by Annette Young
So you have dreams of being a successful writer but just don’t know where to begin. You spend hours writing anything and everything but you know you are getting nowhere fast, so what do you do?
First, you need to understand what makes for a successful writer. Is it someone who makes their fingertips bleed day after day by typing articles and short stories one after another or do you want to be someone who writes smart?
To be a successful writer, try clearing your brain before you even get started writing for the day. If you can identify what you need to achieve that day, you are more likely to complete your goals but you must not get distracted. When you have a creative mind and ideas flow consistently, it’s a hard thing to rein in those ideas but it’s all about learning to control your thought processes and putting all of those wonderful imaginative ideas to one side whilst you work.
You can do this by learning basic meditation techniques which can help you to still your mind and one such technique is to mentally imagine yourself placing all those ideas in a memory box. Identify the idea and then visualize it being placed inside. You will be surprised how much you will remember of these ideas but you can for a period of time, remove the thoughts from your conscious mind.
Alternatively, you can write the good old to-do list but have a page put aside for all of those creative ideas that bombard you. Once you have captured them on paper, you can happily put them out of your mind for the duration of your more important work. Try it; you will see just how much it frees up your mind.
A successful writer learns how to turn on and off the creative process at will. This is important otherwise you are at the mercy of your creativity kicking in when it feels like it and you will miss out on opportunities and productivity. Once the clutter has been cleared from your brain and you can focus on the areas of importance, you are one step nearer to becoming a successful writer.
Some people find it hard to know what they want to write about and they try to write everything which comes to mind and this results in most projects being left unfinished or discarded. This is a ham-fisted approach to becoming a writer and it will not gain you success. Writing with a clear vision does not mean leaving creativity behind, in fact the opposite, it simply means you put the non-essential projects on hold and focus 100% on those projects that could build your brand and earn you some well-deserved cash for your efforts.
The key to being a successful writer is all about writing smart.
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Image courtesy of [Samuiblue] / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
