Writers Horoscope for October 10: Others seek you out.

Of course others seek you out!

After all, you put words together in clear, concise fashion.

You’re brimming with creative and unique avenues of expression.

Wellllll, there’s a problem.

You’re being sought out today for another of your attractive traits: perceived free time.

“Oh, it’s just a little yard work,” they say.

agriculture-buffalo physical labor

It’s never just ‘a little’.

You could go with yesterday’s suggestion: turn and run.

Or you could throw a fit…

gratisography look of desperation

 

Or you could show a creepingly inordinate amount of enthusiasm for the work.

gratisography crazed lumberjackjpg

That oughta cut back on the calls for help.

 

 

 

 

Writers Horoscope for October 9: Perfectionism’s creeping in.

You could turn and run.

Or meet it head-on…with a new sentence, then a paragraph, a page, a chapter, a book.

Seth Godin keeps his view of perfection pretty darned simple.

Here’s another take:

perfection is stagnation

One thing is certain: perfection is not a blank page.

 

Writers Horoscope August 27: Your reclusiveness serves no one.

gratisography cat looking out mail slot dont be a shut in

Get outside and see the world.
You have a pad and paper. And a camera, fergawdsakes.
The weather is too nice for you to breathe indoor air.

And who knows what draft-worthy stuff you might find as you cruise the neighborhood…

mulkey ave bear yay summer

©copyright Tim Haag

 

Cat photo courtesy of http://gratisography.com/

Email Gems: July 17-21

From my Austin Kleon weekly newsletter:
Here [with 2 Years of Exhausting Photographic Detail] Is How to Write a Book by Ryan Holiday

From the newsletter of Jill Badonsky [the author of The Muse Is In]:
“Strengthen Your Tolerance Muscle–To be good at anything in the creative realm you must be able to accept that you’re not instantly perfect or even kinda good. If you don’t have a tolerance muscle, your mission if you want to answer your creative call, is to build it before the skill you are trying to cultivate.”

 

 

 

Twitter Gems July 3-7

Some of the greatest writers of the past century on how to handle criticism   https://t.co/DvCwfSOue4

twitter-rubix cube

A self-publishing primer from @JaneFriedman is among this week’s Finds for Writers: wp.me/p4x0h8-bKZ.

You have to resign yourself to wasting lots of trees before you write anything really good. J.K. ROWLING #amwriting #writing #writinglife

“When an idea comes, spend silent time with it…” https://t.co/WjESlYRIkz

You re-learn how to write a book every time you write a book. bit.ly/2sFlNUQ