Did you just let that opportunity pass by? Part 2

Last time I talked about how I realized a few things were blocking my opportunities or I was distracted from them. We talked about how planning my writing projects and having a long to-do list helped me accomplish more than I had previously. Today I'm going to talk about how focus and confidence can help you maximize your time and take advantage of opportunities you otherwise wouldn't.

3. Focus
This ties in quite a bit to last time with the planning. When you have a plan you know exactly what projects you're going to work on. This helps as you mentally prepare to sit down and write. I need to be in a completely different mindset to blog than I do to write fiction.

So how does focus tie in to taking advantage of opportunities? When you are working on multiple opportunities [or when I get ideas for cool stories] it is crucial that I maintain focus. It is easy for writers to get distracted from their primary goals-writing stories. This is even more true in the days of the internet where there is an ever present excuse for jumping online to conduct a bit more 'research'. Before long you've spent an hour reading the newest headlines, checking out the political polls and responding to a few emails.

But this focus also goes beyond these obvious distractions. What about that saggy middle of your manuscript. You know where you want to be at the end but right now that ending is 30,000 words away and you've run out of things to say. How do you maintain focus during those times. If a person is going to have any level of success in writing there will come a time when they will sell a concept to a publisher without a completed MS. What if you've been paid on this MS and you can't put words to page? What an awful feeling.

That is why you must take the time NOW, before you're published to learn the skills needed to push through writer's block, distractions, barriers and sagging middles to produce consistently well written books.


4. confidence
This is a subtle one that I've only recently discovered. It is MUCH more difficult to write when your confidence is shaken. I find the BEST time to write is right after I've sent a proposal off to the agent. At that moment anything is possible. I can fantasize about the bidding war that will ensue over my manuscript. I can dream of every one of my projects being picked up at once and then being offered huge cash advances. What about after spending a day writing up four article queries. I'm jazzed. They're off. I could be on the verge of breakthrough and national stardom. So with those dreams in my mind I go off to my writing cave...and write.

You know, I'm feeling pretty excited right now. I'll be teaching if two days at the Midwest Dreams Conference in Mansfield, Ohio. I will [hopefully] be meeting some of you there! I have written all of my blogs for the week so that has been scratched from my to-do list. I feel inspired to go write. How 'bout you?

Your Coach for the Journey, Tiffany Colter