Writers are too close to their own work to see all the problems on their own. They need an impartial second and third pair of eyes that will honestly evaluate the work without holding back. A professor pointed out that once a piece is in print, authors can't sit on the shoulders of readers and answer their questions, so all those issues have to be worked out before it gets into the hands of readers. It can be hard seeing your "baby" put through the ringer, and it can be tempting to send it out only to people who love your work. But "head patting" won't improve the story or your writing overall. It's the tough stuff, the comments that point out what isn't working, that help make both the particular piece being critiqued and our writing in general stronger.

Authors have to be willing to take input from others. We don't have to agree with everything that's said, don't have to use every piece of advice given, but we do have to let those who are helping us improve our writing feel they can do so without reprisals. It helps to remember two things: the comments given are the opinion of that particular person, and two, critiques are not personal but are usually given with the intention of helping make the work better. There are times when a reader won't get it and will give advice that doesn't fit, but it's unlikely s/he deliberately missed the point. Weird advice can point out a lack of clarity. And there are times when different people will have different ideas of what's working and what isn't working and contradict one another. It's up to me, as the author, to determine what fits my vision of the piece, but I can't see if I'm anywhere near the mark without input from others.

What it comes down to for me is what kind of work do I want my name associated with. There are those who just want to throw their work out there, who don't particularly care if it's good or not. They just want their work accepted and put in the public eye, and that's all that matters. But I'm one of those writers who wants my work to be associated with quality writing. As much as I want to be published, I don't want my name associated with sloppy or poorly written work. For that to happen, I have to be willing to take tough comments, both before and after publication, and use them to make my work better. They can hurt sometimes, but I will become a better writer by at least considering what was said and acting on those comments to make my stories stronger.

This doesn't mean you start ignoring your family's needs and quit your job. It does mean you make writing a priority in your life, and you make the time to do what you need to do. It means you find a way to work every day. You can always tell when something is important to a person because they find ways to do that activity, be with that person, buy that item. If writing is a priority, it will be something you do more than on the weekend or when you have "free" time. You will make the time to do it. Its importance will be obvious because you will give up other things to write. That might mean less television watching, waking up an hour early to get some words down, or taking a chapter to your job with you to work on during your breaks.

Making writing a priority also means finding a way to work when challenges beyond our control get in the way—world building or researching while sick, writing by hand when a computer isn't available, or finding a way to deal with the million and one little distractions determined to take you away from the page. Making writing a daily habit helps, as does having a ritual to help put you in the right mindset. When the rest of life tries to get in the way, these two things can help a writer keep on track despite the obstacles. But they are also just the beginning. Every writer will have different ways to get past the distractions, to get their mind on the work. When my ADHD is at its worst, I find having a soundtrack for the project I'm working on can help get me focused, and I've seen other writers utilize the same technique (although they might not be doing it because of ADHD). What's important is that successful authors find ways to push through the obstacles and distractions to do what they need to be successful authors.

Only you can decide how important writing and publication, if that's one of your goals, is to you. If being a successful, published author is a priority, the time to start learning how to work through the distractions and obstacles is before that first contract. As every author has a unique way of approaching their writing, so do they each have a unique way of pushing through the blocks, distractions, emergencies, illnesses, and other obstacles life throws at them. Find your way. Push through. Start now and it will help carry you through the rest of your career.

But some writers look at what they're weak at and just accept it they're "just not very good at that." They let their weaknesses stand. There are any number of reasons authors would do this—it's comfortable, it's not something they look for in their own reading, they're not certain of how to work to improve. The problem is, regardless of the reason, the result is always the same: stagnation.

Instead of stagnating, writers should face their weaknesses head on, see them as a challenge, and learn and grow through them. Don't give in to being "just not very good." Figure out who does it well and read their work, figure out how they do what they do and how you can fit it into your own writing. Read how to books. Practice it in your own writing. Don't worry about mistakes—that's what revision is all about. You may not become a master at whatever it is, but you will become a stronger writer, and your writing will be better for the work done to improve your craft.

Writers are always being pushed to do something fresh and new, and most writers take that to mean "read what's out there and do something different." And that is a large part of it. But we also need to do things that stretch our boundaries, that make our writing fresh and new. We need to challenge ourselves, rediscover ourselves, and let our writing grow with us. We need to get out of our comfort zone.

