New Blog = Shut Up and Play your Guitar

Hey all. I’ve been in Italy, so I haven’t had much time to blog. I know…poor me. Italy was a really cool place. We visited a small medieval town called Siena and did an overnight trip to Rome. I will blog more about this trip later.

So I blinked and Nanowrimo is upon me in full swing. I was at the bookstore last night and wondered how many of the people at the care were there to kick off their novels.

I’m sitting out again for the second year in a row. No sense in fooling myself. I don’t like to force myself into writing. I still believe that writing takes time, moreover, ideas take time to fully form. Some of you have been doing months of prep work: outlines and summaries. I think that’s the way to do it.

Every year at this time I post my Nanowrimo tips. This is a list of things that I learned about writing a novel in a month through trial and error.

So good luck to all of you participating this year and here are my tips:

The list below is an updated repost of my Nanowrimo tips. Every year that I fail at Nanowrimo, I learn something. Here are my tips:

NanoWriMo Tips

If you are considering doing National Novel Writing Month in November, here are some tips from a two-time failure. I may not have ever made 50,000 words but I did learn something along the way:

1. Try to do more than the required 1,666 words a day. It’s always good to have a buffer if you miss a few days. If you can get to 2000 words a day, you will have a nice buffer if you miss a day or two.

2. Make as many notes and outlines as possible during October so you don’t have to think too much out where your story is going. You don’t want to be on a roll only to get snagged by a plot point.

3. Pick a point of view that you comfortable with. It’s easier for me to write in the first person, so I usually use this POV during Nanowrimo.

4. Try to write at the same time everyday. This will help you get into the swing faster and will also build good writing habits in the future.

5. Tell your friends and family that you joined the contest.  Good supporters will cheer you on and yell at you if you’re not writing. Find some Nanowrimo buddies and stay in contact with them during the contest.

6. No editing. Don’t go back and edit anything until the month is over. Getting caught up in editing is certain doom. DOOM!

7. Create and account at the NanoWriMo site so you can upload you’re word count at the end of the day. There is something satisfying about seeing that little bar go up every day!

8. If you get really stuck, take a break, look at your outline and try to figure out different paths to take your story on.

9. The first week of Nanowrimo is easy, when you get into the second and third week, you start to feel the drag. Stay positive, and focused. Remind yourself what an accomplishment it is to get as far as you did, and keep writing.

Good luck!

The thing that I like most about the guitar is that I can pick it up at anytime and just play. It’s instant creative gratification. Sometimes I strum some chords, other times, I will play a quick (sometimes out-of-tune) guitar solo. Mostly, I just play whatever comes to mind. I enjoy playing so much, that I’ve often wished that I could translate the experience of just picking up a guitar and playing, to writing.

I first wished that I could do this a few months ago, when my drive to write had completely dried up. In the last few weeks, I’ve had a new and sustained drive to write. I attribute this to my positive thinking and to my free writing.

Free writing is as close to free-form guitar playing as I can get. It’s a simple process, I sit down in the morning at around the same time every day, and write anything. These “anythings” have eventually turned into poems, flash fiction stories, and pieces of short stories. If I can think of absolutely nothing, I write word vertically and then write a sentence for each letter in that word (this is called something but the name escapes me).

Free writing forces me out of the comfort of my normal habits of writing. When I free write, I try all sorts of experimentation. Sometimes I write in first person, sometimes third. Sometimes I try to write stories that are 3-4 sentences long.

Free writing is a great way to get your juices flowing and get you into a writing routine. Keep it fun and casual. Keep it fluid and be adventurous! It’s a great way to bring the enjoyment back into your writing, which is something that I thought was lost from mine.

An Example of Positive Thinking

I can’t even begin to tell you how much positive affirmations have helped me with writing in the last week, but I will try. First, let me start with a quick list of what I’ve produced in the last 7-10 days (and please consider that I’ve written nothing of worth for most of the year):

1. Four flash fiction stories

2. Ideas for roughly 4 more flash stories.

3. 3000 words of a new novel, which I’ve also managed to rewrite completely.

4. A complete rewrite of the 2nd chapter of my last book.

So what are positive affirmations? Simply put, it’s a positive phrase that you repeat to yourself daily. The whole idea is that you planting these ideas into your sub-conscious mind. By thinking positively, you start to believe what you repeat to yourself. I’m not a doctor or anything, but there are a few books out there that detail these ideas, and let me tell you, they work. At least, they have worked for me.

