Writing
My Snarky Take On Embracing The Birthday Blues
October 10th was my birthday, and I’ll admit that each year, I’ve experienced the birthday blues. Everyone thinks they want to stay young forever, and when you are a Gen Z fresh out of college, there is an invincibility factor that you go through. You know what I mean. We’ve all felt it at one point in our lives. When we’re at our peak youthful age, a power comes over us.
Why Sometimes Being In Editing Mode Can Lead To Writer’s Block
Sometimes being in the left-brain editing trenches can zap your energy enough to where you’re unable to switch back to the right-brain creative tasks of writing something new. At least the switch isn’t as easy as you might’ve thought it would. I didn’t actually know that editing-induced writer’s block was an actual thing until I experienced it first-hand.
Read the rest of this entry »What I Learned Editing 1st Ten Pages Of #WIP Via Nationwide Writing Conferences
It’s been a real learning lesson being a former faculty member of the Writing Day Workshops. It’s a hub that manages virtual and in-person writing conferences from all over the United States. Because they like to switch things up to provide writers a variety of perspectives, they select editors and agents to be featured in their workshops seasonally. I was privileged to have worked with them part-time from January through May.
In honing my editorial skills, I’ve also recently signed up for an Editing and Publishing Certification through UCLA Extension. I’m excited to be enrolled in their Editorial Management: Acquisitions to Publication course currently. I’m a huge proponent of continued learning and taking our career to the next level. That means we should sometimes say yes to opportunities that arise. I was really honored to work with Writing Day Workshop this past season. I learned a lot about the importance of our first ten pages.
Read the rest of this entry »Writing Despite Setbacks: Redirecting Personal Challenges Into Our Stories
In an ideal world, only positive things happen to us. We have all the time to write and are in the best psychological mindset. We’re free of stress, always in a zen-like state, can jump into our WIP, and immediately get into a flow. We never let anything get us down, have never experienced writer’s block, and are always in a perpetually creative mood.
The truth is most of us have bad days. We have days where we don’t feel like writing. We have days where if writer’s block doesn’t impede our creative process, circumstances outside our control land on our front doorstep. Some weeks we might be on top of the world, and then all it takes is an unexpected traumatic event to tear it down. We saw the unexpected with the pandemic and how it changed the world. There is a whole list of stressors that experts rank as being the hardest to overcome. Some of us have dealt with illness, career change, moving, the untimely death of loved ones, and more. What they all have in common is that life goes on despite hardships. Relying on good times or our feelings is as reliable as driving a 1970s Ford Pinto. The gas tank could rupture during collisions, not only a scary thing but a potentially fatal one.
Read the rest of this entry »How Almost Losing My Son In 2022 Helped Me To Define 2023 Goals
September 18, 2022, was like any other late summer Southern California day. The weather was nice, and my family and I were excited to use our Disneyland annual passes. As we prepared to leave, we noticed our then 15-month-old son was extra clingy and kept wanting to be held, which wasn’t unusual. But soon, clingy behavior turned into favoring one leg, and then he wasn’t willing to walk.
At first, we thought he strained his right leg trying to climb out of his crib. He was normally our little Tasmanian Devil, climbing up on furniture and running around. So, the fact that he suddenly wasn’t willing to walk was worrisome. We almost went along with our plans to go to Disneyland, figuring he would spend most of the day in his stroller, anyway. But we followed our parental instincts and took him into the emergency room. We had no idea what was in store for us. My husband and I expected to be in and out of the hospital, possibly with a prescription for pain meds. We hoped it would be nothing more than our son being needy. While my daughter was advanced and an early speaker, our son was born premature by 6 weeks. He was trying to communicate with Mommy and Daddy as best as he could. He was telling us something was very wrong, even as he couldn’t speak.
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Writing With Hope 