Tag Archives: Career Advice

How to Step Up Your Journey on the Writing Road

Motivation, ,

How to Step Up Your Journey on the Writing Road. I last posted here about  a technique for boosting your writer’s Imagination. The fourth entry in my Attitude Adjustment series. Confession time. I did not boost. I did not adjust. I walked away.

I needed rest. Maybe you have felt the same. I am done with resting now and ready to get back to work. Please, feel free to join me. Return to a rediscovered writer’s journey. Or repave the road you never left. Here’s How to Step Up Your Journey on the Writing Road.

Life changes when you start your day writing. Wake up. Wash your face. Brew a cuppa. Begin to write. Fall into the world of your story where doubts disintegrate and make believe reigns. A world more truly real to a writer than day-to-day and down-to-earth could ever be.

Plus – something else equally enthralling. After each first-moment-of-the morning writing session, an aura of its captivation magic remains. Your mind feels less fettered. Your worries press less heavily. Even your To Do lists have lost a huge measure of their tyranny.

Need a kickstart? Try this prompt. “I would like to introduce you to my favorite self.” Or. “Meet my favorite character.” Choose the one that attracts you most powerfully. Do not ponder. Put your pen to the paper, or place your fingers on the keyboard. And just write.

Let your imagination fly free. Open your senses wide and turn up their volume. See every detail at maximum vividness. Listen to each glorious sound. Taste your words on your tongue. Smell every scent, pleasant or unpleasant. Feel it all, both outside yourself and within.

Write it down. Fragments of thought. Impressions. Dialog snatches if you hear them. The sensations. The silliness. If you catch the spark of a writing idea, record it, but only briefly. Then abandon yourself once more to your flight into this wide open moment, whatever it may be.How to Put Your Writer Psyche on Your Side - www.aliceorrbooks.com

Think of this day every day as a jewel on the thread of your life. Know that this day, this moment, is a precious step on the extraordinary journey of your writing experience. Place your jewel artfully. Admire its beauty. Take each step with every fiber of you at high alert and maximum awareness. Recognize the wonder.

If a discouraging thought appears, let it pass. Everything you need for your journey is right here, right now, wherever you are. Each step along your road will take you toward the place you need to go. You are on your personal path to your personal writing triumph whatever it may be.

Never relinquish your Power of Enthusiasm. Ralph Waldo Emerson reminds us that enthusiasm is the energy you need to fuel yourself in life. You are energized. You understand How to Step Up Your Journey on the Writing Road. There will be no stopping us now.

Alice Orr – www.aliceorrbooks.com

Alice’s latest novel A Time of Fear & Loving – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series Book 5 – is available HERE.

A Time of Fear & Loving

Look for all of Alice’s books HERE.

Praise for A Time of Fear & Loving: “Alice Orr is the queen of ramped-up stakes and page-turning suspense.” “Warning. Don’t read before bed. You won’t want to sleep.” “The tension in this novel is through the roof.” “I never want an Alice Orr book to end.” “Budding romance sizzles in the background until it ignites with passion.” “The best one yet!”

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Present Perfect Survive-Thrive Secret #1

Motivation, ,

Persist Till You Prevail. We’ve seen many of us fall by the wayside. We’re called Creatives. Yet, we struggle to create the mindset that will keep our bodies and spirits from sliding off the path which gives us joy and satisfaction. The challenge is to Persist. The goal is to Prevail.

I Have Persisted. Over boulders in my way. Under bridges where trolls lurk at every turn.  Am I boasting? You betcha, though God and a great support network had a lot to do with it. Plus maybe my rat-dog stubbornly stupid refusal to give up.

Alice’s Survive and Thrive Secrets. Five rules for life’s risky road were planted deep in me by Grandma when I was young, and I’ve nurtured them some since. I share those seeds in my next few posts. The overall message being Persist Till You Prevail.Grandma and Alice at Two and a Half

What Do I Mean by Prevail? Do I mean fame and fortune? Don’t turn those puppies away if they scratch at your door, but they’re not my thesis here. To Prevail is what my top-line title states and my bottom-line belief dictates. Survive and Thrive. Get past whatever you encounter. Don’t expect easy. Survive to Thrive and tell about it, because we must always share good news.

What Do I Mean by Thrive? Muster the strength to pick up your life, and celebrate your very existence. You made it this far, battered and bruised maybe, but still Present. That, like me not being crushed by boulders or devoured by trolls, is a miracle.

Present Perfect. So, here’s Survive and Thrive Secret #1. Be the Best You Can Be in the Present. The best you can be, not the best there ever was, or the best expected by whomever’s been flogging your psyche for almost ever. Your ma, your pa, Saint Francis. I expect of you, only the best that you can manage to be on any given day in any given moment. You should expect the same.

The Best You/I/We Can Manage is Good Enough. Better than good enough. Your Personal Any Morning Best. That’s a diamond, my friend, subject to polishing perhaps, but worth a fortunate fortune all the same.

