An Awesome Therapy

Yesterday I spent some time in the morning researching websites which talk about freelance writing jobs and how to get those jobs. There were lists of available jobs right now. There were message boards to go through to look for jobs. It was exciting to think that perhaps I could write a blog post, magazine or e-zine article and get paid. There’s nothing like getting some monetary reward for something you love to do. I love to write. I write something almost every day. I would love to get a job doing that. Especially if it were something I can do at home like that. Write a few articles a week and have some spending money. Oh the things I could do with some spending money. I began to look through the opportunities. Lots of topics. Art, design and photography; audio and multimedia; business and finance; computing and IT; entertainment and humor; food and drink; health and fitness; lifestyle; parenting and family; sport and leisure; travel and international; web development; writing blogs; etc. All these lists being very serious about their topic and expecting an educated mind to respond, perhaps with some serious research done.

I have forty-five posts on my blog. All of them quickly typed off the top of my head, from my heart. I have more than that in Scrivener. Nothing serious. I question whether anyone would read my posts never mind pay to have them. I write what I want to write. I write what I like. I just write. One morning I wrote a one thousand word page of nothing in particular. It was rather like a painting loaded with colors, vibrant and soft but with no definite shape or recognizable spaces. Words come streaming out and I an observer. Sometimes I have to change something because I do have a little education and even I know when something won’t work or just plain isn’t right. I have read some books and I have paid attention to some stuff.

These lists of topics intimidated me. I looked at them. I wasn’t even interested in them. If I did feel qualified to write for them, I’m not sure my writing would fit in. I don’t do things like ordinary people. I don’t live like ordinary people. I don’t raise my children ordinary either so even the parenting lists went over my head and out the door. I couldn’t write for the finance columns. What do I know about art? I love art and I like to make art sometimes, although I haven’t picked up a paintbrush since Debbie was here. I couldn’t write about housecleaning and homemaking since I know very little about either. I couldn’t write about being a good wife. Did you know that people actually write about that? Chickens and gardening, well, I’m no expert and I don’t follow the rules even though I read all the available books about chickens, they were impractical and unnecessary and I have had to find my own way. If people knew how relaxed I am with my chickens, well, lets not write about it. My chickens practically take care of themselves and I fill waterers and feeders and open and close doors at night and in the morning and we gather eggs. A child can do it. People write books about it, whole books, long books as though it’s a very important thing to write about. Gardening, well, I’m just learning about that and there is so very much to know and it changes all the time. I’m still reading up on it and learning from Grandpa and from our local farmers. I see gardens in people’s backyards and I’m jealous of them even though I have my own. “Look, they have a beautiful garden.” I say thinking about my own fenced off weed patch which delivers so much to our family in the way of food.

So it seems that I don’t really have anything to offer anyone that could pay a reward to me. I suppose I’m challenged now. Should I become interested in these topics? Should I foster an interest in the American lifestyle enough to write about it? Perhaps I should pretend I was given one of those assignments. Pick one and do my best with it. See what happens. Perhaps I should write about how you don’t need any of that advice at all and that you should just go with your best instincts and make sure that you love you own life just the way you are. Perhaps we should all just stop trying to do everything right and just do what’s best for yourselves and your families. Don’t send your kids to school if you don’t want to. Of course you have to get permission for that. Don’t participate in organized sports if you don’t want to. Don’t go around trying to get the edge on everyone else and don’t go making sure your kids are getting the edge either. Just make sure that they are getting enough sleep. Make sure they have lots of time for play. Make sure they are eating real food and drinking plenty of clean water. I don’t think that kind of writing would be readable never mind getting paid for it. People want to be told how to live. The next best way to do things. That’s why we have our Martha Stewarts. We wouldn’t have those kinds of key people if we weren’t trying to be taught how to make our beds and fold our sheets and what to do with stuff. We wouldn’t have a lot of key people and magazines if we weren’t trying to be like everyone else and know about everything else. I suppose you have to be a little bit interested in the rest of the world if you are going to sell any writing. Perhaps a lot interested. I suppose I should get an education. I’m sure it’s not too late. Or maybe I’ll just write everyday because I enjoy it and it’s an awesome therapy.