There are a number of ways a writer can push their boundaries and explore writing in new ways. One way is to look at our weaknesses and push to improve them. Don't use a lot of description? Work on adding a little more. Always write very streamlined? Try a little poetic license. Not sure where you're weak? Set what you're working on aside for a time, then reread it with an eye to find patterns in your writing. We all have them, we just have to be made aware of them. Read how to books that focus on the areas you want to improve on. Try a new length. Always writing novels? Work on some shorts—it's a whole different animal and you will have learned a lot when you master it. More of a novella kind of author? You can try either short stories or working on a novel.

One of the biggest ways to push your boundaries as a writer is to try new genres. You could start with small steps: if you write epic fantasy, dabble in urban. Worried the similarities might make it more difficult to try a new genre, then make a big leap and try crime fiction. I've dabbled in crime, romance, epic, urban, and am trying my hand now at young adult. With each, I've learn a little bit more about writing, about myself, and about those genres. I've become more aware about word choices, plotting choices, and so much more, and, I hope, a better writer.

Walking away from what we're familiar with, what has worked, can be a risk, but risk has rewards beyond what goes down on the page. Stretching yourself, pushing beyond the familiar boundaries, helps you grow as a person and that can only make your writing stronger. What you learn as a result can breathe freshness into your writing. And you might just discover strength where you thought you had none before and a new passion for your writing.

Writing may be something I enjoy doing, but it's also a job. It takes time and effort. That non-writers don't understand this can almost be forgiven. What they see is someone sitting at their computer, not answerable to a boss, possibly at home all day. It looks easy. They don't think to compare it to a secretary sitting in front of her computer all day or someone who is self-employed. But writers know differently. We must get words on the page and we must revise those words until they're right, then we have to invest time and effort into finding the right places to submit to. If it's a novel, we need to invest time into promotion so we can sell the next novel. No one would expect to work in an office and not get paid. Nor would we expect to get a contractor or a plumber to work in our homes for free. So why do writers think it's okay to not get paid for their time and work?

Some markets say they can't offer authors anything except exposure or a hard copy of their work in print. A few will even say it's the "rare opportunity" to be in their anthology. The honest truth is most of those markets have such a low readership that the exposure a writer receives is next to none, and certainly not of value since it's unlikely anyone with any kind of pull in the publishing industry is reading it. And such opportunities aren't rare. There are more markets that don't pay than do, and even less markets that pay anything remotely close to pro. Giving your work away for free is easy and offers you nothing in return for your time and effort. Markets that don't pay their authors are essentially looking for free labor.

Some will say that publishing is an expensive business for the publisher, and that writers should be content with receiving copies of their work in print. The two do not equate. Publishing is an investment for the publisher. The publisher invests in the writer and his or her work. With any investment, the investor pays money in first, taking the risk that it will generate a profit. Part of funding the investment for a publisher is paying the author. An author should always be paid for their work regardless of length of the work or size of the press or market.

Are there exceptions? Yes, but they are very few, and an author needs to do his or her homework to make sure the market really is an opportunity for exposure. And most markets that offer good exposure and a credit that has impact still manage to pay something. As a writer, when I look for places to submit my work, I start with the highest paying markets and work my way down. I may end up selling a short story for $5, but it's not for lack of trying. And I never submit to a market that doesn't pay anything. I value my time and my work. And I'm saddened when I see other writers who don't value their time and work in the same way. It's not about confidence in your work. It's about valuing yourself, your time, and what you do. Writing is a job. Authors need to treat it as such.

Some time back, I played role-playing games. I was fortunate enough (or unfortunate enough, depending on your point of view) to have some pretty twisted GM's who made some pretty nasty bad guys. Their NPC's were pretty twisted too, come to think of it. Nothing was ever straight forward with these characters. There was always something more going on beneath the surface--some hidden motivation, some manipulation you didn’t see coming, some plot being worked out behind the scenes. I also can’t tell you how many times I fell into their traps, despite being pretty savvy. These GM's showed me how to watch player behavior and character behavior and use it to my advantage. And when I became a GM myself, they showed me how to build twisted, devious characters of my own. Much later, when I started working on my writing more seriously, I took the lessons learned into my story characters as well.

