You Can Write It Now
Are you having trouble starting, sticking with, or finishing a writing project?
Writing is a lonely job at the best of times. It’s very easy to lose heart and confidence if you’re also isolated by circumstances, or maybe even by choice, from people who share common goals with you. You find you wouldn’t strongly object to a bit of outside encouragement.
What’s the Problem?
Let’s do a little analysis first. What makes completing a writing project that is important to you so difficult to do?
- Do you have trouble finishing, or even starting, it because you’re overly responsible? Do you tend to put it last on your to do list so that, unsurprisingly, there’s no time left for it in your busy life, unless you decide to give up sleeping?
- Is someone expecting you to spend your “free” time earning more income, because your writing is not likely to bring in much money?
- Do you have some sort of writer’s block? Every time you sit down at the computer or pull out a long yellow legal pad, do you begin to sweat and your mind go blank? Or do you succumb to the email’s constant call? Or the gossip on the Huffington Post?
- Maybe you haven’t had much encouragement to write. Maybe you’re even encountered active discouragement. Other people may have strong opinions about your ideas, intimidating you.
Yet you may very well be someone who has a story you are burning to tell. The ideas are in your head and probably in your heart too. Why else would anybody want to write? Did you know that not writing them can undermine your health?
What about Academic Writers?
If you’re in the competitive academic world, you may already have sustained a number of blows to your confidence as a writer. That seems to be the nature of the beast (spoken by a woman whose husband is an academic). But you need to complete your advanced degree, or write your article or book to progress in your career, so you must bind your wounds and find the courage to move forward. You may need to figure out how to get the job done while you work to put on the table, raise kids, take care of elderly relatives, and who knows what else.
What’s the solution?
Here is one testimonial from a person who earned her PhD at the University of Chicago in the mid-2000′s:
When I first started working with Lynne, I’d struggled with completing my dissertation for many years. By that time, I was in total dissertation disarray – just for example, I had many important files on a laptop that was no longer working and I wasn’t even sure what I’d backed up. I had many other things on my plate as well – a full-time demanding job, two wonderful young children.
Within a year and a half of working with Lynne, I was walking across the graduation stage to pick up my PhD diploma. Sometimes I still can’t believe it! The big external circumstances didn’t change – I finished my dissertation while working full time and parenting too. Lynne helped change the internal circumstances. She helped me find creative solutions to whatever came up, learn how to stay on track, and think differently about the process. I am such a big fan of Lynne’s, and of the coaching approach. I carry what I learned from the process with me always.
I know, from over 4 decades of experience working with writers, how hard and frustrating the journey to completion of a major writing project can seem. I also know how critical it is to have the right assistance and companionship along the road. That is why I am writing to you here: to offer you information, encouragement and concrete help.
Contact me if you would like to talk about your own projects.
