drink two cans of soda day. Substitute one of the cans for a cup of water or naturally flavored seltzer. Once that’s working well, substitute the other can of soda with something healthier.

Or, suppose you spend 2 hours a day on social media. Time yourself. Stop at one hour. Then jump into writing something, whether it's your story or a blog post.

4. Realize it may take a bit of time to break a habit.
This one isn’t from WebMD, but it’s powerful.

According to Mark Twain, "A habit cannot be tossed out the window; it must be coaxed down the stairs a step at a time."

I love this quote. In one sentence, it lets you know that habits can be broken, but it won’t be overnight. You need to persevere.

All of us have some habits we know we should overcome. Try these four tips and see if you can’t break at least one of your bad habits.

Make it a New Year's Resolution to break those bad habits!

Source:
(1) http://www.webmd.com/balance/features/3-easy-steps-to-breaking-bad-habits

Karen Cioffi is an award-winning children’s author and ghostwriter. She is also an author/writer online platform instructor with WOW! Women on Writing.

You can check out Karen’s e-classes through WOW:
http://www.articlewritingdoctor.com/content-marketing-tools/

And, be sure to connect with Karen at:
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Do Not Give Up: Seek Inspiration

"Success is the ability to go from one failure to another
with no loss of enthusiasm." Winston Churchill

All writers experience it: low times. A low time can rear its ugly head after a particularly painful rejection, a bad case of writer's block, or in my current challenge, a serious case of lack of writing time. At times like these there is only one thing to do: Seek inspiration.

So before you make those New Year's resolutions, spend a little time filling your well with inspiration. Jot down inspirational sayings and thoughts that speak to you—tack them onto your bulletin board and read them periodically throughout the New Year.

Read the Tea Leaves

During a recent visit with one of my daughters, I delighted in sharing a quiet moment with her sipping a cup of tea at the end of the day. Our favorite? Yogi Bedtime Tea (Yogi tea in its many varieties is sold at most major grocery and natural food stores). My daughter would read her saying to me and ask me what mine said, and we would revel in the simple yet profound sayings before taking our first sip.

I keep an envelope with some of my favorite inspirational sayings, many snipped from the strings on my teabags, and am considering using one of the Yogi sayings in the front pages of my WIP book. Enjoy a few from my collection:

• “Oneness is achieved by recognizing your self.”
• "Happiness comes from contentment.”
• “Your intuition is your best friend.”
• “Love, compassion and kindness are the anchors of life.”
• “Let things come to you.”
• “Live from your heart, you will be most effective.”
• “I pay no attention whatever to anybody’s praise or blame. I simply follow my own feelings. “ - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) A saying from a Good Earth teabag.

Inspirational sayings Tacked onto My Bulletin Board

• “I began to wonder if this was why I’m not afraid of the work it takes to write a novel. For me, writing isn’t work. It’s fun. It’s a creative exploration into my characters, their world, the possible points of view the story could be written in, or the possible scenes that could exist. It’s about exploring how wide and deep and wonderful a story can be, rather than seeing it as a straight shot from beginning to end. It’s not time to work on this revision. It’s time to play with this revision. I’m going to open my manuscript and not work, but play.” -  Ingrid’s Notes
• A note about Ingrid Sundberg:  I’ve been following Ingrid Sundberg’s blog for years and gain a great deal of inspiration from her. She is the author of the YA novel all we left behind, critiques manuscripts, and has recently begun teaching high school. If you don’t know her, I recommend visiting her blog. I think you’ll be glad you did.
• “Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.” -  Anton Chekhov, known to be one of the greatest short fiction writers in history.
• “Art can heal anything and everything. Go and give and give and give. And when you give it all, it comes back to you.” -  Ben Vereen  
• A note about Ben Vereen: Ben Vereen, an “accomplished and versatile” entertainer has appeared on Broadway, performed many one-man shows in the US and abroad, played Chicken George in Roots and Louis Armstrong in Louis Armstrong, has had many appearances on TV and has accomplished much more. Vereen holds a special place in my heart because of his courage in keeping his terrific attitude after losing his 16-year-old daughter in an auto accident, and suffering critical injuries from three accidents in one day.
• “You’re dealt a hand of cards. You can choose to play it out—or not. I think the game is worthwhile, I really do.”  Christopher Reeve, the actor who suffered a spinal cord injury after being thrown from a  horse. 
• Do the work. Do the work. Do the work. Bryan Cranston of Breaking Bad fame. I’m an audiobook fan and became inspired by Cranston’s story and advice in his autobiography audiobook, read by him,:A Life in Parts.
• "Learning never exhausts the mind," Leonardo daVinci, heard on CNN Fareed Zakaria's GPS show on Sunday morning.

