Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach

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Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach episodes

May 15, 2016 #50: Stop Waiting for Last-Minute Writing Inspiration
My life presents numerous complications making it hard to plan ahead or get ahead. One simple practice I’ve begun is to stop waiting around for last-minute writing inspiration and instead, generate ideas that can be waiting in the wings, for their chance to step onto the screen and become a blog post, podcast, article or […]
6 min
May 07, 2016 #49: Here's to the Writer Moms
This one’s for the moms out there who are also writers.
Writer moms.
My mom was a writer mom. I am a writer mom. You might be a writer mom, too. And I'm sure you know one.
Please know this: Writer moms are trying to raise their family while advancing their writing in some way.
And it’s hard.
Madeleine L'Engle once wrote in one of her Crosswicks Journals:
During the long drag of years before our youngest child went to school, my love for my family and my need to write were in acute conflict. The problem was really that I put two things first. My husband and children came first. So did my writing. Bump. (p. 19)
I got a chance to hear Madeleine speak one time, and afterwards she signed books. I would have one instant to ask her about that—to ask about writing and motherhood.
We waited and inched forward in line until it was finally my turn.
I handed her Walking on Water. She asked for my name and scrawled a note on one of its front pages. She looked up and handed it to me.
“Thank you,” I said.
Then I blurted out: “When your kids were young…how did you do it? How did you manage to write?”
She looked up at me.
One beat.
Two beats.
I’m sure my eyes looked wild and desperate, but I needed to know.
Three beats.
Four beats.
“It was hard,” she said.
And that was all she said. Then she looked past me, hand outstretched for the next book.
Ask any writer-mom and she'll tell you the same. It's hard. We know that. We need a little something more to keep us going.
I craved more than that—some insight or encouragement from a mom who had been there and could speak into the life of a young writer-mom. I finally got another chance, not with Madeleine, but with Holly Miller.
Holly wrote for The Saturday Evening Post and taught at Anderson University. She was leading a workshop in a small setting and invited questions afterwards. I lugged my big ol' portfolio with me, so I positioned myself at the end of the line so I wouldn't hold things up unzipping it and flopping it onto the desk to show her my work.
Finally, it was my turn. She gestured to open it up, so I unzipped the portfolio and she flipped through it. I told her how young my kids were and asked how she did it. How did she raise her kids while achieving such success as a writer?
She answered, “I’m where I am today because I worked long hours full-time when my kids were young. And now they’re grown. You’ll still have time to develop your career later, but you only have now with your kids. Your kids are so little, and they’re little for such a short time. Right now, I suggest you focus on your children. You’ll never regret spending time with those kids."
Then she said this: “Keep your finger in the publishing world. Just keep your name out there. Publish locally with your paper, like you are. Submit to magazines. Keep it going on a small scale and your time will come.”
That. That's what I needed to hear.
Keep your finger in the publishing world. Keep it going on a small scale, and your time will come.
I needed someone to tell me that making those small deposits in my writing career would add up and pay off later. Holly was right: they did. They do.
If you're a writer mom, let me pass that along to you:
Keep your finger in the publishing world—keep making deposits in your writing career—and it will add up.
Your time will come.
In fact, your time might be...right now! Those small deposits? It's happening! Your writing life is happening!
You might be trying to raise your kids,
8 min
April 28, 2016 #48: Why Do We Writers Put So Much Pressure on Ourselves?
We feel like so much is at stake in our writing lives, the pressure is on. Let’s make writing fun again. Let's find the joy of writing.
7 min
April 20, 2016 #47: Don't Be Afraid to Evolve
Episode #47: Don't Be Afraid to Evolve
The Evolution of Projects
Don’t be afraid of letting a writing piece sit until the idea grows and matures to the point where you feel you’ve got a handle on it. It happens with lots of writing projects, as drafts 1 to 20 and beyond take a twist or turn, whether fiction or nonfiction, poetry or essays.
