Part of The Writer's Life Series
JH: Sometimes the things standing in the way of our writing dreams is our own doubts and fears. Jennifer Blanchard visits the lecture hall today to share tips on how to get our of our heads and back into our writing.
Jennifer Blanchard is a best-selling author, screenwriter, Developmental Book Editor, and the founder of The Feel-Good Life Center. Grab her FREE Story Secrets audio series here and start writing better stories.
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Take it away Jennifer...
I've always been a person who believes anything is possible if you set your mind to it. I proved that to be true over and over again in my life with the things I've accomplished and achieved.
But even with my positive attitude and outlook, I used to have a negative side. And I had lots of negative, limiting beliefs that were stopping me from creating success in my writing life.
The thing about success most people get wrong is thinking that it's all about taking action. Yes, you do have to take action, but it's only a small part of the bigger picture. About 10 percent.
The other 90 percent is your mindset. It's how you think, how you believe, how you feel and the action you take because of how you think, feel and believe.
I didn't start seeing the success I wanted in my writing life until I took control of my thinking.
Here is the daily mindset practice that I used to hit #1 in my category on Amazon three times, sell thousands of books, write and publish nine new books in one year, and more.
1. Clear The Mental Clutter
Your mind receives around 50,000 to 60,000 thoughts every day. That's a lot of noise going on in your head!
In order to hear the good thoughts and the good ideas, you need to clear the clutter that blocks them.
My favorite way to do this is freestyle journaling. I handwrite at least one page, stream-of-consciousness, immediately upon waking every morning.
Doing this allows me to leave the negative stuff on the page and not take it with me into my day.
Some other clearing options include:
- Morning Pages--created by Julia Cameron, these are three handwritten, stream-of-consciousness pages that you write immediately upon waking (similar to what I do).
- Meditation--this allows you to clear your mind and focus on feeling how you want to feel as you go into your day.
2. Set Your Writing Intentions
After I clear out the clutter, I do an intention-setting practice where I grab my journal and write at least one page of positive, present-tense statements about what I want in my writing life.
So, for example, when I was focusing on becoming a Best Seller in my category on Amazon, I wrote in my journal every day: I am a bestselling author. I sell thousands of books every month with ease. Selling books is easy and fun. My community loves to buy my books, read my books and leave me five-star reviews.
The power behind the intention-setting and the repetition of doing it daily is what allows you to penetrate your subconscious mind and program these new beliefs into it.
When you believe something is possible for you, then you're a lot more likely to act on the nudges or inspired actions that come to you every day. And you’re a lot more likely to be consistent with your writing habit and getting your writing out into the world.
By setting intentions and then taking action when I felt inspired to, I was able to achieve the writing goals I desired.
3. Visualize Your Writing Goal As If It's Already Done
The final part of my daily mindset practice is visualizing my writing goals as if they're already done. I focus my visualization specifically on the intentions I set in the second part of my practice.
The important part with visualization is that you not only "see" yourself achieving the goal, but that you also feel the emotion of having achieved it. Emotion is a big part of visualizing.
When it comes down to it, if you want to achieve a goal, you have to fully believe, not only that it's possible to achieve it, but also that it's possible for you to achieve it.
This is a very important point. It can't just feel believable. It has to feel believable for you. You have to believe you can do it.
This three-part daily mindset practice will help you start to believe in yourself and create more confidence in who you are as a writer and in the writing you're doing in the world.
Share in the comments: Do you have a daily mindset practice? What does it involve?
About The Writer's Confidence Boost
You have BIG dreams for your writing life. The problem is, you're not doing much about it.
You're procrastinating and putting your writing off and spending years revising and rewriting but never hitting "publish" and putting your book out there.
Enter the Writer's Confidence Boost.
This book is based on a 15-day audio workshop of the same name. You get access to all of these audios inside the book along with the daily assignments from the workshop, so you can create the inner-strength and resilience you need to go after your writing dreams with full-force.
And now Jennifer Blanchard is bringing this life-transforming workshop to you in book form.
The Writer's Confidence Boost will help you:
- Overcome self-sabotage
- Stop second-guessing yourself
- Take empowered action in your writing life
- Bust through procrastination, doubt, fear, distractions and Resistance
- Create a resilient mindset so you can achieve all of your writing dreams
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indie Bound |
What a fantastic post and not just because of the content but also because of the timing (don’t you love it when that happens?) I am planning a writing challenge for my fb group and this will be very helpful I use sound bowl meditation but the positive affirmations will prove an added bonus- thank you I am a regular reader and love your blog Best Karin
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