Benefit from Other Writers’ Wisdom

• “Show up, show up, show up, and after a while, the muse shows up too.” - Isabel Allende, the Chilean-American author of The House of the Spirits.
• “Kill your darlings. Even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.” Stephen King. One of the main inspirations I draw from Stephen King, and there are many, is how he gave up on his first book, Carrie, and threw it in the trash. His wife found it and advised him that it was good—keep going. When he finally finished it, it was rejected 30 times!
• “Start telling the stories that only you can tell.” - Neil Gaiman, celebrated English author of American Gods, Coraline, and Sandman comics.
• "Be daring, take on anything. Don't labor over little cameo works in which every word is to be perfect. Technique holds a reader from sentence to sentence, but only content will stay in his mind." - Joyce Carol Oates, author of over 40 novels, plays and novellas, and many volumes of poetry, short stories, and nonfiction.

As you begin the New Year, take heart. Inspiration can be found in likely places, and hidden in places you might least expect. You will feel renewed and ready to best any battle that should come along.

Linda Wilson, a former elementary teacher and ICL graduate, has published over 100 articles for adults and children, and six short stories for children. Recently, she has completed her first book, a mystery/ghost story for children 7-11 years old, and is hard at work on Book Two in the series.  Follow Linda at www.lindawilsonauthor.com.

Time Management Tips

First off, I want to wish you a very Joyous Holiday Season from all of us at WOTM ! We appreciate you all and wish you the best!  

Time Management is a hot topic periodically. Today I want to offer you two ideas to consider if you haven’t already done so. We juggle meetings and deadlines, step-out goal plans, and handle a myriad of correspondence tasks each day. How do we keep track of all of this? It takes experimenting until we find the best system that fits for each of us. Almost every system requires modification to work well. So, we need a flexible system.

I set up a color highlighted Goal Plan spreadsheet on Excel to list my: 

•    Year End Completion Goals
•    Monthly Deadlines
•    Meeting Commitments
•    Weekly Progress
•    Columns for notes

Does it work well? Yes, as a birds-eye view for the year. I keep it on my desk but only refer to it periodically. But, does it help guide my work day by day? No. I need something more.

Two writing friends referred me to the Best Self Journal goal and scheduling strategy. (Check it out: https://bestself.co/products/self-journal ) It’s an interesting and effective way to stay on top of your schedule and increase your efficiency. 

My schedule has several areas of repetition each day. Because of this, the daily log didn’t work for me. I used a spreadsheet to adapt a weekly schedule.  The graphic above is what I set up to incorporate several areas of the Best Self Journal plan. After a few weeks, I found I wasn’t relying on my plan but rather continued to scratch notes here and there.

Talking about the Best Self Journal with another writer brought up her scheduling strategy—The Bullet Journal. She showed me how she was successful in using the Bullet Journal over several months. So, I tried it. I set up my Index, Future Log for the next 6 months, Monthly Log and Daily logs (as a ‘week at a glance’). I liked how it flowed for a month and have continued. It’s working! 

It is hand written, but I find that setting up my pages at the beginning of each month helps me re-focus and doesn’t take long. I use a dot grid notebook (~5.75” X 8.25”) and insert tabs for the Index and active Month. Check out the Bullet Journal: http://bulletjournal.com/ .

