Creative Marinating

It's true, I've been doing a lot of creative cross-training with my photography for the past few months. Interspersed with non-fiction deadlines, real estate chaos, and family ups and downs, my children's writing ethic has been on vacation for a while.

But now that school is starting, I have a workshop to attend and an author's event coming up. Plus I owe my critique group something wonderful, which I have yet to write. 

I need to quit marinating and get ideas on paper. I have a couple of projects in mind, but I need to give myself a deadline. I never miss actual (publishing) deadlines. Perhaps before this year's November Picture Book Idea Month (PiBoIdMo), I will get at least 2 stories fleshed out and ready for critique. Then I'll have a full head of creative steam to begin the PiBoIdMo challenge! Yes! I'll do it.

How do you get motivated after days, weeks, or months of creative downtime? Want to be deadline partners? Let's stop marinating and start producing. -Q

Deadlines Are Awesome!

This past weekend, I discovered that the deadline to turn in a manuscript for a conference review was the date to be 'received by' instead of the date to be 'postmarked by.' 

At first, this was not good news (i.e., extreme panic), but after 4 hours of revisions during the wee hours of the morning (I couldn't sleep anyway), I finished version 6 of the story and had it formatted and ready to be mailed the next day. 

The deadline turned out to be the path to unleashing creativity and honing my story to a much finer point. I simply could not miss the deadline. 

So, next time you think there is no time (did i mention I also had unexpected house guests) to get that revision or query or cover finished and submitted, get inspired and just do it. The dead of night could be your best time to work on meeting deadlines!
-Q