Archive for the ‘Pep Talks’ Category:
Written on January 21st, 2026 by adminno shouts
With February and our daily prompts about to arrive the question of where and how to write raises its head. For many this is a huge problem with things like work, caring duties, illness and life in general getting in the way. For a start, we do not all have the same access to time and space to write so the trick is to look at what your typical day looks like and see where and how to fit in the writing. For some people there is no typical day and if that is the case then it is important to acknowlege that – there are still things you can do including laying foundations for writing later on when life calms down a bit, and experience life as building a mental library of things to write about later on – it is not wasted time just because you can not currently put words on a page.
One of our poets found themselves with a few years of hell, being a parent, a carer, recovering from illness themself and trying to work full time from home so they could interrupt their work day for various medical visits and for the parent craft days at school and so on. Social and creative stuff by necessity got shunted to the side. It seemed like a long long time, it was about three years, during that time they didn’t really get to write but what they did do was have a little recording device that wasn’t their phone but could have its files uploaded easily. This digital dictaphone went everywhere with them and when ever there was a moment and they thought of something they could just whisk it out and record their thoughts where ever they were – bed at 4 am, in the hospital waiting room, waiting for the kids after a school play.
Now that life is a little easier they have time to sit and write and have allocated one evening a week where an easy dinner is had and writing is the priority, it is the night with no kids’ clubs and the kids are encouraged to do their homework or something creative in the time period too. They are steadily working through a mix of new ideas and the bits they had recorded aided by speech to text software which, though still far from perfect, does mean they can correct rather a big chunk of text rather than having to spend hours typing it all up and listening to their own voice a half dozen times to get each recording down in a written form.
They intially struggled to get writing again but the notes helped them not feel overwhemled by the blank page and apparent lack of ideas and interest – stressed brains can shut down so one of the things they had found was during the stressful period they were generating fewer and fewer ideas, and if they had not had their recorded bank of ideas they feel they would have really struggled to get going again, as it was building the wanting to write and space and time to write took a good year after the major stressors and grief were dealt with – again sometimes you just shouldn’t “push through” but it is definately not wasted time. Ideas and concepts for writing are pushed down but not gone; they are, as a song writer friend puts it, “mulching” – they are fermenting and turning into something else that isn’t quiet ready yet.
There are many ways to write – start by looking at what space and time you have. Also experiment – what works for one person may not work for others, some can write on the bus, some need quiet, some dictate whilst doing their daily exercise. Maybe look at others’ writing habits to get some ideas.
Good luck everyone.
Written on January 1st, 2026 by adminno shouts
It is that time of year again when we all start to think about what is on the writery horizon! Here at team WoPo we have been thinking about pacing and how that can be difficult for writers in general and often even worse for poets. Now you are probably thinking: what do we mean by pacing in poems? Go and read a few from different styles of poetry, did you notice the beat and rhythm? Was it the same through out? If it was a long poem did that start to make it seem like a run away train or to drag on for eternity? Whilst these effects themselves can be what is sought after to emphasise the feel of the poem, they often are not and have occured by accident.
Try playing around with the lengths of lines and where the rhymes fall, and even the font sizing. What effect does this have on the poem? What makes the pace fast? What makes it slow?
This is a good exercise in general but can, as a concept, also be applied to our general writing habits, but in a slightly different way – what is your annual writing pace? Do you start with good intentions and then fizzle out? Do you get enthused by workshops and only write around them? Does it slowly ramp up through out the year and then stop when the kids are out of school… or some other pattern? Once you know what your general year-long writing pattern is you can work on getting a little bit more writing in, or in some cases less writing but more content and quality for time spent.
So maybe it now is the time to think about these overarching patterns rather than rushing off to do new year writing challenges – and then sinking when it all seems a little too much.
Written on February 7th, 2025 by adminno shouts
It is one week into our poetry writing drive and what have you done? Have you managed to get through all the exercises? Been inspired by our guest bloggers or have you been struggling? Not written a thing?
If you are in the first category then fantastic and keep going but if you are in the second then don’t despair! There is still plenty of time and perhaps you should look at where and when you actually get to write… maybe you need to make yourself a little nook or walk to the park and sit on a bench. Maybe you have a fine writing practice but it just isn’t working for you at the moment – something just isn’t working any more – if this is the case then try just changing what you are doing ie work from home? Go to a cafe… normally work in a cafe? then go for a long walk and sit outside to write! This shift in activity may just be what you need to get you writing again.
Just to get you going why not look at these faces in the mirror – what are they thinking? Why are there so many? Make notes on each face and then take them one at a time to write about. Alternatively just look at the image and start writing.
Written on February 1st, 2025 by adminno shouts
Today is the first day of the 2025 writing challenge – so crack your note book out or electronic devise of choice and let’s get writing!
First off look out the window…. what is the weather doing? If the weather was a person what would they be like? Do they like travelling? If so what type of travelling and to where?
Write for half an hour.
If this exercise doesn’t suite you there are plenty more in the archive under Exercises.
Written on January 7th, 2025 by adminno shouts
Happy New Year – well we’ve made it through the fist quarter contrary of the New Millennium!
So what have you got planed? Anything interesting? If not don’t worry you can just roll with the universe and see where it takes you!
But if you are in between the ultra organised and the go with the flow then you might want to grab some paper or electronic device of choice and start thinking about what you want achieve this year… do you want to write more? Submit poems to magazines and journals? Read more? Make a list of these and make it a BIG BOLD list and put it up on a wall or door or cork board – somewhere you will see it regularly every day! If they are obvious finishable task then tick them off as they are completed and if you need rewards to be motivated then sort out some rewards for finishing off the hard stuff (we all find different things difficult and if say submitting poems is hard for you then reward yourself when you have completed the task!). If it is an on going thing then maybe make a mark to count how many times you have work towards or done a repetition of these kinds of tasks.
