January 2009 Archives - Write to Done

Naked Mind: Writing as Spiritual Practice

By Mary Jaksch

What writing practice, like Zen practice does, is bring you back to the natural state of mind…The mind is raw, full of energy, alive and hungry. It does not think in the way we were brought up to think-well-mannered, congenial. – Natalie Goldberg

Writing is an adventure, not just an expedient way of disseminating information. It can even be a spiritual practice. When I say spiritual, I’m not talking about anything high-flying. I’m not talking about angels, higher vibrations, higher intuition, higher anything. I’m talking about something lowly: how to be grounded in the moment. How to access our wild mind. How to write with a mind so open and empty that inspiration can fall into it. Read more »

Categories: Blogwriting, Craft, Fiction, Habits - Tags: spiritual writing, spirituality, Zen writing

How to Make Your Writing Matter to Your Readers

Photo courtesy of seychelles88

By David Pierce at The 2.0 Life

In all its disparate forms, writing, or at least good writing, has one common denominator: it seeks to make you think, read, or act differently.

Writing seeks to tell a story, prove a point, or bring about a new understanding. Obvious though that may seem, my experience has been that it’s really the largest divide between good writing and bad writing (and I’ve both read and produced my fair share of bad writing). Read more »

Categories: Craft - Tags: good writing

How to Spread Your Ideas

Psst … pass it on.

By Leo Babauta

Blogs are about ideas, and the best blogs are have ideas that are worth repeating and spreading.

That’s how they do so well — the power of their ideas attracts people to them, and the ideas spread widely, attracting even more readers. Read more »

Categories: Blogwriting

7 Reasons Posting Less Frequently can Increase Your Blog’s Popularity

Photo courtesy of SeenyaRita

By Bamboo Forest of Pun Intended

I’ve been exposed to many theories on what makes optimal posting frequency. The problem with the approaches I’ve seen, however, is they fail to address the most fundamental question: How good is the content?

Whether a blog is starting out, been at it for a while, or has a long history behind it – one thing is clear, its success is dependent on the quality of each post. People don’t line up to subscribe to a blog because it’s spitting out three posts a day.

1. More posts mean less scrutiny

Your ideas are finite. By posting less often you can select those ideas that are best, and leave the lackluster ones to germinate or be disposed of. Having a quota of posts you’re adamant about keeping can cause mediocre content to surface. Read more »

Categories: Blogwriting

3 Easy Ways to Write with Style

By Jesse Hines of Robust Writing

Most of us who are writers of any kind (journalists, authors, bloggers, students, freelancers, whatever) want to write with style. After all, most of us enjoy reading stylish writing.

We’d love to be the next Faulkner, Hemingway, or (insert your favorite writer). We’d love to write in a way that expresses our unique personality and grabs our readers’ attention, captivating them with our powerful ideas and soaring command of the language.

We’d love to write with such style and power that our readers are attracted to our writing, fall in love with it, and praise it. We want to stand out instead of remaining mired with the majority of bland writers out there. Read more »