"But I can't think of anything"

"But I can't think of anything to write!"

Sound familiar?

Famed motivational speaker Earl Nightingale, in his classical audio program Lead The Field, said that he gets up 30 minutes every morning before anyone else and brainstorms ideas.  In that 30 minutes of peace and quiet, how many ideas could you think of?

Will all of your ideas be worth the next mega-bestseller?  Probably not.  And not all of your ideas will even be considered good.  But if out of ten or twenty bad ideas comes one spectacular one, then it's all worth it.

Try it tomorrow morning (or evening, if you're more of an evening person).  Grab a cup of coffee (or tea or a glass of orange juice).  Find a quiet place.  Sit.  And think.  Have a notebook open to a fresh page, and write down every thought that comes to mind.  Shoot for twenty ideas.  At the end of the week, you'll have one hundred ideas!  And, like I said, not all will be worth pursuing.  However, if you keep it up, you'll have hundreds of ideas to draw inspiration from and pursue your next project.

Then try it again next week.

Keep it up for the entire month, and you'll have roughly 400 ideas!

How can I writer sacrifice reading time?

In yesterday's blog, I asked what one would need to sacrifice in order to win.  One of the things I mentioned was reading.

But, Mark, I'm a writer.  Writers can't possibly give up reading.

True, but one may have to cut back on their reading.  When I was in college, someone mentioned that one needs to spend an hour of writing to every hour of reading.  I think, for the professor, he was stressing the importance of continual reading.  But a one-to-one ratio is extremely high.

Famed motivational speaker and author Earl Nightingale, in his Lead The Field audio program, prescribed that one has to always be learning.  He said that if you devote 30 minutes a day for 5 days a week, that would equal about 130 hours of learning towards your specific field.  How much time does one spend in college to get a degree?  I mean, actual classroom learning?  It pales in comparison.  What if you devoted 30-60 minutes a day to reading and the rest of your time--time that is set aside to working on your craft--writing?

I'm not saying to completely eliminate reading altogether.  That would be silly.  But instead of reading for 3-4 hours a day, chop that down and devote the other time to writing.

Start a to-NOT-do list

Of all the concepts laid out by Jim Collins and his book Good to Great this one had the most profound affect on me.

Practically every business/success book or course out there prescribes the notion of having a to-do list.  This is typically at the heart of every time management book.  There's nothing wrong with this, because it lays out what needs to be done.  I use a to-do list all the time.

What Jim Collins prescribed was a "stop doing" list or a to-NOT-do list.

On one's to-NOT-do list may be as follows:

I will NOT watch 8 hours of mind-numbing television a day (or 2 or 4 or whatever your number of hours may be).

I will NOT oversleep and not write for the 1 or 2 hours I had planned in the morning.

I will NOT not write something every single day.

I will NOT drive to work listening to the latest political blow-hards on the radio or my favorite 80's rock tunes I've listened to and WILL listen to something inspiring (for me it's either a podcast by Dave Ramsey, Dan Miller, Earl Nightingale, or Writing Excuses).

I will NOT spend my breaks and lunches at work checking my Facebook status and not working on my book.

I will NOT waste my time on mind-numbing tasks on the Internet when I planned on writing or working on my blog.

I will NOT plan one weekday where I don't have at least one blog posting.

I will NOT watch the news every single day.  A 30-minute local news broadcast is fine, but not the hours and hours that Fox News/CNN/MSNBC/Etc. bring to us in their 24/7 news cycle.  Bad news is everywhere.  I don't need to fill my mind with it.

I will NOT not take a break every once and a while, simply because it gives my body and mind time to rest.

I will NOT physically devestate my body or medically devestate my mind through poor nutrition, lack of exercise, and negative attitudes.

I will NOT start my day wishing it was a different day (Monday is just a day of the week, not something to be dreaded, so get over it.).

What's on your to-NOT-do list?

Becoming a list-making freak

In the previous blog, I confessed that I'm a Post-It freak.  But I'm much more than that.  I freakishly love to make lists.

Earl Nightingale taught in his Lead The Field audio program that one should start a list of things you want to accomplish the day before you do it.  He said to write down the five things that you want to accomplish, prioritize them in the order of their importance, and the next day start with number one.  Once number one is complete, go on to number two.  And so on.  At the end of the day, create a list for the next day.

