I’ve been cleaning out my office. While going through drawers and file cabinets I’ ve found many spiral notebooks.

(Have I told you that I love spiral notebooks and steno pads and all sorts of office supplies?)

I’ve found lot of notes from  writing conferences, snippets of ideas and character sketches, and most of all, years and  years of morning pages.

Morning Pages are Julia Cameron’s main tool for kick starting your creativity and moving you closer to your writing goals. Write three pages every day. She says to write them in longhand, which I usually do, and write them first thing in the morning, which I do some of the time.

I do understand that when you do them first, you can get all the chatter out of your mind and free up your creativity. When you do then toward the end of the day, you are rehashing the day. Either way, I find benefit in writing the pages.

As I’m reading back over them, I’m re-experiencing various phases of my life. Some remind me of good times. A lot are reminders to  be grateful for all I have and have had. However, some remind me of the tough times I’ve been through (and survived).

Reading them over evokes a wide range of emotions. There’s joy when I read about trips I’ve taken and adventures I’ve had. There’s frustration when I see myself working too hard for someone else’s goals. There’ a sense of futility or triumph when I read about the trials of child rearing. (If we knew ahead of time what awaited us, would be ever have children?)

Now my biggest question is what to do with them.

Please leave a comment and answer these burning questions!

Do you or have you ever written morning pages?

Have they helped your creativity or your life?

How do you store your pages?

Do you ever re-read them?

What should I do with mine?

Write on,

Lynn

As writers we are great at setting writing goals. If we have trouble we have critique groups, forums, challenges, word wars, and accountability buddies to help us.

This week has been especially crazy for me. Dealing with email scam problems has really derailed my writing. I need to get back on track. You can use this opportunity to get back on track with your own writing.

Connie Ragen Green is having a 30 day blogging challenge. There is  a post on her blog, and people are posting on Twitter using the #blog30 hashtag. I’ve caught up now, but I know there will be other distractions before the challenge is over.

EzineArticles is holding another 100 articles in 100 days challenge starting in May. I’m determine to do better this time. I haven’t seen what the prizes are this time, but the real reward is doing more writing and getting your work in front of more people. If you are writing non-fiction to support your fiction (and you should be), look into putting your articles on EZA.

National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) is the ultimate challenge. Check it out and be ready for November. However, they are in the middle of the Script Frenzy challenge. If scripts are your thing, join now! You may not be able to “win” the challenge, but your script will be further along than when you joined.

Twitter has the hashtag for #writegoal, #writing, #amwriting. Of course there are many more hashtags related to writing, but those are places you can state your goals and be held accountable.

Twitter’s hashtag #wordwar is a great place to find someone to challenge anytime of the day or night. You can set a time limit and compete against someone else or your own personal best.

Of course you can state your writing goals here. I’ll give you encouragement as well as some tools to help you reach those goals.

Whatever you write,

• Leave a comment stating your goals
• Go write!
• Come back and check in with your progress

If there’s enough interest, I’ll start a Ning forum. Can’t do a Facebook group, since I don’t have my account back. (Something else on my to-do list.)

Write on,

Lynn

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January has slipped away (or almost, depending on your time zone). Are you on track with your writing goals? Have you totally given up on your new year’s resolutions? Do you feel as if you are totally underwater and swimming against the current?

By January 15^th, most new year resolutions are history. Don’t let this happen to you.

While working with a client today, I heard stress in her voice. She said that she was feeling overwhelmed about all that she had to get done. The more she talked, the more frantic her voice became and the more her sense of overwhelm came through.

I gave her a series of steps to help her break things up into manageable chunks and think about all of them at once.

Here are the steps I took her through.

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