I’d appreciate hearing about your time management strategies. Please comment. Thanks much.

Deborah Lyn Stanley is a writer, artist, and editor. She is a retired project manager who now devotes her time to writing, art and caregiving mentally impaired seniors. Deborah writes articles, essays and stories. She has published a collection of 24 artists’ interviews entitled the Artists Interview Series. Careful editing preserves each artist’s voice as they share their journey. The series published as monthly articles for an online news network, can also be found on her web-blog: Deborah Lyn Stanley : My Writer's Life . Her “How-To” articles have appeared in magazines.

“Write your best, in your voice, your way!”

Season's Greetings

Wishing everyone a healthy and safe 

holiday season!

Six Writer Actions For the Holidays

By W. Terry Whalin

Each year I can see the shift in publishing communication. This shift arrives right about Thanksgiving and carries through New Year's Day. Emails and submissions do not get answered and it is like your communication with editors and agents comes to a screeching halt. Why does this happen and what can you as a writer do about it? For a few minutes, I want to help you with this topic.

Admittedly a lot of publishing is slow to communicate. From my experience, it often takes weeks to hear from an editor or agent. This process is even slower during the holidays. Instead of processing submissions, these publishing professionals are focused on holiday shopping, spending time with family and other events. 

As an acquisitions editor at Morgan James Publishing, I'm still processing manuscripts with authors and contracts.  While our publication board meets weekly (instead of the typical once a month) in a long-standing tradition, Morgan James will be closed from the end of business today (December 22^nd)  until January 2^nd .

With this silence from the publishing community, how can you be productive with your writing? It is possible for you to be active during this silent period of publishing. About two weeks ago I had the opportunity to drive to Denver and do an in-studio radio interview about my book, Billy Graham, A Biography of America's Greatest Evangelist. 

Most of these types of interviews are 20 to 30 minutes and I “thought” that was what I was doing. As I settled into my place in the studio, they thanked me for co-hosting the program (which I learned was two hours). I loved the opportunity to talk for two hours about Billy Graham—even if unexpected. You can catch seven minutes of that time on this little video. Use this link to download it and watch.

Here’s six different ways to make the most of your writing during the holidays:

1. Rework or update your website.  It has been some time since I reworked my own website and I'm going to use this time to update some of my websites.


2. Work on building your platform and presence in the marketplace. Use my Ebook, Platform Building Ideas for Every Writer on this topic or something else for some idea starters. Can you take some actions to increase your twitter followers or add to the number of people who are reading your newsletter?

3. Write a free ebook for a list generator. Can you take a series of blog posts or articles and turn them into a free ebook that you offer to your mailing list? Use this time to create such an ebook.

4. Create your own event in January. Your new ebook (#3) could be the ethical bribe that you use with this new event. Now is the time to be planning the details of such an event. 

5. Read a book on marketing such as 5–Minute Book Marketing for Authors or Online Marketing for Busy Authors. Follow the links of those books because I wrote in detail about each of these books. When you read the book, apply some of the lessons to your books and writing.

6. Begin a new income stream. Writing has multiple paths and income possibilities. During this quiet time, select a path that you are not currently using such as affiliate marketing, then begin to develop a new income stream. I have a list of writing possibilities in the free sample of Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams. Follow this link to get this free resource.

You may not want to tackle all six of these ideas but hopefully several of them help you. Notice each of them are something you can do without a connection to an editor or agent.
As a seventh way,I encourage you to polish or create a book proposal. Even if you are going to self publish, you will still need a proposal. The proposal is the blueprint for your book—especially if you are writing nonfiction. If you are writing fiction, you will still need this information for the platform and marketing section. A free resource to learn more insights about proposal creation is at: AskAboutProposals.com.

I understand this time of year has many things pulling for your attention. It is a matter of commitment and focus to get these actions for your writing in motion. You can move forward with your writing even during the holidays.

