Sticky Notes Blog

A blog of writing news, tips, and inspiration from Fat Plum

Category: Inspiration

Combating writerly self-doubt

Over at his blog, screenwriter/director/man-about-Hollywood John August answers questions from aspiring writers and filmmakers, and lately he has been posting followups to advice he gave some time back. Today's post is terrific: It talks about that feeling that every writer has at some point, the sinking feeling that maybe you're a crappy writer after all.

At a workshop last week, one writer said her trick to getting through these bleak times started before she even began working on a project. She would write a half-page letter to herself about why she was excited about the project. Then she’d take this letter and seal it away. Hopefully, she’d never need to look at it again. But if she hit hopeless despair, she could rip that envelope open and be re-inspired.

It’s a smart idea. Unfortunately, it does nothing for you, Carey, right-here-right-now, with no hope, no confidence, and no damn letter to inspire you.

Self-doubt is essentially an argument with yourself, and it’s impossible to win a battle when you’re fighting both sides. So concede defeat and move on to the real questions: Do your thirty pages really suck? What changed that led you away from thinking they were great? Do you really know what the movie is that you’re trying to write?

Read the whole thing.

Posted by Cindy on November 17, 2006
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration
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Shaking Dr. Phil's Hand

Yesterday, I attended a booksigning, as all good writers should. After all, we need to support each other in our efforts to spread the word about our new releases.

Somehow, though, I don't think this author acutally needed my support. The book was called Inside My Heart: Choosing to Live with Passion and Purpose. The author? Robin McGraw! Yes, THE Robin McGraw: The woman who picks up Dr. Phil's socks and tosses them in the laundry (or, at least, hands them to the housekeeper).

I'll admit that when Mary, my colleague and friend, told me about the signing, I was reluctant to attend. I wasn't a Dr. Phil fan...

Continue reading "Shaking Dr. Phil's Hand"

Posted by Judy on September 20, 2006
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration

Combat Resistance and get writing!

When you're not getting your pages written and beginning to worry that there's something psychologically wrong with you ? or you're not getting your pages written for perfectly "rational" reasons ??pick up Steven Pressfield's book The War of Art. It is the kick in the pants you need. Pressfield shows how to identify and defeat Resistance, the invisible repelling force that radiates from any work-in-potential. Writing is at the top of Resistance's hit list, but there are many other endeavors.

"Any act that rejects immediate gratification in favor of long-term growth ... any act that derives from our higher nature instead of our lower. Any of these will elicit Resistance."

He goes on to define the characteristics of Resistance and how to combat this enemy by "turning pro". Read it and you'll get to work.

Posted by Julie on January 26, 2006
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration

A Great Publishing Story

If you haven't read Dear Zoe by Pittsburgh author Philip Beard, do so. Also visit his website and read about his amazing personal publishing story. Check out his interviews to learn about the fortune cookie that started it all!

Posted by Julie on December 07, 2005
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration

Shutter to Think: A Writers Workshop

Forwarded to me from Sherrie Flick (of the wonderful Gist Street Reading Series), an upcoming FREE writing workshop in Pittsburgh. In her words:

Here's a great chance to get writing done and spend a bunch of time with amazing photographs at the Carnegie. Please note, writers have access to the exhibition any time (during regular hours) throughout the 5-week run of the workshop.

Shutter to Think: A Writer's Workshop
Sat. Nov 5, 12, 19, Dec. 3, 10, 2005
Carnegie Museum of Art
Free, registration required

Novice and experienced writers are invited to explore the intersection of images and words in a free writing workshop inspired by Carnegie Museum of Art photography exhibitions, Luke Swank: Modernist Photographer and Witness to the Fifties. This five-session workshop is moderated by Sherrie Flick, writer, editor, and director of the Gist Street Reading Series.