Obviously we are interested in your New Year Poetry pledges!
Here are some ideas of pledges or resolution to make:
1) Write for 5 minutes before bed every nights
2) Spend 1 hour a week editing and sending poems off for publication
3) Get a new note book and see how fast you can fill it
4) Make little notes every time you come across something inspiring, if you made one of these books last year then start writing from the notes.
5) Take a phone or other recording device on walks and strolls and adlib poems whilst looking at and recording interesting spaces such as fish swimming in your local pond. (different countries have different rules on photo taking and video recording and some parks may have their own rules so make sure you know what your local areas is.)
6) Read a poetry book each month.
7) Go to the local poetry reading night.
8) Take part in your first poetry slam or performance night.
9) Take up journaling and see what snippets and poems natural arise from the pages.
10) Enroll on that course you’ve been thinking about.
These are just ideas – try coming up with your own.
Happy New Year and good luck with any resolution you choose to attempt!
Written on February 28th, 2019 by adminno shouts
As we bring the WoPo poem a day writing challenge to a close this year, the team here hope that you have found the writing prompts and suggestions helpful. The archive is always here if you need a little help through out the rest of the year.
So what do you do with the poems now?
Well… now the work begins – it is editing time!
Take a look over what you had e written, are you going to keep it all or only a fraction – do not throw anything away initially but file it else where for a while. Sometimes poems become something only when we forget their origins.
Maybe join a critic group to get your work into a place where you can start seeking publication or popping them out on your social media etc…
What ever the destination for your poems – be proud of yourselves for having come through this journey of poetic madness with us here at WoPo.
And don’t forget there are many more poem a day writing challenges and celebrations out there from the local to the national to the global – we will be back with a few more guest poets in April to inspire those taking part in NaPoWriMo, and there might be something special for International Poetry Day in March 🙂
Written on February 21st, 2019 by adminno shouts
There is one week left of the WoPo poem a day writing challenge! Do not despair if you are no where near your target of a poem a day – for now is the time for one last push!
Get writing, be serious about the writing, feel the looming dead line and WRITE! WRITE! WRITE!
If you have already completed the challenge then do not give up – either continue to write or in the writing time that you have been using begin the editing process, smoothing and honing those poems to perfection.
You can see the finish line now – so don’t give up and push onwards to victory!
Written on February 15th, 2019 by adminno shouts
It’s the half way point of the month, this can be where life starts to get in the way and the novelty of the challenge starts to wear off. So how do you keep momentum going?
There are several ways that people have found useful but not everything works for everybody.
1) Set your own goals… so if you have already completed the challenge and are wondering where to go next set yourself the goal of completing the same within a week (so half the time).
2) If you have been struggling and know that there there is just no way you can completed it and are suffering from the “why bothers” – you can sit back and look at what has and hasn’t worked for you, which exercises were good and which weren’t. Stream line the process so that you are not trying to complete everything and achieving nothing.
3) You are struggling to bring any poem to completion but have done tones of writing – this is fine, this just means you are going to have a fun time editing after the writing frenzy has passed but you might want to mark yourself a time period for editing in the calendar so that the work doesn’t just sit there almost complete for the rest of your life.
4) What’s the point? Some people struggle with setting their own goals and writing for themselves so why not make it for other people. The easiest way to do this is to decide the poems are going to be submitted to magazines or entered into competitions. Publishers websites will normally have the current sort of stuff they are looking for on their website somewhere.
5) View this month as the warm up for Nation Poetry Writing Month in April rather than the real thing. This is the proactive to get you up to speed.
Now get back to the writing!
Written on February 7th, 2019 by adminno shouts
It is Day 7 of the World Poetry writing challenge and we have been seeing some lovely poems shared on a variety of social media. Some people are racing ahead and that is great but don’t slack off – keep going and see how many you can write this month! Others have barely begun or have spent a lot of time on one poem and that to is fine – that is one more poem than you would have written other wise.
If you wish to share for feed back and group discussion there is a WoPo Facebook group and we have been popping out all the archive exercises on the Facebook Page and twitter, plus added lots of exciting images to the Pinterest Board!
So week one and EVERYTHING IS AWESOME! (And if it’s not don’t panic there is still time!)
Written on February 1st, 2019 by adminno shouts
So it is time to get writing and creative – so sharpen pencils, crack open the new ink, power up or awaken those devices and write!
The idea is that from now until the end of the month you set a side some time to write… each and everyday. Sometimes this isn’t so easy and that is where strategy comes in – write smart! Record voice memos on your phone, jot things down in pocket note books and take some sort of device/pad with you to do so – you’ll be amazed at what can happen during a coffee break at work, or whilst stuck at the train platform.
This doesn’t mean you have to write all ideas down as soon as they strike, some people like to mull ideas and let them merge and split and take shape in their mind before ever setting them down in words. If you are such a person, or even if you are not and you just didn’t get a chance during the day, then the bedtime recap could be the thing! Take the notepad/phone etc. to bed with you (warning insomniacs this might not be brilliant for your sleep patterns but is often a very creative time!).
Now on this first day make sure you have your writing supplies set and that you peruse the various writing exercises in the archive, more will be appearing during the month but it’s always nice to have a rummage through some of the old stuff!
Well what are you waiting for? Go get writing!
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