Now some would say that a gaming influence is a bad influence on writing, and I've definitely had to learn how to edit my experiences as a player and GM. For example, I may love being a description queen, but even I will concede that a GM describing a room to his or her players needs to use far more description than a writer needs in a novel. I've had to learn to tone it down, but I would never say the gaming influence on my description was a bad one. If anything, I learned more about paying attention to details.

Writers should never turn away from an experience because it's a "bad" influence. If an experience is harmful and causes pain, some distance may be needed before that experience can be used in writing, if it ever can be, but writers should otherwise endeavor to soak up their influences. Everything we experience, from the situations in our lives to the personalities we meet, is fodder for the imagination. Passing something by because it's not acceptable, or it's not "appropriate" for writing, or whatever other reason given for it being bad, only reduces the material you have as a writer to work with. How can you create wonderfully deep, twisted characters if you haven't seen other wonderfully deep twisted characters either real or imagined? We are the sum of our experiences. When we deny ourselves the use of those experiences in our writing, we deny a part of ourselves, and our writing suffers for it.

Soaking up the influences in your life helps you to add color and depth to your writing that would otherwise not be there. It allows you to create characters who are so different from yourself that readers wonder how you write them so well.

This does not mean that movies and TV shows are bad, or that the techniques used to make them good for their target audiences are bad. I may be particular about my movies, but I do enjoy them. However, many of the techniques used in movies and TV are meant for visual story telling alone. They don't work well when used in the written word. Unfortunately, much of today's population is raised on TV and movies, and less are reading. This has been a gradual but definite change over the years, and it is influencing the way future writers perceive what a story is.

Like Ursela LeGuin, I believe a story is "a narrative of events (external or psychological) which moves through time or implies the passage of time, and which involves change." That change can be an actual change in the character or his situation, or a character's attempt at change. Characters must grapple with some kind of conflict, but the way they do so doesn't need to huge or dramatic -- they just need to try to get what they want. Sometimes this requires little actions -- pretending to drink from the poisoned cup instead of throwing the cup to the floor. Both are ways of avoiding the poison, one is just a less dramatic way of doing so. Less dramatic action does not equal passive. Passiveness is allowing the events to happen and making no effort to avoid them.

Action is a window into the character's soul, the circumstances surrounding the conflict, and the plot itself. The struggle to overcome the obstacles in our lives don't usually require dramatic overtures or flashy explosions. If TV and movies are to be believed, we see cars blow up every day. Most of us, however, probably have yet to see just one go up in a fireball. I know I haven't and I'm in my 40s. Even the most extra-ordinary of circumstances often only need the smallest of actions to be dealt with. Fiction is supposed to be grounded in this reality, even when based in the unreal. Making your fiction larger than life doesn’t mean taking life out of it entirely. Fiction, in all its forms -- even the least literary genre, is supposed to be a reflection of life, not an overdose of Hollywood flash. We as writers must keep the distinction in mind and avoid confusing good fiction with a Hollywood movie. Flashy special effects are for the big screen, not the printed page.

Many writers say that goals are depressing -- they don’t meet their goals and end up with negative feelings about themselves and writing in general. I think some of this comes from a misunderstanding of how to use goals and how to set them. Goals should not be a straightjacket. They are guidance. They create a path for us to follow, and reaching the end of that path is not always required. They need to be based on our current abilities and time. If you know you can write 1000 words a day, then a good goal would 1250 words a day. This kind of goal pushes you to do more as a writer, but isn't so far out of your comfort zone that it becomes impossible to reach. They should cover the basic aspects of writing: new words, revisions, submissions. If you're a part of a critique workshop, you may also want to include critiques on the list. They also need to be goals for things you can control. How much of your work gets accepted is out of your hands since you can't control what an editor will like, so attempting to make a goal for acceptance rate is setting yourself up for failure. The first key is balance: a balance in time, a balance in ability, and a balance in what you try to achieve.