The program includes gallery discussions and facilitated writing sessions, brief presentations by guest writers and photographers, and culminates in a public reading on December 10 at 12:30. Participants have access to the exhibition any time during museum hours for the run of the five-week workshop, which begins on Saturday, Nov. 5, at 1:30, in the Carnegie Museum of Art theater (immediately following the curator's talk on the Luke Swank exhibition, writers are encouraged to attend). Subsequent sessions will take place on Saturday mornings, 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. in the exhibition galleries and include generative writing exercises, discussion, revision strategies, and brief guest presentations:
- Nov. 12 - poet Jim Daniels and photographer Charlee Brodsky;
- Nov. 19 - writer Sherrie Flick and photographer Sue Abramson,
- Dec. 3 - writer Lois Williams and poet Nancy Krygowski.

The workshop is free but pre-registration is required. Call 412.622.3288 to register.

Lots of inspiration all around, plus the company of writers. And all the readers are terrific writers and people. I hope to attend at least one of the days. Don't forget to pre-register!

Posted by Cindy on October 18, 2005
This entry was posted in the following categories: Coming attractions, Inspiration
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Fighting with an uncooperative novel

Author Neil Gaiman has locked himself away to work on his new novel, and he's posting a bit about the process. In this entry, he explains the difficulty of getting characters to stop talking and start doing. I find it reassuring that even experienced novelists struggle with it sometimes.

Posted by Cindy on December 12, 2004
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration

All you need is a pen and a notebook

Multi-talented writer Neil Gaiman shares why he loves being a writer:

I love being a writer because it is something you can do anywhere. Some jobs like for example being an astronaut you can only do in special places like in for example space rockets or outer space or somewhere like that eg the moon. If you were trying to be an astronaut in the supermarket people would just laugh at you and say What Is He Doing Is He Absolutely Barking Mad Or What? The same thing goes for people who pick grapes and the people who show you to your seat in theatres after the light is all gone down. They can only do it in their special place.

But I can write anywhere.

Posted by Cindy on October 25, 2004
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration

An interview with Robert Coover

Robert Coover, distinguished author and Brown University professor, is is interviewed in McSweeney's Internet Tendency:

[C]reative-writing workshops have absolutely nothing to do with our nation's literature, though writers sometimes, more or less by chance, turn up in them, looking for an agent or romance or someone to start a new magazine with them. Creative-writing workshops mostly have to do with creating other creative-writing workshops. And this is all right, I suppose, because writing is good for people, or at least not seriously harmful. It teaches them to read, for one thing. We don't need more writers, but we do need more readers. We need creative-reading workshops. Students would still have to write in them, but for nobler ends. And the self-proliferation of creative-reading workshops would be a less onerous thing. You asked me if teaching has enhanced my writing in any way, and I'd say mainly it has got in the way of it; might have made me a better reader, though.

Posted by Cindy on June 22, 2004
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration

Ideas from the Pied Piper of public radio

Ira Glass, creator and host of This American Life, shares his Manifesto in producing great radio and chats with interested people (including you!). He's hoping to help radio beginners, people who want to create great radio pieces of their own, but his advice is useful for anyone with creative aims:

I bring all of this up to say that if you're someone who wants to make radio stories (or do any kind of creative work), you're probably going to have a period when things might not come too easily. For some people, that's just a year. For others, like me, it's eight years. You might feel completely alone and lost during this period -- God knows I did -- and I hope it's reassuring in some small way to hear that what you're going through is completely normal. Most people go through it. And there are things you can do during this period of mediocrity that will get you to the next step, that will drive you toward skill and competence.

Posted by Cindy on May 26, 2004
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration

Winner of McSweeney's Twenty-Minute Stories Contest

The winning story has been published online: "Untitled," by David Kennerly. It is so short and tied together that it seems a shame to excerpt any of it, but I post the first sentence to help draw you in.

He had always tried to be a gentleman, courteous, respectful in the most thorough way, and believed he was doing his utmost to continue this philosophy when he realized he was having a heart attack, there was no way he could land the plane anywhere else, and he saw the beautifully ordered expanse of backyards open up before him like a shining path, the center line composed of fences and lit by the glint of the sun.

Continue reading "Winner of McSweeney's Twenty-Minute Stories Contest"

Posted by Cindy on May 25, 2004
This entry was posted in the following categories: Inspiration