Skip to main content

Where's your writing hang up?

Image: process.st
An interesting question was posed to me by the writers at Oz (@ideasbyoz)--where do you feel the bottleneck is in your work. After working with writers for a while, it seems that there are common sticking points.

Now, I know every writer is unique--one only need look at the gamut of professional writers to know that (Gonzo Journalist Hunter Thompson fueled by drugs and rum, Balzac who drank 50 cups of coffee a day, Maya Angelou who had a hotel room in her hometown). However, the problems are similar, as are the solutions.

Personally, I was tormented by procrastination--I believed it was a part of my personality, the essential make-up of who I was. This belief continued through college and was only fueled by a career as a newspaper and television journalist. However, graduate school, first in creative writing then in English medieval literature, was sufficiently terrifying to kick procrastination to the curb. Out of necessity, I began scheduling draft dates and meetings with friends who would hold me accountable. It worked, and now I am a bit on the OCD side about scheduling.

So, where's your bottleneck? In the next few posts I'll be offering tips to writers on how to overcome their bottleneck(s), wherever they come in the writing process.

    Comments

    Post a Comment

    Popular posts from this blog

    The Social Media Starting Kit (Part 1): Establishing Your Brand

    Businesses, the best businesses, are the response to a problem. And, the entrepreneur's encounter with this problem and creative response is the story. Problem: Children without shoes Response: Tom's  Problem: Unhealthy hair Response: Monat Problem: Children with a lacking education after public school term Response: Classical Conversations Your business tells a story. Its formation, website, branding, and sales style are all a part of that story. But, in a world of billions, how do you ensure that story is being heard? The answer is social media. And, when a story is spread on social media, you have magnified your audience and increased the likelihood of your business' success.  But, how do you engage in social media? A business owner does not have time for rabbit holes, education in social media best practices (which are constantly changing), or endless likes, follows and unfollows, tweets and moments.  Entrepreneur's Social Media St...
    Post a Comment
    Read more

    The Space between Social Media and Business Acumen

    There was a space for an entrepreneur to offer quality and business acumen in social media to other entrepreneurs and small businesses. SDS took it. A Passion for the Written Word There are thousands out there. We're the people who notice a Q without a U, a misplaced apostrophe, and a false word ("conversate"). We strive for meticulosity. We are logophiles and linguaphiles, and we often suffer from infobesity . In the modern business world, we find our niche in the conversation of the day--social media. This passion for the written word is the beginning of the SDS story, but the inception was forced by a frustration with dishonesty and a love of the hustle. A Frustration with the Status Quo Too many are paying too much for too little. This truth is apparent to every business owner who has hired a social media agency and received a smattering of disconnected posts that amount to nothing. However, this is not the way it should be. A social media professional, at h...
    Post a Comment
    Read more

    The Social Media Starting Kit (Part 3): Calendars and Management

    You've got a profile, you've got ideas for a few posts and images, and now it's time to begin posting. But, how do you bring strategy in? When do you post? Where do you post? How do you keep from becoming a slave to your social media? That's where the next two crucial elements of social media management come in: calendars and management. First off, each social media platform has different needs, and each audience within the platform has different expectations. The average consumer expects a response from a corporation in Twitter, and 72 percent of people who complain on Twitter expect a response within an hour, per the HubSpot blog . Otherwise there are standard best practices for when to post and how often to post on each network. Image courtesy of Fast Company SproutSocial posted earlier this year about the best times to post on each social media network for engagement . It is an incredibly thorough post, and I would recommend reading it to begin charting ...
    Post a Comment
    Read more