Bethany Henry: Writing & Wellness

It happens to all of us: we hear “Do you have a minute?” “Can you help with this?” or “What are you doing there?” Our writing gets interrupted. We have cats and small children climbing on top of our keyboards. Holiday events that are planned during our writing hours. There are things to do and places to be. So what do we do when the inevitable distractions, phone calls, and interruptions occur? Well, we have a few choices. One reaction is to treat any interruption as an unwanted and unallowable distraction. We must protect our writing time, after all! It’s time for us to focus on our work. The words won’t write themselves and we need to get things done. There’s a lot of good things to be said about this attitude!  We need to be able to protect our writing time and set boundaries if we ever want to accomplish our projects. However, there are times when these interruptions can make us both better writers and better people. Now disclaimer here:  This is not about making...

So you’ve written your book. Good for you!! Cue fireworks! Celebrations! Accolades of all kinds! This is a  huge  deal, my friend. After all the excitement dies down, you may find yourself asking, “So… now what?” Just as there are many different writing styles and methods, there are many different options when it comes to publishing and sharing our work. Today we’ll look at a few options on what to do with our stories once we’ve finished them. This post is Part 9 of the Steps to Success series designed to walk us through the process of writing a novel from beginning to end. As always, personal preferences and experiences differ. This guide is based in part on my own experiences as well as from authors I have worked with and/or learned from along the way. If you haven’t looked at the earlier steps in this series yet, I would encourage you do so.  Our work should be as polished and finished as possible before we publish it! Getting Published To start off with,  you don...

Sometimes we just need to know we’re not alone, we’re not (too) crazy, and that other writers have been here before us. Writing is hard and a little encouragement can go a long way! Here are some inspirational, go-getting, and encouraging quotes for writers no matter where we are on the journey. Enjoy, and I hope they bring joy to your day! Special shout out to anyone doing NaNoWriMo this month- hang in there! I think you are amazing and brave and I believe in you! Encouraging Quotes For Writers “One thing that helps is to give myself permission to write badly. I tell myself that I’m going to do my five or 10 pages no matter what, and that I can always tear them up the following morning if I want. I’ll have lost nothing—writing and tearing up five pages would leave me no further behind than if I took the day off.” -Lawrence Block “Just write every day of your life. Read intensely. Then see what happens. Most of my friends who are put on that diet have very ...