How often to set goals will depend on the writer. I set a yearly word count goal, weekly goals that cover all my writing and activities, and create a to do list each day based on those weekly goals. Others set yearly and monthly goals. Still others set their goals by the project and, using what they know to be their usual pace, create target dates for completion. Each writer must experiment with goal setting to discover what works. Which leads to the second key: use these goals as a way to guide your progress. You must allow them to be flexible enough to account for changes and disruptions, but firm enough that you don't ignore them. Use them to determine what you will do each day, but don't beat yourself over the head if you miss the mark. Perhaps they were set too high. Maybe life got in the way. Maybe you need to adjust how you set your goals. Whatever happened, don't kick yourself for not making your goals, but applaud yourself. You may not have reached the target you wanted, but you reached for something, and that is more likely to lead to success than reaching for nothing.

I learned that real writers write in the way that most encourages them to finish the work. I learned that we all have to figure out what works for us as individuals. No one else can tell us this, we have to find it on our own. Maybe this is why so many first novels end up in the bottom desk drawer or under the bed: these are the novels that teach us how we need to write. The process of floundering around and trying to figure out what works for you is bound to affect the quality of the writing, if not the story itself. But it's a process that must be experienced. It involves not only finding the way that works for you, but also learning to hold to it. It's working through this process that makes you a real writer. It's working through this process that gives you the courage to do what you need to do as a writer regardless of what others, particularly experienced writers, say.

This doesn’t mean you don’t explore other options. We all grow, as people, as workers in our jobs, as a part of our families, and as writers. We learn of new ways of doing things we never even thought of before. If we shut these ways out because we've "always done it this way," we risk becoming stagnate, and no writer should be stagnate. Writers are explorers. We explore the world through words. By experimenting with new ways of writing, we discover new tools that aid us as writers. We learn. We grow. We revitalize ourselves and our writing.

How should you write? You should write in the way that fits you. Experiment until you find the way that gets you to a completed story or novel. Your learn whether or not your style of writing is influenced by length or genre or any of a number of other factors that come into play when writing. For example, I write my shorts from beginning to end, from first word to the last, without outlines or notes of any kind. This is known as an organic linear style. This is the way of writing that I thought, and was later told, made a person a real writer. But I can't write novels that way. To complete a novel, I write mostly in a linear structured style -- using outlines and notes to help me get to the end, with a lot of organic writing (world building and adjusting the plot as I write) thrown in. Occasionally, I even have to write novels in a non-linear fashion just so I keep moving forward on the novel without letting a scene hang me up. And I'm learning I have to be careful with how much world building I do and when I do it. Too soon or too much and I burn out, I don’t want to do it even though it's necessary to the continuity of my novel. I have to space the world building out to make it work for me and the story. That means there are a lot of times when I'm writing without any clue whether it will fit into the world I have made for it. But this is okay. That's part of what revision is for.

When it comes to your writing, you do what you have to do to get it done, just like anything else in life. You find your way, and you never let anyone convince you that you're wrong. As long as you finish the work, it's right for you. It's the way you should write.

But there is another kind of stepping back that is often harder to justify. Setting aside a project, any project, is a difficult decision in a business where finished projects determine your value as a writer, particularly if a lot of time and effort has already been put into it. All that work is seen as wasted and that pressures the writer to continue. Other writers can add to this pressure without realizing it -- they like the project and want to see it done. They may indicate that the author's misgivings are related to a lack of confidence and advise the author to just push through those feelings by continuing to work on it. Even articles like the last meta, A Dividing Line, can pressure a writer into continuing where she or he should not.

Sometimes a writer just needs to take a big breath and set aside a project. This is particularly true if the project is ambitious with a lot of advanced techniques involved and the writer is new to the career of writing. No one walks the day after they are born, writers can't fly the day after they first pick up a pen. We all want our stories to come out "just right," but for that to happen the writer has to be ready. It's about limits, and most people don't know where their limits are until they've pushed past the boundary. Once that's happened, it's more damaging to the writer and the work to keep going than to set it side for a time.

How big of a breath will a writer need to take? That depends on the writer and the project. Regardless of the time, however, an author shouldn't feel guilty about putting something aside until they are better prepared to work with it, even if they have to set it aside several times before they finally finish it. Picking it back up and trying again often takes more perseverance than just moving on to another project. Everything in between those efforts is nothing more than breathing.