Book proposals are an interesting example, especially nonfiction proposals. The author puts together an idea he feels great about and submits it. The agent or acquisitions editor shows interest, but contacts the author saying they like it, but would like to see some tweaks and changes. If the heart of the message or idea remains and the author has the time, energy, and grit, I’d encourage him to go for it. Don’t be afraid to let that project evolve to give that publisher what they think will sell in the market and best serve their readers.
The evolution of an individual project is an expected part of the writing process, but don’t be afraid to evolve as a writer.
The Evolution of the Writer
You might launch your career thinking you’re a poet. That’s how I started. Over the years I've gone on to publish everything from feature stories in newspapers and magazine articles, to books and a podcast. From poet to podcaster, I evolved.
With each new venture, I wasn’t always sure I wanted to take the risk of being a beginner in that area. It would have been easier not to evolve—to stick with what I knew.
The Evolution of This Podcast
In fact, if you’ve followed this podcast for long, you know that it, too, has evolved. When I launched, I called it The Writing Life with Ann Kroeker. But somewhere along the way, I realized a technological misunderstanding on my part meant I thought my podcast name was used for the feed in places like iTunes, but all that time it was actually grabbing the name of my website, which is Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach. I had to adjust in some way, to make some decisions, to evolve.
Would I launch a new site devoted to the podcast using that original name, disentangling it from my main website and blog? Or would I simply change the name of the podcast midstream, renaming and rebranding it to what iTunes thought it was all along and leave everything else the same?
I chose the latter. That’s why you’re listening to Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach. At risk of confusing listeners, I let the podcast evolve.
Stay Focused or Evolve?
If you’re feeling safe and secure in the genre you know well, where you’ve gained accolades and name recognition, that’s great. It shows you are working toward mastery. You’re focused.
If you are scared to evolve, however, and that’s holding you back from something you’d like to try, don’t let fear keep you from evolving. You may find that the new type of writing you wanted to try ends up being your sweet spot, and you never would have known if you hadn’t let yourself evolve.
A lot of us feel we don’t have a lot of extra time to mess around—like we need to stay laser focused to accomplish our goals. And that very well may be. You may have the last laugh when you walk on stage to receive your Pulitzer Prize. There’s wisdom in "niche-ing down," as they say, and being the best you can be at that one thing.
But I think back to that 20-year-old poet straight out of college, and I’m glad I evolved. I love the writing I do and the coaching I’m capable of because I was willing to evolve.
Experiment
If someone offers you the opportunity to contribute to a project and you’ve never written like that before...maybe you should try it. If you’re an essayist feeling a little nudge to try your hand at fiction...experiment.
And remember that even skilled poets may not excel at the first few attempts at creative nonfiction. A novelist may struggle to adjust to the format of a...
7 min
April 13, 2016 Ep 46: What’s the Big Idea?
Summary and Show Notes
Episode #46: What's the Big Idea?
Whether you start writing and discover what you want to say as the words spill out, or you outline and plot it all out in advance, either way, you probably have a big idea.
With the first method, you may not be able to articulate it up front, but I’ll bet some spark of a driving thought sent you to the screen or the page. As you write, the big idea becomes clearer and clearer.
If you are the latter personality as a writer—the outliner or plotter—you probably couldn’t organize your material if you didn’t have that controlling idea.
Back in high school and college, the big idea might have been called the controlling idea or the thesis. Remember the thesis? You were probably trained to express it as one sentence—a statement that is, in fact, arguable. The thesis statement expresses the big idea of your project in that one sentence and then you set out to explore and support this statement.
That seems so...academic.
Author and writing coach Jack Hart's approach is less academic and more practical. He explains:
I always start every piece of writing I do by thinking about what is the core thing that I really want to say. And the first thing that I always write is theme—the word theme, t-h-e-m-e, colon—and then try to come up with a theme statement that is a simple subject-predicate-object sentence that is my core idea.
It probably will never appear in print, so there's no angst associated with it. It's not for public consumption. But it's right there on the top of my screen to guide me all through the writing process...it's a lot easier to write if you know where you're headed.
