Stay in the room. As a writer, your greatest strength is your work ethic.
Decision #13 from Sixteen Superpowers Memoir Writers Need to Have. Over sixteen posts, I help you make pacts with yourself so all will go well for you.
Photo by Florian Klauer on Unsplash
13. Stay in the room.
YOUR MANTRA: Don’t get tossed away.
Know that your work ethic is your greatest asset. Great writers stay in the room. They don’t get tossed away.
Become the expert on your particular work skills. For instance, I’m great at inspiration and generating, generating, generating. For me, there is no such thing as writer’s block.
My other great work ethic: I can untangle things. I can iron out the wrinkles in a plot. I can turn a mess into polished work.
It’s some kind of magic potion of inspired action and stubborn refusal to be daunted by doing hard things. What’s your secret sauce?
As writing teacher Natalie Goldberg (Writing Down the Bones) says, “Write until the atom bomb goes off. Keep writing until the radiation gets you.”
DECISION: Work hard for what you love, and enjoy the journey.
ABOUT SIXTEEN SUPERPOWERS OF MEMOIR WRITERS
It’s easy to write a memoir! All you need to do is write something with universal resonance that is true and comes from your life.
Let’s get real. To write a memoir, you need a basket of superpowers.
As a memoir writer with a forthcoming book (BOUNDLESS, coming December 2024 - pre-order here at Bookshop | Barnes & Noble | Amazon and as a book coach/developmental editor who works with memoir writers, I’ve learned quite a lot about tapping into literary superpowers.
What’s enduring about memoir is that it is real, and it matters. A few decisions you make on the front end will determine whether it will go well.
In this series of posts, I give you 16 decisions to install at the beginning of your journey. Make these pacts with yourself, stick to them and you’ll get there!
THE FULL SERIES - AVAILABLE TO PAID SUBSCRIBERS
The Sixteen Superpowers of Memoir Writers: Make These Decisions on the Front End, and All Will Go Well for You
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From Lived Experience to a Book: The Path of My Memoir, Boundless