Grow Your Writing Life

Try these 10 strategies to help you boost your creativity and productivity.
BY SAGE COHEN Successful writers accomplish what they set out to do by living and writing in alignment with their aspirations. While no two writers are striving for exactly the same results, we all have the opportunity to put solid systems, strategies and attitudes in place to keep us moving toward what we value most. Following are the 10 best ways Ive found to exponentially increase the results of our writing lives. No matter your genre, level of experience or time limitations, you can put these strategies into practice to start writing more and selling more right now, today.

Strategy #1
HAVE A STRATEGY.
As the authors of our writing lives, we get to decide what productivity means to us and how we intend to shape a practice that reects our goals. Ask yourself: HOW DO I DEFINE PRODUCTIVE WRITING LIFE? This can be different for everyone; you need to decide what a productive writing life looks and feels like for you. What does it accomplish? What are its ofce hours? What else, in addition to writing, happens in that life, and what is the work/life balance? HOW AM I PRODUCTIVE TODAY? Think about what youre accomplishing that you value. What skills and strategies, technologies and tools, attitudes and habits are making this possible? HOW DO I INTEND TO BE MORE PRODUCTIVE MOVING FORWARD? Identify, specically, what you want to achieve in your writing lifeboth tomorrow and over the long term. What skills, tools, attitudes and habits could make this possible? Write down your answers and refer to them often to keep your eyes on the prize, and your words moving across the page to take you there.

Strategy #2

LIVE, BREATHE AND WRITE YOUR PLATFORM.

Platform is the turf you claim as your area of expertise in your writing lifeand its everything you do to make that expertise visible. Think of your platform as your portfolio of accomplishments (publications, leadership roles, Web presence, classes) that demonstrate your authority on a given topic. A platform can give you: FOCUS. When youre clear about your niche or area of expertise, you can make better decisions about how your time is spent: You know which opportunities t with your identity and your goals, and which do not. EFFICIENCY. The more you write about your specialty, the more expert and procient you become. OPPORTUNITY. Once your dedication to your platform has earned you a reputable name, youll have more power behind your pitches to publication outlets. MOMENTUM. Success tends to build on itself: Requests for interviews, articles, speaking engagements and more are likely to start rolling in.

Strategy #3
MAKE THE MOST OF THE TIME YOU HAVE.
Time is a writers most precious natural resource, and chances are you could be using yours even more effectively. Here are a few ideas for squeezing every drop of value from every minute you can spare for your writing: DEFINE YOUR PRIME TIME. Does your energy surge with that rst coffee on the drive to work, or are you tapping the revelation vein at 2 a.m.? Determine your best hours, and see if you can nd a way to dedicate at least some of that time to your writing. What else could you try to make your days as hospitable to your writing life as possible? PROCRASTINATE PRODUCTIVELY. Sometimes we sit down to write at our scheduled time, and its just not happening. You can waste time effectively by ling, logging business expenses, updating a to-do list, adding contact information to your database or taking care of any other administrative tasks that serve your writing life. CONTAIN SOCIAL MEDIA. Social media can be powerful when we use it in service to our goals, rather than letting it derail us with distraction. Decide up front how much time per day you will devote to your online activityincluding Facebook, Twitter, your blog and e-mailand keep that time focused on working toward your community-building or

promotional goals. REMEMBER THAT YOU HAVE ALL DAY. An interviewer once asked ction writer Grace Paley, You are a mother, a teacher, a writer and an activist. How do you nd the time to do it all? To which she replied, Well, I have all day.

Strategy #4
CULTIVATE MEANINGFUL RELATIONSHIPS.
The way we relate to our peers, guides, business partners and readers can make a big difference in how we write and publish. So how can you make the most of the relationships in your writing life? DO WHAT YOU SAY YOURE GOING TO DO. A writers word is her reputation. Follow through on promises you make, or renegotiate responsiblywith clients, editors, students, colleagues and yourself. USE ENVY AS A COMPASS. Sooner or later, a writer you know is going to accomplish something that will pluck one of your No fair, that was meant for me! heartstrings. We may not even know we want something until that chord plays through us. In this way, envy is a useful indicator of desire. Use it to point you toward your own goals. Then get back to work. LET SUCCESS BE CONTAGIOUS. If you stay attuned to the good news of your writing community, chances are youre going to get charged with excitement and start creating some of your ownand vice versa. So spread the word about what youve accomplished.