In his book A Writer's Coach, Hart offers an example of a theme statement:
EX: [SUBJECT] [TRANSITIVE VERB] [OBJECT][The myth of the perfect first line] [obscures] [the importance of focus and organization]
So that sentence—The myth of the perfect first line obscures the importance of focus and organization—appears at the top of his screen, to remind him where he's headed.
Next time you set out to write, consider writing at the top of your screen your controlling idea, your theme statement, your thesis, or, simply, your big idea. Let that guide you. Because it's a lot easier to write, if you know where you're headed.
Click on the podcast player above or use subscription options below to listen to the full episode.
Resource:
Ep 169: How to Be a Better Writer: Boost All 7 Traits of Great Writing
"Getting into the Writing Game, With Words of Advice From a Coach" (interview with Jack Hart)
Featured image design by Ann Kroeker (photo via Pixabay, Creative Commons).
4 min
April 12, 2016 Ep 46: What's the Big Idea?
Summary and Show Notes
Episode #46: What's the Big Idea?
Whether you start writing and discover what you want to say as the words spill out, or you outline and plot it all out in advance, either way, you probably have a big idea.
With the first method, you may not be able to articulate it up front, but I’ll bet some spark of a driving thought sent you to the screen or the page. As you write, the big idea becomes clearer and clearer.
If you are the latter personality as a writer—the outliner or plotter—you probably couldn’t organize your material if you didn’t have that controlling idea.
Back in high school and college, the big idea might have been called the controlling idea or the thesis. Remember the thesis? You were probably trained to express it as one sentence—a statement that is, in fact, arguable. The thesis statement expresses the big idea of your project in that one sentence and then you set out to explore and support this statement.
That seems so...academic.
Author and writing coach Jack Hart's approach is less academic and more practical. He explains:
I always start every piece of writing I do by thinking about what is the core thing that I really want to say. And the first thing that I always write is theme—the word theme, t-h-e-m-e, colon—and then try to come up with a theme statement that is a simple subject-predicate-object sentence that is my core idea.
It probably will never appear in print, so there's no angst associated with it. It's not for public consumption. But it's right there on the top of my screen to guide me all through the writing process...it's a lot easier to write if you know where you're headed.
In his book A Writer's Coach, Hart offers an example of a theme statement:
EX: [SUBJECT] [TRANSITIVE VERB] [OBJECT]
[The myth of the perfect first line] [obscures] [the importance of focus and organization]
So that sentence—The myth of the perfect first line obscures the importance of focus and organization—appears at the top of his screen, to remind him where he's headed.
Next time you set out to write, consider writing at the top of your screen your controlling idea, your theme statement, your thesis, or, simply, your big idea. Let that guide you. Because it's a lot easier to write, if you know where you're headed.
Click on the podcast player above or use subscription options below to listen to the full episode.
Resource:
"Getting into the Writing Game, With Words of Advice From a Coach" (interview with Jack Hart)
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You can subscribe with iTunes, where I'd love to have you subscribe, rate, and leave a review.
The podcast is also available Stitcher, and you should be able to search for and find "Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach" in any podcast player.
Featured image design by Ann Kroeker (photo via Pixabay, Creative Commons).
4 min
April 06, 2016 #45: You Don't Have to Do It All
Show Notes
Episode #45: You Don't Have to Do It All
The writing life involves a lot more than writing. These days a writer has to at least consider blogging, even if she isn’t officially a blogger. A writer has to build up an online presence and think about platform, encouraging likes, follows, and pins. A writer is encouraged to do readings and speak and present. Writers learn to propose and pitch and query, and to promote their work online and in real life.
We do all this when all we really want to do is sit down and pen a few lines of poetry, write another romance novel, compose a screenplay, or finish the draft of an article for a dream publication.