The affirmations that I’ve been using daily, are as follows:

1. I am creative.

2. I always have ideas.

3. I’m always ready to write.

4. I am a writer.

5. I can accomplish anything.

You can make up your own, of course. I repeat these affirmations right before I go to bed and sometimes when I wake up. I pick one or two and just say them over and over until I get bored. I noticed a difference in my attitude after only a few days of saying these phrases.I find it much easier to just sit down and write. Hell, I’ve even been writing in bed with note book and pen, which is something that I rarely ever did.

It may sound like voodoo, but trust me, it ain’t. Many writers spend most of their days saying things to themselves like:

“I’ll never finish my book”

“I’m a terrible writer”

“My book is no good”

I used to think this way, and it certainly takes a toll. No matter what you think, positive thoughts can never hurt you. Just give it a try and let me know what you think.

To read more about the power of positive thinking, read this book Feel The Fear and Do it Anyway. And remember, my site is not affiliated with anyone except my own bad self.

How many different writing methods are out there? I’ve covered many of them in this blog over it’s lifetime. There are so many different ways to organize and write a book, that it’s easy to become overwhelmed. Especially if you’re like me and you know about all of these different processes. Weeding through them can be somewhat of a pain. I’d advise trying different things and figuring out what works for you and ditch what’s not working.

I posted a few days ago about my quest for motivational help. Instead of looking to someone else to find this motivation, I’ve decided to come up with my own plan to write and stay motivated.

The first thing that I did was take a blank notebook and do a brain dump of every writing process/aid/method that I’ve learned over the years. I was surprised at how long the list turned out to be. I then went through each of these and decided on the few that I thought worked best for me.

Over the next few days, I will describe some of the processes that I decided to use, and which are working best for me.

A couple of writer friends of mine recently had their own books published. I always get excited when people that I know get their work out there. It just goes to show that a lots of hard work and perseverance can pay off.

If you have the time, check out the links below:

Once Bitten by Kalayna Price

You can read about the book here

You can order it here

Prosperity by Deborah Woehr

You can read about Prosperity and Order it here

Matt Damon, a guy who acts in movies, had some really nasty things to say about Governor Sarah Palin.

He had this to say:

“It’s like a really bad Disney movie. The hockey mom, you know…’Oh, I’m just a hockey mom from Alaska!’ and she’s like facing down Validamir Putin and using the folksy stuff she learned at the hockey rink. It’s absurd….It’s a really terrifying possibility. The fact that we’ve gotten this far, and we’re that close to making it a reality, is crazy.”

This is interesting coming from a guy who contributes basically nothing, except to star in some okay movies.

I don’t care what you think about Sarah Palin, but her story should be celebrated; a concerned mom who joined the PTA, then ran for public office, fought corruption in her own party, and went on to become Governor of the state that produces 30% of the energy in the US.

What has Matt Damon accomplished? Oh yeah, didn’t he mastermind that big heist? Oh wait…that was just a movie.

Note: I created a new category called Stupidity to file this post under.

Well, another summer down the drain.

If you read my last post, you probably know that I kind of took a vacation from writing over the summer. Now that summer is over, I think that it’s time for me to get back to work.

I’ve had a few new ideas floating around my head and finally, that wonderful thing happened where they all sort of crash together to form one single idea. This is usually how things work for me. I have a lot of incomplete ideas that eventually bond together into something worthwhile.

But where to start?

Frankly, I’ve accepted the fact that I either really know nothing about how to write a book or that I need to unlearn what I already know and start from scratch.

The unlearning method worked for me with guitar playing. Before I started to play the guitar again, whenever I picked my guitar up, my fingers would automatically go to the same frets, playing the same progressions. Part of unlearning and relearning the guitar was to force myself to break my normal habits. Using this method allowed me to force myself to try different things and not fall back onto my old comfortable style of playing.

I need to do the same thing with my writing, which is to basically get rid of the old techniques that don’t work for me and try something new.

(A week passes)

Holy crap. A whole week just went by since I originally started this post. Amazing. I meant to get this up sooner.

So have I figured anything out in a week? Well, I came to the conclusion that I lack motivation when it comes to writing. I mean, let’s just be honest here. I spend most of my day telling myself that I’m going to write when I get home from work, and when I finally have the time to do it, I just don’t feel like it. This happens almost every night. I even explained this phenomenon to my wife. She said that she often feels the same way.

I decided to try to find some books on motivation, so I hoped on Amazon and soon, I was drowning in Self-Help. As a rule, I skip any book that has either Dr. Phil or Dr. Laura staring back at me.

There are loads and loads of motivational books out there. They fall into a few categories:

1. Spiritual

2. Thinking yourself Rich

3. Changing your life

I checked out a few of these books online and decided to take a ride to the bookstore at night and check a few of them out…in person if you will. After paging through several and becoming more and more confused about the path that I should take, a sense of clarity started to overwhelm me. Did I really need any of these books? Was I just complicating things. I know what I have to do.

