When You Don't Feel Like Writing...

That was me a few days ago. I kept finding excuses to not write--not a good thing when you want to be published writer! Alas, I didn't write that day at all.

But the last three days I have been writing...and I've managed to surpass my Nifty 350 each time. In fact, there was so much flowing that I didn't leave work to go home until after 5:00! (I did have to endure some major slowdowns going home. Bah.)

These last two days I've just had the program running (off one of those jump drives), and I've managed to just get into a nice rhythm.

The first day seemed like it was going to be another one of those days procrastinating. But I decided to try to use a technique that's helped me before, something that sounds so outlandish you probably won't believe it.

It's called Emotional Freedom Technique. Now, that website won't give you, the writer, anything specific to writing. But I downloaded an e-book that is specifically tailored to writers.

The basic gist is this: By tapping on certain acupressure points, you'll unleash bad emotions; at the same time, you'll be saying certain phrases to, first, bring up those bad emotions, and, second, replace them with good emotions.

My big thing, where writing is concerned, has to do with realizing that my writing is important. (Of course, my day job is important to pay the bills, but why shouldn't I look at writing fiction as important to my creative side?) I received a newsletter last week from the woman who is selling the e-book (and, no, I don't receive any sort of commission from her), and she had a script in the newsletter that deals directly with this--apparently, this is something she has to deal with, too.

The first time I used it--going through what's called rounds of tapping (wherein I did two rounds)--it worked! The words just flowed from my fingers. As I mentioned recently, a lot of those words might be dreck, but when you're in the rough draft stage, who cares? If you hit the main points by using index cards or whatever system you use, that's all that matters. You can clean up things later.

I tried it again three days ago, this time doing three rounds, as I felt I really needed some positive things to boost me. It worked again! Right now, I've finished Chapter 3, and am eagerly looking forward to writing Chapter 4.

Mythology Courses and Other Research

I'm enjoying myself right now with a course from The Teaching Company. Many of their courses cost hundreds of dollars, but they have a lot of sales throughout the year. I'm listening to audio CDs of a course on ancient Greek mythology, and it's fascinating. My original thought was to get some ideas for a previous story I was working on; that work has been abandoned, for the moment, but I'm still deriving pleasure from it. It's interesting to hear about how female-phobic the ancient Greeks were, the most well-known myths, the gods and goddesses--it's endless as to the number of things I've picked up from this course.

And I see they have an Egyptian course...hmm...although I'd have to get it on DVD instead of audio CD (which means playing it in the car ain't gonna do it). I'd want to see any maps or photos, so I'd have to go that way. It still costs over US$100, but I'm contemplating it.

Check 'em out.

And, as always, don't give up--keep writing!