Writing for Pleasure

Or so I am told by Jake…for failing to make this little blog a the success he had envisioned.

I never claimed to be a professional blogger but agreed to help him as I saw it as a learning opportunity…and I did the work for free and also paid for the domain and the web hosting out of my own pocket.

Jake is very disappointed and blame it on me… not on the fact that he has failed to come up with the content he promised… and now he find little reason for providing the rest and why shall I then continue to try and make the blog interesting?

Obviously people are more interested in writing for money than writing for pleasure… though I am certain that it would be easier to write for money if a person got into the habit of writing for pleasure first…

But people apparently do not agree…and thus there is no interest in the subject of writing for pleasure…though I will continue doing it… 

I still feel a great deal of pleasure in writing and I do it daily.

However, I will not continue writing this blog, but I will let it be active as long as the hosting remains paid… then I will let it die in peace and silently disappear into the cyber space… not missed by anyone.

Unfortunately this has also soured the relationship between Jake and I… Meaning that not only have I failed with the blog, I have also lost a long time friend…

Right now I am soooo tired of living.

I did receive an email ad where I was, among other things, told that I could learn “how a good website can make or break a writer” which was pretty bad news to me…I had thought a good website would be something desirable but apparently not…I didn’t think I needed that course…:-)

However, I then came across another blog by the writer and psychologist Carolyn Kaufman, and she thinks it is very important to have a website. She also gives some very good advise about the “why” and the “how” of how to do this.

You can access her blog post “Creating Your Author/Book Website: The Why here.

And you can access her other blog post”Creating Your Author/Book Website: The How” here.

These posts are well worth reading, and I believe these gave me more and better information than the course I was invited to join…at a fairly high price…the information on the links are free…:-)

Not to mention that her website, as well as her blog, is very well worth studying -  there is a lot of good information for a writer there…something that also we who do writer for pleasure can enjoy and learn from.

You can access her website here. A visit is highly recommended.

I stumbled across a very interesting site with information about blogging that I most certainly will try to make use of – I need all the information I can get to get this blog working the way we planned it. So far it is not living up to our expectations and I blame myself for that.

Anyhow, as I had received such interesting information about writing courses (see previous post), I looked for more such information. In English this time.

That is how I came across Angela Booth’s “Fab Freelance Writing” site. where she gives information about how to “Develop Your Writing Career, and Make Money”.

The editorial article that caught my interest is titled “Blog Success: How to Get More Writing Clients” and is well worth reading for anyone interested in blogging. You can read it here.

And NO! I have no affiliations with Angela Booth and I have not read any of her books nor taken any of her classes – yet!

something we try to make people understand with this blog…and we try to do it by making people interested in writing for pleasure.

The reason I write about this, is an email-ad that I received yesterday. It is not in English and that is why there will be no link to that particular website. It is a writing coach who offers a course with the goal of having people start writing – anything!

The course will concentrate on having people write – be it stupid stuff, childish stuff, poetry without real talent, etc. The main purpose is to get people started writing.

There will be feed-back from the other participants, but only positive feed-back is permitted…no criticism at all.

I find that a very interesting concept, and a course that I would wholeheartedly recommend to those who are interested in learning to write for the sheer pleasure it can give a person.

If I find similar courses in English I will add the information here.

Someone sent me a link to “Audio Thrillers” and there I could read the following: “Audio Thrillers take Audio Books to the next level. A first of its kind Media offering in the world.” You can check it yourself here.

But I kind of wonder…isn’t that the same thing as the Radio Theater that I remember from my youth? Made very memorable by Orson Welles and the “War of the worlds”

I should warn you though. They want your money to produce the audio material for you…they will not accept anything you produce on your own for their site. Perhaps a smart business idea…but to produce such material on your own could be possible.

I do find it interesting and something that could add another dimension to Audio Book production – especially Adult Material…:-)

 Tony Schwartz (President of The Energy Project, Author of The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working) has an interesting article “The Death of Depth: Less and Less of More and More” on the Huffington Post. You can read the full article here.

It gives an insight into the present “time” of short messages, headline reading, Twitter and blogging… often to the detriment of reading more in-depth analysis of various topics. The “fast-food” as it applies to reading.

To me it was an eye opener as I often “skim through” the material that I have to read. Useful in my profession as a writer, but less useful when I set out to learn something.

My method for serious reading is often a quick read-through (the “skimming”) and when I have determined the usefulnes of the information I give it a better and more thorough read. I also use the “serious” reading to take notes, underline text or – in the case of digital PDF files – make annotations both as highlights and as inserted notes.

Valuable texts I file away as “resource” files and I often return to them for additional information.

I like the PDF files as they permit me to do a search of all the documents in a given resource file.

I am too old to rock, but I can still drool…:-)

I came across this interesting blog after seeing that the owner had started to follow us on Twitter. I checked up her website and found it very interesting with many articles that I could relate to. Very well worth reading in other words. You can access it here.

The blog “Paperback writer” have a very interesting article that you can access here.

It gives some thoughts about how our different “brain personalities” can affect our writing. I for one am

When writing for pleasure I am sure that we, for the most part, use the right part of the brain…the creative side…the left brain kicks in when you are editing your work…:-)

Another blog article that I recently found via a Twitter tips, “How Writing Can Be Like Great Sex: 17 Hot Tips”.

This excellent article on the blog “Writetodone” describes how fun it can be when the writing comes easily and from the heart…or mind…or from your muse…it is what writing for pleasure is all about. You can read the article here.

Don’t miss reading the comments, many good items there too…and below this article there is another interesting item, the “12 Life Lessons from Warren Buffett to Being a More Compassionate Writer”

Also well worth reading. No wonder I have subscribed to this blog myself.

A friend of mine sent me a link that took me to the following life enhancing story. This had such a great impact on my own thinking that I though it well worth sharing. You can access the article here.

It is very true that we often run through life without noticing the beauty that surrounds us. I was born and raised on the county, and perhaps that helped me develop a sense of the natural beauty that surrounded me – I was (and still am) very interested in photography and that helped too.

I have had a great deal of use for this “power of observing”  the world around me in my working life. In my early career I was responsible for the operation and maintenance of rather complex installations, and knowing how easy it was to run past developing problems without seeing them, I made it a routine to take a leisurely stroll through the plant at regular intervals – with the sole purpose of looking at things around me.

It always amazed me how many developing problems I could identify when I concentrated on looking at the equipment in my care. I always noted down the problems I had identified and could then attend to them when time permitted.

To develop an appreciation for the world around you will help you in your writing, and it is something that should be developed as part of your journal writing.