it’s hard.  Write because you like to write.  If you want someone to buy your art it has to be good, has to move them, has to reach in and touch them.  The only way you’re going to do that is moving yourself, reaching inside yourself and putting it on the page.  When you stop thinking of the end result i.e. a check, an award, a deal…and concentrate on the body of work, a funny thing will happen – the end result gets closer, maybe in a different form, but it’s there.

It’s like the old inner game books on tennis or golf, the minute you focus on the stroke or swing a different part of your brain kicks in and actually works against what you desire.  If you let the subconscious take over the brain will reach down and deliver to you what you need – also know as being in the zone.

Get in the zone, and deliver – it’s why you got in this gig in the first place.

J

If you’ve seen this movie you know what I’m talking about.  If not, go watch it.  What you’ll realize is that any excuse not to write is just that, an excuse.  The other day I was writing in the library and couldn’t get MS Word to fire up-we’ve all been there right?  So easy to waste time diagnosing, tinkering, fidgeting.

Not good.  Opened up a text file and wrote in that.  Write when you can, with what you have.  Your drive for writing should be such that you would write on a grocery bag with a crayon if that’s what was available.  Or, as in the movie, with something much worse, on something much more fragile.  Get it down however you can, make it look pretty later.  Now, go fire it up.

It has been proven that exercise does as much for your brain as it does for your body.  If you need proof just read John Ratey’s book  Go Wild.

The other side of the coin is the thinking, cognition and imagination that it takes to string a few pages together daily is enough workout for your brain to actually expand its capacity, at the same time getting you further in your creative endeavor.

When you’ve worked yourself into a habit of regular creative pursuit you can feel the difference in your conscience, your being and your vision.

So to tie this all together, if exercising regularly is as simple as getting the appropriate clothes and gear on, then writing regularly should be as simple as sitting in front of the keyboard.  Neither one are that simple, but you can’t do them without putting on your shoes or opening the document.  Action first, motivation later – it is always that way.  Fire it up.