It’s no secret that I’m not a NaNoWriMo fan. I see too many writers end up stuck, discouraged, pressurized, fear-ridden and disheartened to encourage anyone to participate in this month-long challenge. So when Kyeli wrote a post about her struggles and experiences during NaNoWriMo, I sympathized – and then I asked her to write a guest post. I feel the subject of NaNoWriMo is worthy of discussion. It has many pros – and many cons that leave me shaking my head each time I see yet another writer cries out in anguish and sense of
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Have you Discovered Your Fearless Why?
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Giuletta’s a pretty cool person. She’s bold, she’s brave and she submitted her post fearlessly. Nice. But truthfully, Guiletta didn’t start off bold and brave or even close to fearless. Fearful is more like it, as I read her story. I couldn’t help but grin, though, when she hit on something near and dear to my heart – can you figure out what it is before you reach the end of the article? I felt excited yet overwhelmed when I started my graphic design business seven years ago. Various fears reared their ugly heads —
> Read MoreWhy You Shouldn’t Write Often
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Write lots. Write often. Write every day. Write as much as you can, prolifically and continually and constantly. And if you do, they say your skills will improve. It’s the key to being a great writer. I don’t think so. If all you’re doing is writing, you’re only producing volume. You’re repeating behaviour – but you’re not improving. The act of repeating behaviour makes you more experienced and faster and eventually that behaviour becomes second nature. But it doesn’t make you better at writing. In fact, consistent writing may actually do you damage and hold
> Read MoreHow to Sharpen Your Writing Sword
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A while back, I couldn’t sing enough praise for Ali Hale. She wrote great posts, she loved fiction, she was fun and chatty and reliable and made me smile every month. Then she disappeared. It felt like years of absence and I’d just about given up on her when Ali returned from her adventures of marriage, name changes, a house move and traveling overseas. She even brought me back a souvenir – this lovely guest post. Enjoy. Some time ago, you set out on a writing adventure. And like any good adventurer, you carried a
> Read MoreHow to Unblock Your Writing and Create Effortless Words
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Did you know writers have a mental factory hard at work in their heads? That may be surprising, but it’s true: You have a full staff up there in the office of your mind. Now, you may be the CEO calling the shots, but your mental employees are the ones who action your decisions and produce the blog posts, articles, web copy and novels you create. When you take awareness of your team, you have one awesome production line at your disposal. Close the office door and ignore your team’s existence, and you have chaos.
> Read MoreWhy You Should Treat Customer Relations Like a Marriage
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I get a lot of guest post offers, and some of them come from people who leave me scratching my head wondering why on earth I’d accept their post here at Men with Pens. I mean, come on. What’s in it for me? For my readers? That was the case when Dr. Corey Allan, a marriage and couples therapist contacted me about a potential guest post. A marriage guy? On a freelancing blog? Okay, sure, maybe freelancers aren’t having enough sex, but… well, there’s more to life than that. (No, really. There is. I swear.)
> Read MoreShould You Use A Pen Name or Pseudonym?
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People write me often to ask my advice on using online personas, pseudonyms and pen names. They have questions, and they’d like to know my thoughts. (It seems I’m considered somewhat of a go-to resource on the topic – like Aerosmith said, dude looks like a lady.) I’ve noticed that most people who contact me aren’t just trying to satisfy their curiosity, though. They aren’t looking to philosophize. They aren’t interested in my story. They come to me because they have a question and seek an answer: “Should I use a pen name?” I can’t
> Read MoreHow to Rip Off Your Band-Aid and Reinvent Your Business
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When you have a business – any kind of business – there are two ways to grow: You can tinker away and make changes to accommodate growth in little bits as you go along You can shut the whole thing down and start over Most people do the first. It’s easier to pick away at what you have and make little tweaks and improvements here and there, fixing up your business as you go along. You add a new service. You fiddle with your prices. You change a few lines of your web copy. You
> Read MoreDo Short Posts Deliver on Value?
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I write long. It’s a bit of a fault of mine, actually. I feel that long posts are just … better, somehow. Fuller. Richer. More valuable. I feel that long posts give you all the goods, everything you need, all in one place. Long posts are hard work, though. Delivering that much value and information in a single post without losing a reader’s attention is tough. And if a reader decides it’s too much work to get to the end… Well. That’s no good, is it? Then nothing gets read. All that hard work goes
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