Skip to main content

"Overpowering Your Writing Goal"--Todd Stone

Morning Folks,

Well, it's awfully yucky outside. Gray, dark, thunder, lightning and rain, rain, rain. Splat, splat, splat against the window panes (I suddenly feel very Dr. Seuss-ish LOL...Mr. Brown Can Moo Can You? anybody know that book?)

In any case, in the fine tradition of continuing a theme, I'm gonna give you some of the pointers I learned from the Todd Stone's Novelist Boot Camp.

Todd Stone told us "Never fight fair" (and re-emphasized this at different times in the workshop). What he means is, if your goals are 5-10 pages a day and you're struggling to get it out, don't tell yourself "I have to do this!" And get all frustrated, consider lowering your daily goal until you get your rhythm. (even if this means you're writing 1-3 SENTENCES per day).

His point? When you break your writing down to simpler goals, then your creativity has room to grow.

Who knows, you could be up to 5-10 pages before the end of 2 weeks!

Todd Stone calls this "overpowering your writing goal" (hence the name of this post).

He says when you're writing a draft "You can't write anything bad because you're going to make it better."

I don't know about you, but when I learned about lowering my personal goals for my writing I felt much better about the whole creativity process. It felt like, "Wow, I could really get a lot done." Finding a rhythm is something all writers have to do.

Todd Stone says: "Writing should be fun work."

There's way more information about all this on his site (in particularly in his book) so be sure to look that up (I provided the links in an earlier post, titled "Boot Camp Kicks Butt!").

Happy Writing!

Have A Marvelous Monday!



Comments

Regina Quentin said…
I actually just felt major relief while reading this. Some of my goals need to be lowered for a time and as you said, they may increase again. I was stressing myself out a little by trying to still meet goals that are unreasonable with what I'm going through right now (I'll explain more to you later when I e-mail back your chapter, which is what I'm looking at now).
Bethany said…
Regina,

Yeah, I felt a sense of relief knowing that until I'm published I can have smaller goals. That way I'm able to get my first novel in "ship-shape" before querying. This way I'll learn methods that can help me with the rest of my writing and other novels. Looking forward to hearing what you say about Chapter 1. I'm thinking I'll probably keep it at first person present tense unless you tell me it really doesn't work. When I make the 7 Revision Passes I'm sure I'll be able to make it even better :-)

Popular posts from this blog

Get Thee A Nom De Plume!

Good Evening One & All, Shakespeare wrote in Romeo & Juliet, "What's in a name?...A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." Disney talked about names in Aladdin in the lyrics, "Better get a nom de plume ." (the song, "One Jump"). So, for a writer, what does a nom de plume (or, pen name) say about the author? It could be a different spelling of the author's name, it could be a name that has a significance. They could keep their first name, but change the last, or change both. A pen name is also the name a writer will write under for his or her books. The name that his or her readers will recognize them. The name on the autographs and the one where people will say, "Oh yes, that's so and so, they wrote..." Some authors write under their own names. Others, for a variety of reasons, choose a pen name. What about you? Are you considering a pen name? What have you looked at when thinking of your nom de plume ? For myself, I&

Fangs and Mistletoe

Happy Wednesday All, Congratulations to Sarah K. who won the Tess St. John giveaway. Please confirm receipt of the email I sent you to claim your prize! ****KERRELYN SPARKS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED . Thank you to all who particpated. A special thank you to Kerrelyn Sparks for providing the prize.**** Merrily the December Days Blog Giveaway keeps going! ***THIS GIVEAWAY IS OFFICIALLY CLOSED. It was closed on Wednesday, December 14, 2011 at 10:30 p.m. Central Time per the giveaway details. I am no longer accepting entries to this giveaway*** If you haven't had the fun of reading a Kerrelyn Sparks paranormal romance, then you're in for a treat. Kerrelyn is offering to one lucky winner a signed copy of her fun and fangtastic novel, All I Want For Christmas Is A Vampire: Toni's friend is in the hospital going on about vampires. Toni will prove her right. But can she resist Ian's charm, in spite of his fangs? As always, the book is full of Kerrelyn's wit, ro

Gregori Celebrates My Birthday

Happy Tuesday All, ****CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED**** In honor of my birthday (that was on Oct. 15th) I am doing TWO give aways! The FIRST one is TODAY!  Today's give away is a copy of Kerrelyn Sparks' Sexiest Vampire Alive . Kerrelyn, being the awesome person that she is, has agreed to give a signed copy of the novel to ONE lucky commenter on my blog. Here's how it's going to work and please read all instructions CAREFULLY. ONE entry PER person : If you choose to email in your entry: Email to this email ONLY .  Your email should state who your favorite vampire is. And no, it does NOT have to be one of Kerrelyn Sparks' characters, but that would be really cool if you DID mention one of hers. If you choose to enter by commenting on my blog: Leave your FIRST name, email address, and what vampire is your favorite. It can be ANY vampire--but like I said, it would be really cool if you mention a Kerrelyn Sparks' vampire. You don't know Kerrelyn Spa