A quiet location (not home) . Libraries are good for this. Something to look at . A window to the outside is nice, but in a pinch you can use one of those over-sized picture books from the photography section and place it, open, against the back of a library desk Something to listen to . Use an ambient noise mixer and a soundtrack to have some nice, wordless ambience. I choose the Ravenclaw Common room on Ambient Mixer and the Harry Potter Soundtrack on YouTube. Clear goals . What do you want to get done during this alone time? Make sure you know your schedule and what you want out of this session. Don’t let yourself come out of this retreat without meeting at least half of your goals. Something to read . You may get bored staring at the blinking cursor but, rather than use this as an opportunity to browse Facebook, why not make that time productive? Read something you’ve been meaning to for a long time, or grab something entirely new from the shelf just because. You can also...
In April of this year, I graduated college. I was quite proud of it, as I'm the first in my immediate family to do so. I'm also proud of how I spent my college time - shoring up The Writer's Guild , being an RA, and generally busting my ass in every classroom to grab each and every coveted "A" (stands for Acceptable - as in, the only grade acceptable). My standards were high. After graduation, I moved to rural Louisiana where my husband is stationed with the military. I thought it would be boring, but idyllic. A place to relax and write. After the hectic pace of university life, however, it was more isolated than relaxed and completely lacking in the underlying academic structure I'd become reliant on to stay focused. For some time I was aimless, depressed even. I thought if I got a job things would be great. Well, McDonald's was about the only place I could get employed and it wasn't exactly an inspiring work environment. Soon my writing outp...
I've recently been reading Booklife by Jeff Vandermeer, and I must say it's a great read so far! It's all about balancing one's public (often digital) life with their more private, creative life. Though some of the technical bits are a little outdated, the advice is as good as ever. As I read through a section all about choosing one's level of involvement on the internet, I felt a familiar welling of panic. I have a confession: I've felt jealous and bemused by young people's ability to juggle endless social media accounts while still having the time to write a story a week, and go out and explore the world. I have trouble just balancing writing with cleaning and keeping the husbs fed. Then it hit me: most younger folks don't have to cook. They don't have to meal plan, grocery shop, or do the dishes after. For a lot of students, it's eat and run - toss the paper plates and get to class or where-have-you. So of course they have the time! ...
Comments
Post a Comment