Archive for May, 2010

So, in light of the fact that I don’t really have anything to do, I’ve decided to take part in the Thirty Days Project. Registration closes tonight at midnight Pacific Time, but even if you don’t make the deadline, I encourage you to check it out.

The project is designed to fight what the creators call “option paralysis,” which is a common affliction for us creative types. We can do anything, work on any project, make use of any idea, and that is often incredibly daunting. I know it is for me. The possibilities are often too numerous and overwhelming, and no work gets done. The Thirty Days Project works to break things down into 24 hour blocks and give participants a deadline. According to the Thirty Days site:

By establishing deadlines, even artificial ones, the act of creation is given a higher priority in the hierarchy of everyday activities. Re-prioritizing daily tasks is often difficult at first, but becomes easier over the Thirty Days. The aim is to get something made by the end of the day. It may not be your best work, but it will give you experience with re-organizing your life to make creating art a priority. Something you are accustomed to doing may end up being squeezed out in order to make room for your creative work. This may be for the better.

I know that this is something I need to address in my own life. I’m sure there are plenty of you out there who need to do the same. Creativity needs to play a more prominent role in our lives. We need to make time each day to take part in creative endeavors, and sometimes, we need a little push to do that. That’s part of the reason I feel that National Novel Writing Month is so popular: it breaks the process of writing a novel down into 30 manageable chunks of 1,667 words. Writing a novel doesn’t seem nearly so daunting when you put it in those terms.

Is there a project that you’ve been putting off because the prospect of such a huge undertaking is just too overwhelming? The Thirty Days Project is your chance to give yourself some smaller deadlines and make that project seem more doable.

So, sign up, officially or unofficially, and let’s tackle the creativity of the next thirty days together. I would love to hear about your daily projects! Drop me a comment or an email and share your wonderful creative endeavors, and I’ll share mine here on this blog.

Sorry for the link overload of this post. This is partly to share with all of my writer friends, and partly for my own future reference so I don’t have 19874934298472398742389 tabs open in my browser with posts and articles I want to read but haven’t had the chance to yet.

• Flarf poetry
• Rising above the slush
• Writing when you have no time
• Complications worksheet
• Formulating your plot
• Warning signs your novel isn’t working
• Creating relatable characters
• Keeping characters straight for your readers
• Story openings

Okay. I think that’s all of them for now. Phew.

Found this funny/depressing/way-too-true post via @elizabethscraig: How we write: The phases of the writer. At least now I don’t have to feel alone in my craziness.