Hyba Is Writing

Help! I've Lost the Ability or Desire to Write! - The 3 Week Plan to Get Back on Track I was diving through the writing forums and found a post where someone who wrote non-fiction articles for a company had realized, after leaving their job, that they could not return to writing their fiction. They simply couldn't make it happen. They were so used to the surgical way in which they'd been writing in their previous job that they couldn't figure out how to write for the creative, fun freedom of it.  Also very recently, I had a very long period of burnout. Months and months of burnout. Not fun. I've been working hard (or, rather, working gently) to pull myself out of my rut and finally get back to my creative projects. And I've known for a while that one of the main issues writers can face is just finding the motivation to write. Once that dries up, sitting down to write can feel like nails against chalkboard.  So, I decided to sit down and think up a plan - a day b...

17 Free-writing Prompts for Writers Free-writing is when you give yourself a set amount of time - usually about 5-10 minutes - and all you do is write. Write whatever comes into your mind. The main point of the exercise is that you're writing - try not to pause. That is easier said than done, of course. And sometimes, Brain = Empty. So, here's a list of free-writing prompts to give you that starting nudge. From there, who knows where you brain will take you?  What did you do today? / What do you want to do today? If you could travel anywhere in the world right now, where would you go? What is your favourite kind of cuisine and why? Talk about a book or movie that you read/watched recently. What did you like about it, and what did you not enjoy? How would you improve it? What is the one skill you don't have but think is very important for you to learn? Do you prefer to write short stories or novels? Why? What did you want to be when you were a child? Do you still want the sa...

Notes from Six Figure Authors Podcast - Ep. 125: How to Launch a Successful Series Check out the podcast episode here! Or watch it below:   These are some notes that I wanted to jot down for my own reference as I listened to the episode, and I've decided to share them here in case it helps any other writers and a few of you have shown interest in checking out my notes, especially if you don't always have time to listen to full podcast episodes. Basically, I'm sharing my study notes with my fellow writing students! 🖋 Below the notes are my own thoughts, which will hopefully also provide some added value.    Episode Notes Notes from Lindsay Buroker's advice: Write around 5+ books in a series because you may need to spend more resources to get people into Book 1, so the more books you have after Book 1, the more readers might want to dive into your series. Have an overarching story or mystery or something to be solved that's going to compel readers to read on to th...

23 things to try if your story isn’t working for you We've all been there: We're working away on a story, and at first, it's going great! Then, as we get farther and farther into it, we start to feel like something's off... Something's just not working. And we can't really put our finger on what it is. Is it too boring? Is this the dreaded muddy middle? Are the characters just not interesting?  Sometimes, if we let it, this kind of issue can make us doubt ourselves as writers, and when we're not quite sure how to fix what we think is broken, it can feel like the only solution is to just throw the whole story away. Not too fast! There are still a lot of things you can try before you decide to put away your story.    23 things to try if your story isn’t working for you: Change the protagonist of the story. Change the main characters’ personalities. Make your characters’ personalities affect the plot in some way. Figure out which characters have opposing desire...

Monthly Writing Prompts Round-Up - July 2022 As I work on creating writing prompts for the future editions of 101 Writing Prompts digital workbook and other prompt workbooks, I've decided to share some of them with my readers and fellow writers in hopes that they can help you unleash your creativity and get writing.   Here are the writing prompts I shared on my social media during the month of July: The owl visited my window every night, and every night I began to expect the wide-eyed face through the glass, the gently hooted tales of things to come.   🦉 I awoke to find an army atop me, clambering over one another on my skin, their tiny black bodies in a nightmarish, writhing mass.   🐜 Legends warned of the cloudless, starless night when the moon would disappear. I stared at the black expanse above and tried to quash my fear.   🌑 Hidden within, they scratched and scrittered, scraped and rasped, and all the while I stared at my walls, unable to sleep.   👂 H...

Battling Creative Uncertainty and Doubt - June 2022 Writing Update Ever find yourself in a highly uncertain phase of your life? When things have been thrown up into the air and you're in that moment where they're hovering, just about to drop back into their new places, and you're not quite sure what the fallout will be.  June was that moment for me. Heck, July is still that moment for me! But at least now I'm at a point in time where all those thing that were thrown up in the air have almost touched the ground again. Things are starting to look more concrete and less uncertain.  Back in June, and even before, that wasn't really the case. There was a lot happening for me in terms of my career, and without going into much detail, I felt I was at a crossroads and needed to make a big decision.  This, of course, sent a signal out to the universe to bring me a bunch of options all at once, which is great, but also confusing and multiplied my uncertainty by about a thousa...

The Koummya, or Summer Shopping at the Souq It was a small, unassuming shop nestled into a niche between two similarly miniscule shops. In fact, everything here was small. Everything here was cluttered, the shops bursting at the seams with handmade goods - everything from furniture to clothing and jewelry. Summer tourists from a plethora of other countries lined the souq streets, and I squashed down the frustration as I wove my way through them, passing group by group. The sun filtered onto the road through the gaps in the thick cloth awnings, and every now and then I felt its scorching heat upon my skin. My shirt clung to my back, my skin damp with a mixture of sweat and humidity. I needed to find what I was looking for. I wasn't entirely sure where I was going, though my strides were purposeful, and just when I thought I could no longer handle the heat, gasping and panting for air that seemed in short supply in the souq, I came to a halt. In front of me was the little jewelry sho...