In the Interests of Full Disclosure. My own consciousness lost the gist of that last paragraph for a while. The concrete of forgetfulness paved my path, honed it into hobble-stones that delivered a direct hit to my psyche more than once. A cautionary tale you must remember when tempted to overlook the glint of the jewel you already are, or misjudge it not glinty enough.

Be Gentle with Yourself (And so the Exercise Begins). Identify goals that are Realistic for You. Not for whomever you’re alleged to be less whatever than. Realistic/Doable/Workable Goals for You. Be compassionate. Cutting somebody a break begins at home.

Brainstorm Those Compassionate-with-Yourself Goals. Get someone who really loves you to join in, or make it a solo storm. A bottle of wine could help, or a pot of strong tea if you prefer. Make mine cabernet sauvignon, please.

Write Them Suckers Down. Do not edit. Don’t say, “That’s stupid,” or “This won’t work.” Remember the psyche-floggers I mentioned earlier? These dismissive self-critiques are echoes of her/his/their voice. Ignore it. Write down every syllable. Then leave the list alone for a bit, maybe even a day or two.

The Cooler Consideration. Again, do not edit. Guided by self-compassion, prioritize Your Realistic Goals. Start easy, not with the biggest thunderclap on your brainstormed list. Now, make a new list from the new sequence you’ve created.

Print That List in a Large Font. Hang it everywhere you hang. Your laptop lip, the fridge door. Do not laminate. Periodic tweaking, always in self-compassion mode, is encouraged.

Go After Those Goals at Psyche-Sensitive Speed. You are Present Perfect now, Lovey (as Grandma used to call me). Survive and Thrive Secret Number One is done and done.

Alice Orr – www.aliceorrbooks.com

A Wrong Way Home – Alice Orr’s Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series Book 1 – is a FREE eBook HERE. Enjoy!A Wrong Way Home

A Time of Fear & Loving – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series Book 5 – is available HERE.  Praise for A Time of Fear & Loving. “Alice Orr is the queen of ramped-up stakes and page-turning suspense.” “Warning. Don’t read before bed. You won’t want to sleep.” “The tension in this novel is through the roof.” “I never want an Alice Orr book to end.” “The best one yet!” “Budding romance sizzles in the background until it ignites with passion.”

Look for all of Alice’s books HERE.

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Amanda Rescued My Writing Career – Here’s How

Motivation,

Amanda Rescued My Writing Career, but before that was necessary, I would wake up in the morning with an itch to get back to whatever story I was working on at the time. I carried my writing notebook with me everywhere. I even took longer subway routes so I would have more scribbling opportunities between stops. Then, I put my writing notebook aside and hardly remembered where it was.

Before Amanda rescued my writing career, I was despondent. One of my very best friends, my devotion to telling stories, was losing her life right in front of me and I had no idea what to do to save her. Thank heaven I did have enough mind presence left to realize I needed help from an expert and got in touch with a motivational coach. Maybe a professional mojo locator could relocate mine.

To tell you the whole truth, I didn’t really believe it would work. I figured she’d assign me some intriguing creativity exercises. I would complete the exercises, because I’ve always been the kind of student who does the assignment. But, in the end, my motivation to write would continue to be disappeared.

Then we sat down to talk and her first question was this, “Would you mind telling me about your heroine?”

My response was to stare, probably slack-jawed. In the interests of full disclosure yet again, I must admit to you that I had barely thought about Amanda in weeks. FYI – Amanda is the main character of A Time of Fear & Loving – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Book 5.

“Amanda is a widow,” I began, because I needed to say something. Then, I caught myself. I had to qualify that statement. “But she’s tired of being thought of as a widow. She’s ready to come back to life.”

“What kind of life does she want to have now?” Ms. Motivator asked.

I hesitated for a moment before it hit me. I knew the answer to that question as well as I know my own name.

“It’s what she doesn’t want that matters most to her. She doesn’t want to be taken for granted as the always-dependable Miller sister any longer. She wants to break out and become somebody even she doesn’t expect herself to be.”

FYI once more – Amanda’s family owns Miller’s Inn in Riverton NY, and she has two sisters, Bethany and Patrice. We’ve already heard Bethany’s story in Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Book 3 – A Vacancy at the Inn.

I didn’t hesitate again. Detail after detail tumbled out of me, including some I hadn’t previously imagined. There were murders, even a possible kidnapping. I write Romantic Suspense after all. There was Amanda, of course, and Mike and Willow and Justin and the entire Book 5 gang. Every one of them had returned to life demanding that their story must be told.

Meanwhile, most magically, my love of writing had returned with them, and that is how Amanda Rescued My Writing Career.

A Time of Fear & Loving

Alice Orr – https://www.aliceorrbooks.com/

– R|R –

Read Amanda’s story – A Time of Fear & Loving – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Book 5. Available HERE. You can find all of Alice’s books HERE.

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