Strategy #5
ACTIVELY SEEK INSPIRATION.
Just as youre not likely to wake up one morning and run a marathon without training for it, you cant expect that light bulb to come on over your head the moment you sit down to write if you dont have a practice of tuning in to what gets your hand moving. If youre used to waiting for inspiration to strike rather than going out and nding it, start simple: READ. Take in a mix of books, magazines and online content that feeds your imagination in different ways. Read writing thats a lot like what you want to write. Read writing thats nothing like what you want to write. Read writing that can teach you something about a new topic. Read writing about writing itself. You get the idea. LISTEN. Go to events or get online and listen to people you admire

read from their work or talk about what they do. Let other writers fuel your sense of possibility. CREATE COMMUNITY. When you have people to learn with and from, people who are intimately engaged with the unique opportunities and challenges of the writing life, everything youre striving for will feel more possible. Both online communities and live connections can be invaluable. LEARN. Classes, workshops and conferences are great ways to acquire new skills and to learn from people whose writing and expertise you respect.

Strategy #6
CREATE EFFICIENT SYSTEMS.
You can expedite success by having solid systems at your ngertips for managing time, information, goals and your own performance. Here are some good habits to develop: MONITOR YOUR TIME. Know how much time various writing projects take you, so you can make sure the return on your hourly investment is worth it. SET SCHEDULES. Think of these as maps of what is possible. Block off the hours you intend to spend each day on each task, so you can see how your deadlines will be met over time. TRACK SUBMISSIONS. Know where youve sent work, where you intend to send work, who youve heard back from, and who you need to follow up with. SAVE IDEAS. Have a simple system for capturing and storing ideas when they appear. PRESERVE YOUR DARLINGS. Dont throw away those scraps from the cutting-room oor. Save what didnt work in a darlings le; it might come in handy for a future piece of writing. CREATE FILE-NAMING CONVENTIONS. Be consistent with how you label your documents (both paper and electronic) so that you can easily nd what youre seeking, when you need it.

Strategy #7
ALIGN YOUR WORK WITH THE RIGHT OPPORTUNITIES.
The better you understand your market and your value, the more successful youll be. BUILD A CASE FOR YOUR FUTURE. Make a habit of ling examples of

everything that might inform your career trajectoryconferences and workshops, potential markets for your work, etc. Then, when it comes time to nd a home for your writing or teaching, youll have a good idea of where to start and what might be possible. DO YOUR DUE DILIGENCE. When its time to submit, pitch or query, always follow the submission guidelines of your target market. Otherwise, youre not just wasting the editors timeyoure wasting your own. KNOW WHAT YOUR TIME IS WORTH. When considering whether an opportunity is a t for you, it helps to understand what your time is worth. Begin by researching market rates in your eld. Learn what other teachers are charging for classes of a similar duration, or what other freelance writers are billing. If you are seeking publication in a magazine, compare pay rates for publications of a similar scope or size. Then, once you know the playing eld, assess where you are in the ballpark. Are you a beginner or an expert in your eld or on your topic? Consider also the nonmonetary value of every opportunity. If you could gain a valuable clip or portfolio piece that would bolster your expertise, it may be time well spent even without a sizable paycheck.

Strategy #8
PRACTICE, DONT PERFECT.
Every time you sit down to writeno matter what youre writing, how accomplished you believe yourself to be or how high the stakesthink of what youre doing as practice. Why? Because it takes the pressure off and keeps the humility front and center. Who needs the performance anxiety of striving for (the impossibility of) perfection? I sure dont, and you dont, either. Practice is a gentle way to hold ourselves accountable to high expectations with a loose and friendly grip on the reins.

Strategy #9
REPEAT & REFINE WHAT WORKS.
When you do something that works in your writing life, do it again. Make a point of seeking out opportunities to repeat and leverage success. Whether its a promotional strategy or a revision technique, if it worked, add it to your arsenal and use it often. CREATE TEMPLATES WHENEVER POSSIBLE. Templates are a great way to easily copy, paste and modify something that served you well once. Use them to quickly create invoices, queries, bios, teaching tools you name it.

BREATHE NEW LIFE INTO OLD WRITING. As you develop your platform, over time one piece of writing can become a foothold for the nextuntil you approach vistas you never before imagined possible. Instead of starting from scratch each time you pitch an article, workshop or book concept, build on the wealth of information youve already researched and written, while nding a new dimension to explore, a new audience to educate or a new way to share what you know.

Strategy #10
HAVE AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE.
The only person who has enough information to appreciate how hard youre working is you. Thats why one of the most important jobs you have as a writer is to celebrate your successes, your failures, your willingness to take risks, your ability to follow through on your commitments, your capacity to work through fear when it comes upthe whole shebang. When you really start to authentically feel accountable to yourself (and grateful for your own efforts and accomplishments), anything is possible.
Sage Cohen (sagesaidso.com) is the author of Writing the Life Poetic, the poetry collection Like the Heart, the World and The Productive Writer: Tips & Tools to Help You Write More, Stress Less and Create Success.