Elizabeth Williams, daily writing exercise, 1,012 words

My Blog

It’s the first day of August and this marks the end of the first three weeks of my 1,000 words daily exercise. I have really enjoyed this and I plan to continue to write 1,000 words a day. I don’t always blog what I write, sometimes I do if I think it would be interesting to anybody. It isn’t great writing, it’s just writing. I haven’t been writing long enough to have great writing. I don’t spend long enough with each piece to have it qualify as great. Usually I sit down to write, open my program and just start writing. I let myself discover what is on the inside. I think this is important because it gives me an idea as to what is on the inside. It also gives me the chance to let my brain flow. Sometimes I start with one thought and end up with a completely different one with several other thoughts in the middle. Usually when I have struggled through the start of a piece I look at the word count and it says 155 or something. I immediately think that that’s nothing yet and I’m running out of words. What will I write about for 850 more words. I keep going and after awhile I check the word count again and it’s around 750 words. Now I’m thinking that I better get to the point and tie things up because I’m running out of words. But the words keep coming and I keep typing. When I’m finished tying things up I check the word count and it’s way over 1,000 words, so I read through and start cutting. I find other mistakes in spelling or grammar and quickly fix them. I take out repetition and unnecessary rambling until I’m really close but still over. That’s all I do. Then I post it to my blog and share it on my face book page. Now if I want to write something really good or even great, I would put a lot more time into it and choose words carefully and go over the outline in more detail. I would take longer with it, but since it is meant to be a sample of free flowing words I just let it be. Recently I found this paper with ideas for weekly writing to share on my blog. It is by: DIY Author. I printed it out and I really liked a few of the ideas. One is to serialize a whole story. That is a cool idea. Another one is to write micro fiction. Just little stand alone stories, 1,000 words. Most of their ideas were great. I like having a map for stuff. Sometimes it just helps. At first when I started my blog I was all about setting it up. I did it carefully, needing it to reflect me. Then it was ready and it was so clean and nice but completely empty. I wasn’t sure what to put in it because I didn’t want to mess it up. I want to encourage anyone who wants to write to just go for it. Start posting stuff. Start getting your words out there. Start a blog and write for it. Don’t worry about audience yet. Start publishing your words to your blog. It is great practice. It is best not to start off with a huge audience because that is a lot of pressure. Once you get the feeling that someone is reading what you wrote then you have to deal with that feeling. You will have that. You will be so grateful that someone actually took time to read all those words. The thing is you have just got to start. In three weeks I have changed from being a private writer to being a self-published author. You know you are considered published when you post to your blog. Strange how easy that was. It has nothing to do with money. It has only to do with your writing being where anyone can pick it up and read it. Some of the other things on this list are; sharing excerpts of work you are currently doing; telling the story behind the story, or revealing where you came up with the idea; Q&A with characters in your book or series; interview authors who write similar to you; share and review new books in the same category as yours; make lists of books similar to yours; invite your readers to ask questions and have Q&A time. The are more, it’s a pretty awesome list. I like the first one, ‘serialize a whole story - 1,000 words at a time’. I will still write 1,000 words a day but not always post them. Sometimes I will be rewriting and planning the next step in a story. I’m also working on a children’s book, illustrations and all. Sometimes you just have to do it. You wonder for years if you could, if you should, then one day you just have to go ahead and do it. Perhaps I’ll write a serialized story once a week, a micro fiction once a week or other kind of story and do a book review once a month. A book review will require a library trip on my part, which is something I would like to get back to doing. I would like to feature other writers from time to time but that will take time to figure out. These are some of the plans I have for my blog. Unlike most other venues in business, there is not much competition among writers. No two writers are exactly the same and there is always room for more. It’s the more the merrier in this field. What is important is the quality. One writer inspires another and in inspiring is inspiration. I have received emails from well-known authors encouraging me to write and keep writing until I break-out and then, keep writing.

Elizabeth Williams, daily writing exercise, 1,000 words exactly.