Perseverance goes beyond the market hunt. We can't give up on our stories at any phase of development. They may require more revisions than we thought we'd ever need to do, or a complete rethinking or rewrite. We may have to set them aside, sometimes for years, but we can't give up on them. Perseverance means working through the challenges, whether those challenges are finding a new market after a stinging rejection or picking up a novel we abandoned after 4 attempts to write through to an ending. It means doing what we need to do despite how we're feeling, despite lack of support, despite the obstacles, set backs, and discouragement.

It doesn't come easy, this determination. Like almost everything else about writing, it's something that happens one step at a time. A story gets returned, the comments aren't so great, and you decide to hunt up a new market anyway. Choosing to write a little more on the next chapter after a long day at the "real" job and frustration with progress on that novel. Only the serious writer does these things and all that other "tough stuff" that makes writing what it is. They don't give up on their stories, their dreams, or themselves.

It is far too easy to see these books as the absolute authorities on how we should write. Being in print lends the book a sense of absolute truth, and books from well known, well published authors are given even more power by the mere fact that their authors have used the advice given again and again quite successfully. We take the advice to heart, start to follow it as unerringly as we are capable of, and then find ourselves confronted with one of two problems (or both): another authors, equally well known and well published, puts out a book that contradicts the advice we're following; or we find ourselves unable to work in the way the author demands. For years, my first novel never made it to a completed rough draft because I kept hearing that the way "real" authors write is to begin with the first word and end with the last word. But I can't write a novel straight through like that. I finally found my way, but I wonder if it would have been found sooner if I had realized earlier that "Real" authors write in the way they need to write, not to some specific technique or style.

Writing is very personal. Every writer will approach it differently, from how they write to what they write. We're told to limit adverbs, but J. K. Rowling does just fine with hers. We're told less is more when it comes to description, but that hasn't kept Mercedes Lackey from publishing new work. Writing books are helpful, but they are not the absolute authorities on writing. As with any other advice we receive, we need to read widely and take what makes sense to us and make it our own. Reading on how to write is enriching to us as writers, we learn and grow from such reading, but none of it is absolute. Writing is an art, and art has very few absolutes. Every artist must find his or her own path, his or her own voice.

Writing is also very much tied to culture and time. What is seen as excellent writing in England in the 1500's certainly isn't the kind of writing that will sell today. And what readers enjoy today, they will not enjoy in a few years. Just as the popularity of certain genres come and go, so do writing styles and rules. And books about writing are just as tied to the culture and time they are written in as the short stories and novels that are published. They are static, a picture of what works at that particular time.

Some writers become so caught up in the learning, in getting all the information they can on how to write, that they forget the rest of the equation. Reading about writing is a good thing, but we only become better writers when we actually write. It's easy to get caught up in the reading, to realize there is so much more we need to learn, and to not pick up a pen. But reading about writing and not putting pen to paper is the same as reading about painting and not applying paint and brush to canvass: the reading isn't going to teach you the control you need to make the picture you want. You must practice. It's the only way to improve your own work.

Read to learn about writing, but balance it with the actual writing practice you need. There's always something new out there for us to learn, something more that can help us improve our writing. It never ends. To try to fill up on what you need to know before you get started will only keep you from doing the one thing you're trying to learn to do: write.

But writing without publication in mind does more than renew our creativity. Freewriting allows us to explore our ideas and find new ones. Since freewriting is personal and not intended for any eyes but our own, we are free to release our deepest thoughts and feelings on the page, no matter how silly or how horrific. While something in our freewrites might eventually lead to a publishable short story, publication is not the goal. The goal is to release ourselves, to let the word flow however they may, without censure or pressure. Freewriting is for release and discovery. Like freewriting, other forms of non-publication writing have their purposes: letters communicate; lists and notes jar our memories; journals records our success, our failures, our lives, and allow us to explore our feelings. None of these are wasted. They have purpose; they have their own power.

Beyond expression, release, and creativity, writing also teaches. Not only so we discover ourselves, but we learn about our craft. I have stories I would never dream of attempting to publish that have taught me about form, genre, style, and voice, and that I've used in classes to teach others about writing. My first 3 failed attempts at my first novel taught me about how I write and how I need to write, and how to take criticism. Critiquing teaches me how to read, teaches me different ways of writing, gives me an appreciation for different voices, shows me new ways of seeing and doing, and helps me to reinforce what I already know. Even fan fiction, which I do not write, has its lessons. Writing in someone else's world, using someone else's characters, isn't easy. From it a writer can learn about all those basics of writing: plot, character, setting, and so on. Those who write fan fiction are learning, in a roundabout way, the skills they need to be published (if they wish) from authors who already are published.

