Taming Your Piles of Files and Procrastination Stoppers!
When I was researching the Write Your Life Story course, I read as many how-to-write books on writing as I could get my hands on. Below are the great practical suggestions that apply to writers of any genre. Some of them are also great procrastination stoppers!
~ Set up a workspace and shelving where you can leave things undisturbed.
~ Be well stocked on stationary so you don’t have to search for materials.
~ Use a manilla folder filing system, or folders on your computer, for themes or life periods, years, events, however you decide to divide it up to be manageable.
~ Use a computer, typewriter or handwritten manuscript, whatever you are comfortable with.
~ Recycle abandoned wastepaper for use in drafts – it keeps the costs down and saves wastage.
~ It’s a good idea to keep rejected or reworked pages for a long time so you can go back to them. Put them in a box specifically for that purpose When finished, use them as scrap paper.
~ Keep two backups of work on two DVDS or portable hard drives.
~ Number each page before you start writing on it, or set up numbers in the footer of your word processor. That way you won’t get the pages mixed up when printed.
~ Put in dates, places. If you don’t write them down, readers won’t know where or when they took place. This is particularly important if you are doing a family history.
~ If telling a former way of doing things, e.g. grandma making butter, write down the steps that were taken to do it.
~ If you write like you talk, you’ll automatically take care of sentences and punctuation.
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Filed under: The Memoir Project, Writing Resources Tagged: author, autobiography, Cate Russell-Cole, ideas, inspiration, life story, memoir, organisation, resource, safety of data, workspace, writer, writing
