writing and research» writing

Writing Through the Night

suejeff — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 23:52:12 +0000

Most freelancers end up writing through the night on occasion, either to avoid missing a deadline, or because they have overloaded themselves with work, or because sometimes, life just gets in the way of writing.

From time to time I try to update my daily working regime, either to try and get a quart out of a pint pot, or simply because I feel like a change. I am not sure whether this process helps or hinders my writing, but when I do it I feel virtuous – and it looks as though I am not the sort of writer who ends up writing through the night a bit too often.

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Creative Freelance Writing

suejeff — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 22:54:14 +0000

Every so often someone makes a distinction between freelance writing and creative writing. While most freelancers get paid for their writing it doesn’t necessarily follow that they are not writing creatively. Each time you write an article or post to a blog, you are employing your creative processes because you are bringing into being something that was not there in the first place.

Take a look around the web at some of the many writer’s blogs and you will see evidence of the fact that writers write creatively every day. Just because something is not fictional, doesn’t mean to say that it is not creative. Every time you labour over a word document or s sheet of paper you are trying to find the right words and sentences to get your subject across. The very fact that freelance writers take care over the order and type of words they use, makes that enterprise truly creative.

The gap between fiction and non-fiction writers I believe, is a false one. Whatever type of writing you do you are choosing one word over another then revising and recrafting what you have written. In any writing endeavour the art is in the reshaping of something you have written into something that others may enjoy reading.

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When Writing is Your Passion

suejeff — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 00:25:39 +0000

I like being a work at home writer. A lot of the writing that I do is paid writing for other people, but that is not all of the writing that I do. I try to keep up with blogging and a couple of times a week I will free write in my journal or try and work through a plot or character problem that I’m having. I try to work on my novel a couple of times a week. Occasionally I write poetry, or at least rhyme. This last batch is the writing that I love, yet I try to write everything with passion. While passion may be a bit short when you reach the twentieth article on dog food or the tenth on web hosting, I will still aim to do my best work.

Writing When You’re Tired

Sometimes I don’t write as much as others because I am tired, that does not mean I’m tired of writing, I just get tired because I have an immune system disease. Working from home most of the time is ideal for me, if I am feeling under the weather then I can take things slowly, or even not at all if I feel that bad. I get time to sit and read when I want to, which is great, because if you are going to have some degree of freshness in your writing then reading the work of others is a must.

Writing for Money

Yes I do write for money, and sometimes if I need the money I will write for one cent a word, that doesn’t mean that I will turn in shoddy work because I care about writing. When I started out freelancing I wasn’t looking for a way to make money online, I don’t have the patience for that kind of thing, but I was over the moon when I realized that I could write and get paid for it. If writing is your passion and you can earn a living from your passion, then I don’t see that as a problem.

Reading About Writing

I love to read books about writing and I enjoy other people’s writing blogs, I also find myself scrolling through Twitter when I am bored just looking for the tweets that have been posted by writer friends. Writing interests me, whether I am doing it or reading how someone else does it, I don’t get bored writing or reading about writing because writing is my passion. Is it yours?

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Clearing Your Mind For Writing

suejeff — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 20:07:15 +0000

I don’t know about you but I find that if there are too many things clogging up my mind then I find it hard to write. I generally try to get things written down and if something occurs to me while I am working then I break off and jot it down in my moleskine. Once it is out of my head and down on paper then I can go back to concentrating on what I’m doing, whether it’s writing a blog post or writing articles.

Monkey Mind

When our heads aren’t clear then we can’t get to the real meat of things. In order to get to our true writing selves we need to get past what Natalie Goldberg has called monkey mind, underneath all the crap that fills our brain to wild mind, in order to write from the heart. All too often when I sit down to write my mind wants me to start worrying about kids or the weather or the taxman. If I just stop for a minute or two and write these things down, call kids later, take umbrella when I go to college, and fill out tax form, it is out of my head, hopefully leaving me to get on with writing something that is worth reading.

I love to write, but unless I can put other worries aside and stop procrastinating, then I don’t find it easy. When I get everything else down on paper so that I can concentrate on what I’m doing rather than on what might happen, then the words flow better – at least I feel as if they do and maybe that is half the battle.

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Writing to Glastonbury

suejeff — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 23:50:41 +0000

No I’m sending letters to the festival, just sitting here writing after just having heard Neil Young sing. It’s been a really strange day, the news has been full of the death of Michael Jackson. It’s hard to believe that his parents had him performing with his older brothers before the age of five.

What’s Your Mood Mover

I have never been one of those writers who could sit tapping away in silence, I need some kind of noise to get me moving and in the mood to write. I know that some people want perfect silence when they are writing, some like to listen to the radio or a recording, I usually have the television on, especially if I am writing in the evening. Many freelance writers would find that distracting, but for me it is just background noise, and I can occasionally look up if something catches my eey or my ear. I find it much harder to concentrate on writing without some kind of background noise.

Glastonbury on the telly is quite good, you can watch and listen if you want and not have to deal with the mud and the crowds, although I have to admit that I would actually like to go one year, just for the experience. I suppose that to some extent music helps to booster the imagination and strengthen the writing arm, something that doesn’t happen for me if there is perfect quiet. Do you write in silence, or do you listen to music or have the television on?

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