If one does this, commits to doing this, you'll accomplish more than you've ever dreamed of.  Will there be some days that you only get one thing done?  Of course.  But it doesn't matter because you worked on the most important thing.  Motivation author Brian Tracy taught in his book Eat That Frog that the best way to start your day is to do the biggest, ugliest task--the one you've been dreading or procrastinating on.  He calls it "eating the frog" with the frog being that dreaded task.  Once it's done and out of the way, you can move on to other tasks.

What's your frog?  It could be the start of your novel.  You just don't know how to start it (blog idea topic - yippee, something to write on my Post-It!) and you're just procrastinating.  Just get up tomorrow morning and jump right to it.  Before too long, it won't be that ugly frog anymore and you'll enjoy doing it--if, in fact, you love writing.  It's possible you'll discover that writing is not your thing and really it's your love of working on Harley Davidson motorcycles.

Start it today, right now, and make tomorrow's list.  Then, tomorrow, look at that list . . . and do it.

I am a Post-It freak!

3M must love me because I love Post-Its.  Stickies, in other words.  Whenever I get a flash of inspiration or I need to jot a few ideas down for a story or a blog or even make a small list of things I need at the store, I usually write on a Post-It.

Post-Its are like temporary lists, because when I complete my list, I can throw it away and start fresh.

Sometimes my "office" is filled with various notes to myself or small lists of goals I want to accomplish in the next week or month.

Can "to-do" lists be too lengthy though and one can never accomplish everything on it?  Oh, sure.  I've been accused many times of creating "to-do" lists that could never be completed because I've got three kids to raise and other jobs to get to.  But that doesn't mean I still don't create lists.  I create lists to organize and prioritize my goals, something I learned from Earl Nightingale.

And that, my friend, is for another day, another blog.

Reseach and Development - R & D of your writing business

The "head" of your writing business is Research and Development. Okay, what does this entail? Very simple: learning new things.

"Learning new things?" you may ask. "You mean, like English composition and stuff like that?"

Not necessarily, but it could be, depending on your situation.

First, the publishing business, like any other business, is ever-changing. No writer in the history of the world ever got published without some influence or "help" from experts. If you are serious about writing, there are a few books about writing that is essential to have. The first is "Elements of Style" by Strunk & White. This is a small book about the mechanics of writing, and is vital to have in your arsenal. The next is Stephen King's "On Writing." King talks about not only his life and how he got published, he also breaks down the crucial parts of a writer's life and offers excellent advise on writing style, plot development, dialogue, work habits, query letters to literary agents, and even rejection. If you read at least these two books, you are well on your way to knowing a lot more about the writing industry.

Are there other books about writing that I recommend? Certainly . . . although, for the sake of time, I will only mention one more here: John Gardner's "On Becoming A Novelist." This one was recommended to me in April of 2010 by a literary consultant named Ian Graham Leask as he stopped for a writing conference at the library in Red Lake Falls. I read it, and I can certainly say that one area in which I was lacking was forever changed because of Gardner's book: editing. Gardner's book gives a straightforward and moral approach to writing. Of the one area in particular that I was lacking, Gardner helped to influence my writing. Or, more specifically, my editing. Before, I would read a particular chapter three or four times and then more on to the next one, and the changes in that chapter would sit for a long time (anywhere from a few months to a few years) before I made the changes on the computer. Gardner's method is as follows: break each chapter down into parts or scenes. Read each scene 3-4 times, immersing yourself into it, until the chapter is done. Then, make the changes and repeat the process. It may seem slower, but I have actually gotten more accomplished using this method.

Bookstores and libraries are full of books to help you with your writing. Are these stinkers out there? Of course, but you'll have to weed through them. Besides, you do not have to do everything that these books tell you. Take the best parts out that fit your life.

What else can be learned in this R & D section of your business? Well, simply reading a good novel or story in the same genre that you are writing will help. In fact, over the years, I have made a study on reading the first novels of the most successful fiction writers, to see what they wrote to become as successful as they are: Stephen King's "Carrie", John Grisham's "A Time To Kill", J. K. Rowling's "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" and so on. Read the first novel of your favorite author. Even read a different genre. You'd be surprised what you could learn, depending on what it is that you read.

Okay, anything else, Mark? Yes. I would read anything you can about success and motivation. "Think and Grow Rich" by Napoleon Hill and Dale Carnegie "How to Win Friends and Influence People" are only two such examples. Also, reflect on your own life. Find an author who is coming to a town near you and watch his or her presentation. Can you see yourself doing that? You can even get a good book on public speaking, if that's one area in which you are lacking. Also, how about a good book on marketing. Because if you want to be successful at writing, you will need to take the bull by the horn, so to speak, and learn how to market your book.