Writing cannot be wasted, no matter its form. Whatever its purpose, from the personal to the professional, writing always gives back to us. Words have power. While they may not always reach out to others, they always reach into ourselves.

Every writer who has a notebook uses it differently. From what kind of notebook we use to what's put in it, the notebook is very customized--tailored to a particular writer's personality, writing style, and needs. Some need a binder complete with pockets to be able to store clippings and pictures. Others are fine with a spiral notebook divided up into sections for their ideas, submission tracking, and so on. Some of us have more than one: a small one we can carry around for jotting down ideas as they come to us and a larger one that carries everything else. For the writer who uses it as a storehouse, the Writers Notebook is invaluable. Writer's block becomes less of a problem if you have a place to go for ideas and to explore news, pictures, poetry and phrases that inspire you, and so on. Even just using the notebook as a journal can provide a wealth of ideas for new writing.

New writers who have never heard of the value of a Writers Notebook, however, may have no idea what they want to use for the notebook itself, much less what they should put in it. And I've met too many new writers who have never even heard of the concept or think it will be too difficult to create or keep up. Some are so new, they have no idea what their writing needs and style are yet, much less the kinds of supports they will need. But this is part of the beauty of a binder type book: a writer can change what goes into it as his or her writing changes and his or her needs become apparent. My book, for example, is a day planner, but a binder or other type of notebook that allows you to customize it can be used as well.

As for what to keep in it, the ideas are almost endless. Most writers keep a repository of ideas, from phrases that can prompt a short story to full paragraphs and notes for possible novels. Some also keep newspaper clippings, photographs and other images, scraps of dialogue they overhear, postcards, letters, bits printed off the Internet, and so on. But a writers notebook can be used for so much more than an idea space. Other items that can be kept in it include a record of your submissions, phrases and lines you liked from other novels, ideas for character names, world building notes, research notes, project tracking, a daily writing journal, sensory notes and descriptions, freewrites, and so on. I even created a weekly planner calendar with writing related notes, from goals to accomplishments, to replace the standard planner calendar.

Once they've created a Writers Notebook, most writers find that it isn't hard to keep it up. This is where you record your accomplishments, your submissions, your goals. It becomes as much a part of your writing life as the writing itself. It goes with you everywhere so you can add your ideas as soon as they come to you. As you use it more, you begin to see what you need to add and what you don't need to keep. You adjust, making it more a part of you, more useful to you and your writing, more focused. And, eventually, you wonder how you managed without it.

One solution I've found is to write in the cracks. Every job has cracks--those spaces of time between tasks, or breaks in the day when you can sit back and not concentrate on work, or moments when there's nothing demanding your attention. These moments are the perfect opportunities to make space for your writing. Oh, they don't do well for the actual writing portion of the process, but they do provide time for some of the other tasks of a writer: world building (such as a character profile), outlining, revising, market hunting, even critiquing if you're a part of a workshop.

I always take writing to work with me: a chapter or two of the current novel in revision, a short in need of attention (as long as it doesn't need a major overhaul), the manuscript I'm reading for a friend, a piece or two to critique, and my writers notebook (which goes with me everywhere anyway). Taking such a selection allows me to pick and choose not only what I'm in the mood for, but what I have the time for. On good days, the kids work and I revise or crit, and I get quite a bit done. On bad days, the only time I can do anything is during my planning time. I will admit it was much tougher finding the time to do anything during my long term positions since there's almost always something that needs to be done (planning, grading, meetings), but I usually found some small way to keep in touch with the writer in me, it just took longer to get anything done (which was certainly better than not doing at all).

Days off will always allow the time to work on those things that require more concentration or a higher word count. But don't limit yourself to a days off kind of writer. Those bits of time at work may not allow for much, but they do allow for something, however small. They are tiny moments of forward progress. Writing at work can be the highlight of your day and even help make a job more tolerable. And, at the end of a hectic day, a day when you come home and all you want to do is fall asleep in front of the TV, writing between the cracks also lets you say, "I wrote today." For some of us, that's a big accomplishment all in itself.