Keeping a journal is good for you
January 27, 2024
We hear a lot these days about the value of keeping a journal.It's interesting to note that journaling has been around for a very long time. It is nothing new and one of the earliest journal/diarists is thought to be the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius (121AD - 180AD) who famo...
Time to Restart the creative engines
December 23, 2023
2024 is here. We've recovered from the festivities and over-indulgences, we're taking some quiet moments to rest, recover, recharge, and read in the garden. It's also a good time to get the creative engines running again. It's a stepwise process. Add some fu...
Set achievable writing goals
December 23, 2023
The New Year is upon us, just like that. Many people I've spoken to recently say 2023 was one of the worst they can recall for several reasons: the climate (floods and destruction), the cost of living (high), wars in the world, the constant COVID resurgences ... an...
'Be a good steward of your gifts.'
May 7, 2023
"Be a good steward of your gifts. Protect your time. Feed your inner life. Avoid too much noise. Read good books, have good sentences in your ears. Be by yourself as often as you can. Walk. Take the phone off the hook. Work regular hours."The above is a quote from US po...
The mysterious process of creativity
April 13, 2023
How do we nurture that creative flicker into the flame needed to write imaginative stories? Setting the wheels in motion to create, allowing the mind to fly free ... as writers we all have different ways of reaching that place, zone, space, whatever you'd like to call i...
Being a writer is the No. 2 dream job
January 29, 2023
It came as no surprise to me to read this morning that, according to a survey undertaken by Remitly, (a financial services company for immigrants), being a writer is the second most popular 'dream job' of those surveyed.Remitly describes how they came up with this ...
Set your writing goals for 2023
January 4, 2023
Will 2023 be the year you write your memoir?Maybe you'll finish the crime novel you started writing last year or begin a new project, perhaps a work of fiction, non fiction or life story.A fresh, new year spreads out before you. How will you make the best of it with your wri...
The pohutukawas are blooming ...
December 15, 2022
.. so it must be Christmas!It always lifts my spirits when I see the first bright red blossoms of our gorgeous native Pohutukawa trees, and we are blessed with a goodly number here in our little bay.We have some on the beachfront and of course they cling to the clifftops too...
Halloween is a great time to write horror
October 28, 2022
Ah yes, it's one of my favourite times of year - Halloween weekend!My love of the scary comes from Mom who delighted in ghastly things: books, movies, and, in the 'old days' (by this I mean 1960s!), gathering around the radio to listen to that classic series The Uninvit...
What's the story with cats?
October 14, 2022
The neighbour's cats make themselves at home.Often in my home.That's the way with my two feline friends Poppy and Mr. Boy who live next door. I've written about them since they were kittens and now they're a couple of fully grown adventurers who prowl around our bush-clad pr...
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