I hope this has helped you get the perspective on the R & D portion of your writing business. Now, this does not need to take up gobs and gobs of time. Earl Nightingale taught that if you devote 15-30 minutes a day to learning your craft, in a few short years you would be classed as an expert in your given field.

I would also recommend, if you want to be published one day, that you also learn about query letter writing and literary agents. In fact, even if you are still on your first draft, start writing your query letter. Believe it or not, your one page query letter is harder to write than a 1000-page novel. Don't ask me why, it just seems to be. Also, go on the Internet and find blogs about writing. The first that comes to mind is www.guidetoliteraryagents.com - the blog on this site in extremely valuable and there are even more links to other sites. I highly recommend this one.

Now, go forth and conquer. Learn . . . expand your knowledge . . . and you will succeed.

Writing as a business introduction

We previously discussed about your writing as a business. Because if you want to succeed to the next level in your writing (from the "playing around" stage to publication) and are serious about doing it, then that is the mind-set that you need.

First, what I am about to discuss is a variation of a motivational talk by the great Earl Nightingale. In his excellent audio collection "Lead The Field" he talks about the four components of a successful business, which can be shifted to how one can learn to succeed at whatever you put your mind to do. I take this one step further, but at an elementary level I still credit Mr. Nightingale for the knowledge I am about to share.

Think of yourself as the CEO of your company. Or, better yet, the CEO of your life. There are three main components to it, which, depending on how successful you put them to work, influences the fourth. Since we are in the writing business, you are the CEO of that business and how successful your writing will become, will largely influence how much . . . money you are able to earn.

The three main components of any successful business are as follows: Research and Development, Production, and Sales. If any given business works these three areas to the best of its ability, it increases the fourth component: money. If one area is lacking, then the business becomes stagnant and eventually fails.

Earl Nightingale put this in a personal perspective when thinking of your own life, of which you are the CEO. If you look at your own body, the head is Research and Development, the hands are Production, and the legs are Sales. Your chest . . . let's put a huge Superman-like S in the center, but instead of an S let's put a dollar sign. How successful you are in R & D, Production, and Sales will affect how much money you are able to earn.

In the next few blogs, I will break each of these three components down for you.

Writing a novel in a year - setting goals

Greetings fellow writers. I read a lot of success books. Meaning, books about becoming successful. Successful at whatever your heart desires. And of all the books, from Napoleon Hill and Earl Nightingale to Tony Robbins and Zig Ziglar, they all stress the importance of setting goals.

Goal: write a first draft of a novel.

Seems easy, doesn't it? Well, for those who've never done it, it can seem like a daunting task. Let's break it down, shall we?

Oh, I'm forgetting something. You also need to put a timeline on it. Timelines can change, and they will as you go along. That's okay. Give yourself permission to do it. There is a famous saying that "there are no unrealistic goals, just unrealistic time frames." Not sure who said it, but it's true. Okay, here we go . . .

Modified goal: write a first draft of a novel in . . . one year (365 days).

How does that sound? Terrifying? Exciting? Both? It can be done.

Now that you have your larger goal of writing a novel in 365 days, let's break it down into daily tasks. Let's say . . . write one page a day. "Okay, Mark, I can do that. No problem."

Day one: write that one page. When it's done, look at it and pat yourself on the back. You are one page closer to getting it done. If you do that for a week, you'll have seven pages. Phew! Holy cow! After a month, it's thirty pages (yes, you'll be writing on the weekends too). You are thirty pages closer to getting it done.

But how long is your novel going to be? Who knows? Let's say . . . 400 pages (note: none of my novels have I really known ahead of time how long they'll be but we had to pick a number so just go with me).

"But, Mark, at that rate, I'll never finish the 400 pages in a year."

Ah, ha!

Let's say after thirty days you've started to get a good rhythm and you do two pages in a day. Wow, two pages! If you do that for a month, you'll have sixty pages. All total, ninety pages. Very impressive. Now it looks like you'll finish that novel in a year.

But wait, there's more. You'll find as you go along, there will be days where the one or two pages will just flow and the next thing you know, you've written somewhere between five and ten pages. This doesn't give you permission to take the next few days off. No way! Keep writing. And before too long, if you keep this pace up, constantly writing more and more pages as you go along, three or four months have passed and it'll be done.

Then, comes the next phase of writing: editing.

But that's for another day, fellow writers.

Final note: write down your goals. Post it where you can see it everyday.  In fact, even get a calender and write how many pages you write in a day. You'll be surprised how many you can do when you set a goal, write it down, see it, and execute.