As the list grows long, we start to see things sitting unfinished and half-done on our screen or our to-do list. We can’t get everything done. We can’t. We’re just one person trying to write something meaningful, something funny, something true. Sometimes we’re going to have to pick just one thing, do that well, and be okay with the rest waiting another day.
If you’ve been putting a lot of pressure on yourself to try it all, to get it right, to work nonstop, to reach every goal in a tight time frame, and everything’s falling apart or you’re falling apart...give yourself a break. For a few minutes. For a day. Sit down and have some tea. Or stand up, and stretch or dance.
And when you finish that break, pull out a Post-It and write on it no more than three things you can honestly pull off. Depending on what time of day it is, you might just write one thing on that little square of paper. Or maybe it’s bedtime. Put away the paper and get some sleep.
Because you can’t do it all. And that’s okay. You don’t have to do it all.
At the very least, though, make sure ... you write.
Click on the podcast player above or use subscription options below to listen to the full episode.
Resources:
#9: Start Where You Are
#12: Rest and Productivity
#14: Progress, Not Perfection
#34: Celebrate What's Done
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You can subscribe with iTunes, where I'd love to have you subscribe, rate, and leave a review.
The podcast is also available Stitcher, and you should be able to search for and find "Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach" in any podcast player.
Photo of artwork and image design by Ann Kroeker.
4 min
March 30, 2016 Ep 44: Why Every Writer Needs a Buddy
Show Notes
Episode #44: Why Every Writer Needs a Buddy
You may feel like such an introvert, you don’t want or need a writing buddy.
And it’s true that most of the time you do the work of writing all by yourself. When you write, it’s just you and the keyboard...it’s just you and the screen.
But let’s say you finished the draft of an essay you plan to submit to a literary journal, and you really want another set of eyes. Wouldn’t it be nice to phone another writer—someone who could provide a little input? You could swap projects and offer a few thoughts on each other's work. Wouldn’t that be a great gift to both of you?
Or maybe you simply hold each other accountable to deadlines and goals in a weekly or monthly check-in. If one of you is stuck on a project, the other could offer ideas as you talk it through.
In this episode, I suggest where to find a writing buddy, when you should ask someone to be a mentor or coach instead of a buddy, and what you can gain from forming this relationship.
I hope you can find someone you trust, who asks about your projects and cheers you on—someone who trusts you, too, as you cheer him on.
Listen for the full podcast.
Resources:
Bless, Assess or Press (a way to ask for input from someone reviewing your work)
How to Write Together (the day my writing buddy Charity Singleton Craig and I wrote together)
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You can subscribe with iTunes, where I'd love to have you subscribe, rate, and leave a review.
The podcast is also available Stitcher, and you should be able to search for and find "Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach" in any podcast player.
Image by Isabelle Kroeker.
5 min
March 23, 2016 #43: How to Avoid Distraction and Manage Attention to Write
Show Notes
Episode #43: How to Avoid Distraction and Manage Attention to Write
In this episode, I take both a macro and micro view of attention, focus, and distraction.
At the macro level, I suggest that formulating a general plan of where you’d like to go as a writer will make it easier to focus your attention on how a given activity fits into the big picture (and you can more easily resist Shiny Object Syndrome).
At the micro level, we can focus our attention by minimizing everyday, moment-by-moment distractions. Clear your desk. Try the Pomodoro technique. When you launch your writing session, silence phone notifications, close the browser. You can even try using the "focus" view in Word to minimize visual distractions on the screen.
In addition, we can learn to become "meta-aware," noticing when our mind is wandering. When we increase meta-awareness, we can learn to nudge our mind back to the task at hand by telling ourselves, “Okay, I’m writing now. So, quiet. I’m trying to concentrate.
Listen for the full podcast.