Just write.

Am I just making my problem bigger than it really is? Making it seem epic? It’s much easier to avoid work if you create epic style road blocks.

The leaves are falling already. Still pondering this.

If I was, I wouldn’t be able to write this blog post.

I may not be dead, but my writing certainly is.

By April or May of this year, I noticed that I hadn’t written a damn thing all year long.

No stories, no blog posts, no poems. I did write some emails, but only under duress or due to work obligations. Unlike some of the folks that I work with, I have to respond to an email that’s sent to me. Not everyone in the working world feels this way, I have noticed.

So what happened? Well, for one, I spent years writing a book, only to find that I hated it. I kept pulling it out, reading it, and putting it away. I did mean to publish the damned thing at some point, but when I finally came down to the end, I just didn’t feel like it was ready.

My wife was not too happy about this. After years of watching me put so much time into something, she had a hard time understanding why I hated the thing so much. It’s just one of those things I guess. If you are a writer, then you probably know what I’m talking about. Maybe you do, maybe you don’t.

Mind you, I still thought about writing everyday, even though I wasn’t doing it at all. Which is pretty much worth nothing in the end. Thinking about something doesn’t fill up a blank page. The sad part about it is that I kind of didn’t care that I wasn’t writing. I lost the drive, which is something that I NEVER thought would happen.

Life, being completely unpredictable and wonderful, compensated with another creative outlet….

Isn't she lovely?

For 7 long years, I’d given up playing music. I lost interest when the writing bug bit me. But just like that, I found myself with a renewed interest in guitar playing. I cleaned up my guitars, restrung them and decided to reteach myself how to play. I started with the basics, learning chords and scales, while also trying to learn everything about the guitar from a maintenance perspective.

Mind you, I’d played in several bands while in my 20s, but I never really bothered to learn how to play the guitar. I learned everything by ear. I never had time to learn things the right way. There was only the drive to write music, record music, and play live.

Now that I’m older, I decided to take a step back and learn how to really play the goddamned thing. In a few short months, I find that I play better now than I ever did, and I enjoy it much more.

The best part is that I know why I enjoy the guitar so much. And I know why I have lost my drive to write.

Writing became work. As much as I tried to put publishing aside from my thoughts, it was always there. So when I got to the end of my book and realized that I could not even try to publish it, everything sort of caved in. I didn’t start writing to get published. And I don’t enjoy writing to get published.

With guitar playing, there is no pressure. No band. No push to write songs. It’s just pure enjoyment. When I play, I kind of slip into a black hole within myself. It’s so instant and fulfilling…it’s hard to explain. I can sit for hours (after my daughter is snoozing of course…and very quietly and just play.

So, have I given up writing. No. I am just taking a break. You see, I need to feel about writing, what I feel about playing the guitar.

Writing should be a joy.

My first musical disaster happened a long time ago while I was living with my parents. I woke up to find that my basement had flooded, ruining over 200+ albums that I had accumulated. All of my original Yes, Genesis, Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, Alice Copper were gone. Not to mention a load of others that were out of print.

I still lament over the loss of my record collection. Even back then, it would have cost me thousands to replace them. When I lost my records, CDs were already available. I ended up replacing all of my vinyl on CD.

This past weekend, I suffered another music disaster. My hard drive, containing no less than 12000 songs. At first, I didn’t panic. Most of the songs on that drive were copied from my CD collection, which remains intact. Still, there were still several albums that I purchased from iTunes that were lost on the drive.

I still remained calm. I have some of those albums backed up on CD and the rest were on my iPod. There are programs that allow you to pull files from your iPod and load them back to your computer.

One thing of note, Apple does NOT allow you to re-download your music. You download it once and that’s it. If you lose it, you are SOL. To be honest, this policy sucks. They have a record of everything that I downloaded, why not let me just pull the files down again?

The final part of the disaster struck yesterday when my iPod got wiped. I’m not sure how this happened. One minute, all of my songs were there and the next minute…gone.

So now, I don’t have any backups of those albums. Now I’m pissed.

Since Apple does will not allow me to download these albums again, I’ve vowed never to purchase digital music again. Sorry, but I’ll keep my hard copy CDs.

If music is going to become completely digital, then these companies need to come up with some kind of policy that allows customers to get their music back in case of a disaster. Even if I could get the last 6 months of purchases back, I would be happy.

So let this be a lesson to you:

1. Whenever you buy music online, make a hard copy or two.

2. Read the policies of that store before you buy.

3. Pray that CDs never go away…