Being a blogger isn’t always sunshine and rainbows. While we’d all like to think that ideas for new articles simply flutter into our minds like butterflies in the breeze, bloggers may find that developing new topic ideas is harder than writing the posts themselves.
What’s your next move when you find yourself stuck while brainstorming?
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“You don’t need to take notes,” one esteemed lecturer told me and others in the crowd ahead of a highly anticipated presentation on digital publishing. “I’ll send you a PDF of this slideshow.”
I soon found myself in a sea of side-eye when I—undeterred—took out my notebook and recorded the date in the upper right-hand corner.
My mother has accused me of being an “old soul,” and perhaps it’s just a quirk of my personality that I’m keen on pen and paper, but I’m not alone. A 2014 study from researchers at Princeton and UCLA, previously cited in a July 2017 guest post on my blog, showed that taking notes by hand helps with retention in the classroom—largely, they say, because the physical note-taking process forces the listener to actively synthesize, process, and reframe the information being presented.
“The more deeply information is processed during note taking, the greater the encoding benefits,” researchers Pam A. Mueller and Daniel M. Oppenheimer reported.
If you’re like me, and the majority of the participants in Mueller and Oppenheimer’s study, then taking notes helps you better understand and recall new information—and you’re going to want the right tools for the job. As a freelance writer and editor, here are my five favorite notebooks, journals, and planners—the ones I use on a daily basis and simply can’t live without:
Continue reading “A Professional Editor’s Favorite Journals and Planners — 5 Notebooks I Use Every Day”This year has flown by—can you believe it’s already October?—and as we approach the holidays, many writers will soon find themselves struggling to keep up their regular workflows. Between all the gift-giving, meal cooking, and school–holiday–concert attending, it can be hard to find time to be creative. But you don’t need to let yourself fall into a creative slump.
If you’re feeling out of your element this fall, don’t beat yourself up: you’re not alone. You just have to put in some extra effort to get those creative juices flowing!
Continue reading “5 Ways to Boost Your Creativity and Beat Writer’s Block”Please note: This article was published Oct. 17, 2017. Links may no longer be active and resources listed may no longer be available. Click here to read my more recent posts.
This year seems to have gone by so quickly. There are barely two weeks left in October—which means NaNoWriMo is just around the corner.
Whether you’re here to prep for November or you’re just in the midst of working on your latest W.I.P., I’ve compiled some of the most useful prewriting tools on the web just for you.
Here are nine resources that have helped me as I gear up for my latest creative adventure:
Continue reading “9 Best FREE Prewriting Resources for Aspiring Authors”
Shelly Rawlings 