Lots of Resources:
#42: Manage Your Energy So You Can Write
#41: 5 Steps to Find Time for Writing
#40: Take Charge of Your Writing Space, Tasks, and Projects
#39: Manage Your Writing Space to Be a More Productive Writer
#38: Manage Your Writing Space, Time, Energy, and Attention
Novelty and the Brain: Why New Things Make Us Feel So Good
Concentrate! How to Tame a Wandering Mind
Write in the Middle: Yes, You Can Maximize Distraction-Free Writing
Write in the Middle of Everyday Distractions: 7 Strategies for Getting Back on Track
Productivity 101: A Primer to the Pomodoro Technique
* * *
You can subscribe with iTunes, where I'd love to have you subscribe, rate, and leave a review.
The podcast is also available Stitcher, and you should be able to search for and find "Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach" in any podcast player.
Image by Ann Kroeker.
6 min
March 17, 2016 #42: Manage Your Energy So You Can Write
Show Notes
Episode #42: Manage Your Energy So You Can Write
In this longer-than-normal episode (over 7 minutes), I offer ideas for how to manage your energy as a writer.
You’ve taken charge of your writing space and begun to prioritize it. You’ve figured out where your time is going and now you're scheduling a regular writing slot and/or grabbing opportunities where you can.
Now it’s time to manage your energy to make the most of that time.
Takeaway 1: Managing our energy starts with identifying activities that energize or drain us. If you do something for 40 minutes that drains you while I do something for those same 40 minutes that energizes me, I'll be able to continue making progress without much of a break, while you may need to pause and create some space.
Takeaway 2: Doing an energy audit can help us understand the flow of our days—our natural peak energy hours, and the times of day we dip into valleys. Whenever possible, we can schedule writing for peak energy, when creativity is at its max. The audit may also reveal bad habits that are causing the valleys.
Takeaway 3: Improve your sleep (get enough sleep, and make sure it's quality sleep), nutrition (read studies to see pros and cons of caffeine, and determine the best foods to eat for meals and snacks), and exercise, and you’ll maximize your energy so you can write.
Takeaway 4: Try one of the following three actionable ideas today, during your writing hours, to boost energy while you work.
Standing desk: I've been using a DIY standing desk for several months (in conjunction with a normal, sit-down desk), and I find that standing to write keeps me more alert, creative, and productive—especially at times of the day when I'd be lagging.
Mini exercise breaks: Once in a while, when you feel you're losing focus, take a five-minute break and do some sit-ups, jumping jacks, the plank, or a few minutes of hula hooping. These brief, focused exercise sessions not only improve strength and flexibility, they also energize our minds when we return to our writing.
Drink water: During a low energy time, we may reach for caffeine when what we really need is to simply hydrate. A big glass of water may energize you without relying on coffee.
These simple solutions offer immediate results to help us manage our energy so we can write.
Listen for the full podcast.
Lots of Resources:
#41: 5 Steps to Find Time for Writing
#40: Take Charge of Your Writing Space, Tasks, and Projects
#39: Manage Your Writing Space to Be a More Productive Writer
#38: Manage Your Writing Space, Time, Energy, and Attention
Manage Energy, Not Time (article by Jenné Fromm on tracking whether an activity energizes or drains)
8 Healthy Ways to Boost Energy and How to Eat Healthy Throughout the Day for Maximum Productivity (both articles include tip of drinking water)
How to Get Better Sleep (And Need Less Every Night)
7 Things You Didn't Know about Caffeine and How to get as much energy out of caffeine as possible (both are pro-caffeine, in moderation)
10 Reasons to Quit Your Coffee
Five Health Benefits of Standing Desks
44 Benefits of a Standing Desk (from the maker of one)
How to Use Your Body's Circadian Rhythm as a Recipe for Productivity
Beyond the To-Do List podcast episode (mentions several ideas including drinking water and exercise breaks for energy)
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You can subscribe with iTunes and Stitcher, where I'd love to have you subscribe, rate, and leave a review.
You can also use the feed with any podcast player.
Image by Isabelle Kroeker.
8 min

About Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach

From the publisher's feed

With Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach, you'll gain clarity and overcome hurdles to become a better writer, pursue publishing, and reach your writing goals. Ann provides practical tips and motivation for…