How do you keep your writing life going during the holidays? Or do you put it on hold for these weeks?  Tell me in the comments.

Tweetable:

Take action on these six or seven ideas to boost your writing life during the holidays.  (ClickToTweet)
--
W. Terry Whalin has written more than 60 books for traditional publishers and his magazine work has appeared in more than 50 publications. He is an acquisitions editor at Morgan James Publishing and always looking for great books to publish. Terry is a book proposal expert and the author of Book Proposals That $ell, 21 Secrets To Speed Your Sucess. He has over 200,000 followers on Twitter.
 

Holiday Cheer

This is our yearly Season's Greetings video to our subscribers, followers and visitors - in other words, our online family!

I created this short animation (60 seconds) in 2014. Each year I go back to it to revise, tweak, or change it in some way, but never do. I just love it. So, all I do is change the year. LOL

Hope you like it!

Is Your Protagonist Multidimensional?

Between your characters and the plot, you develop a story. If the mix is right, and the characters are believable, you can create a story worthy of publication.

While there are many articles about creating believable characters, it's an important topic and reminders are always in order since your characters are a crucial aspect of your story.

So, which is your protagonist?

1. Is your protagonist flat...lacks any type of emotion and action. Like the simple and safe kiddy rides at a children's amusement park...the carousel horse that goes round and round, but does nothing else? Then you have a one- dimensional character on your hands.

2. Is your protagonist a little bumpy...he has some quirks, life and emotion, but no real depth of character or history. Like the carousel horse that goes round and round and up and down at a steady easy pace? Then you have a two-dimensional character struggling to break into the world of believability.

3. Is your protagonist a full-blown amusement park...a roller coaster, full of ups and downs, knowledge, emotion, character, quirks...life and history? Now you have it—you have a believable three-dimensional character that is strong enough to bring your story through to the end.

Now the question is: how do you create a wonderful, believable life-like three-dimensional character?

There are a number of methods you can use that will help create a believable character, here are two:

1. Create a character sheet or use an index card before you begin.
On your sheet, list all the characteristics, quirks, moods, mannerisms, physical attributes, artistic attributes...you get the idea. Keep this sheet handy as you're writing your story. If you tell the reader Pete has blonde hair in the beginning of the story, and then you describe it as black, unless he dyed his hair as part of the storyline, stay true to the character. Readers pick up on errors very quickly.

The more detail you add to your character sheet the easier it will be to know what your protagonist will do in any given circumstance. This will take the element of wondering out of your writing process and save time...Pete finds a bag of money next to his neighbor's car. Hmm . . . will he keep it or try to find out if it's his neighbor's? Oh, wait a minute, on your character sheet you wrote he's an honest guy! Simple.

2. Add characteristics and attributes to your protagonist as you write your story.

Write your protagonist's characteristics, quirks, moods, mannerisms, and so on, on a character sheet as your story evolves.

There are some writers who use different methods to create a story. Maybe you're using the 'seat-of-the-pants-method' and your character evolves as your story does. With this method, you want to be sure to note each new development in your protagonist's character or being.

Let's go back to Pete again. Pete scratches a car as with his bicycle. Does he leave a note on the car he damaged? Does he quickly leave the scene? Does he just ignore the incident and goes about his business?

While he's usually honest, he could have a moment of weakness? Maybe he's worried about the consequences.

Whichever one of these actions he chooses will establish another element to his character - be sure to make note of it.

No matter what process you use, remember to add life-like qualities to your character. Readers need to develop a relationship with the protagonist. If they feel Pete is three dimensional and they are drawn to him, they'll be sure to read to the end of your book.

Karen Cioffi is an award-winning children’s author and children's ghostwriter. She is also an author/writer online platform instructor with WOW! Women on Writing. Get monthly must-know writing and marketing tips with The Writing World newsletter.

And, be sure to connect with Karen at:

Twitter: http://twitter.com/KarenCV

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/writingforchildrenwithkarencioffi/

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LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/karencioffiventrice

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