Take a Break from Writing Copy to Just Write

“A writer is someone who writes”
– William Stafford, poet laureate

In Issue #190

Take a Break from Writing Copy to Just Write

If a writer is simply someone who writes, than I have always been a writer.

I kept a journal when I was younger as a way to endure a crazy family life. I started channeling those loose thoughts and feelings into the structure of poems and stories when I hit high school. By college I was sharing my work through reading publicly, and finally, assembling my first book-length collection of poems and stories for my thesis.

But when the need to pay all those student loans rolled around, poems weren’t an acceptable form of payment. Next came the infrastructure of being married and having children, plus the responsibility of supporting that new and growing family. Writing became a stolen, guilty pleasure. It went from a regular activity to a yearning for something I wanted to get back to later in life when I imagined time would once again expand to allow for it.

In fact, one of the reasons I love the quote above – a writer is someone who writes – is because the man credited with saying it, William Stafford, didn’t start publishing his work until he was 48 years old! But his practice of writing a poem a day enabled him to publish 60 books of collected poems, even though he got such a late start. He took his own writing seriously long before the world did.

Writer and writing teacher Pat Schneider says it best in “Writing Alone And With Others” –

“Most commitments that keep me away from my writing are masks that I put up to hide my fear and my failure to do what I need and want most to do. If my belief in my own work is strong, other commitments will adjust themselves.”

Unfortunately, until I became a copywriter and started earning my income from writing, I didn’t feel like I could call myself “a writer” – and I didn’t take my pursuit of writing very seriously. In a world where the exchange of money for goods and services defines and legitimizes every activity – being a closet poet didn’t seem to count for much.

So it wasn’t until I became a copywriter that I finally started to call myself and feel like a “legitimate” writer.

And yet, a couple years into my business – even after I was getting the big clients and making the big money – I realized I still wasn’t writing the things my soul and spirit yearned to release into the container of words.

I was a writer – but not the writer I needed to be.

Until about two years ago – when I just couldn’t hold it back another minute. The words started spilling out onto the page. And when they did, I discovered that unleashing my creativity in copywriting was much more possible when I allowed myself to take a break from writing copy and include other forms of writing into my practice.  

Even if you never had a writing practice before you started writing copy, I suggest you take one up now. Write a few warm up pages in the morning about anything that pops into your head. Keep a journal you write in every day. Collect lines of dialogue you hear in line at the supermarket or at a cafe, and use them as a launching pad for a short short story.

Free writing – writing that is done with no goal or product at the end but is just done for the fun and freedom of it – will add to your copywriting practice enormously. On your best days, it hones your writing voice, helps you write better detailed passages, and keeps the reservoir of images and observations of the world around you full and overflowing.

And on your worst days, it keeps you sane. Either way, there’s nothing to lose and plenty to gain. Start today.

Resource Referral: The Care and Feeding of the Writer Within

As copywriters, we know all about writing a finished product. But we often don’t let ourselves the luxury of just freely writing. So I thought I’d direct you to a few of my favorite books – the ones I turn to as companions in my own free writing practice.

I tend towards books that support a process, more than a product. And ones that include plenty of exercises and ways to get started. There’s nothing more intimidating than a blank page and no direction!

Here are the four books I have found the most useful in supporting my regular writing practice outside the parameters of writing copy: 

  1. The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron
  2. Writing Alone and with others by Pat Schneider
  3.  A Writer’s Book of Days by Judy Reeves
  4. Writing Down The Bones by Natalie Goldberg

Special Invitation: Join Monica in New York in September!

The type of writing I specialize in when I am not writing copy is sensual and erotic writing – no, not Penthouse letters style! (Although if that’s your thing, I hear it pays well ).

I enjoy exploring more deeply the kind of topics and experiences most people keep private – and giving a voice to this very natural, very core part of the human experience. It has been very freeing for me personally. And as I’ve shared my work more openly with others, I’ve discovered that putting a voice to sensual experience – whether fact or fiction or some combination of the two, as is often the case – can have a powerful and profound impact on your entire life.

Not to mention, it’s hot, and a heck of a lot of fun!

If this kind of writing interests you – or you are already exploring it yourself – I hope you’ll consider joining me in New York City next month for my new workshop, Sexpressions: Exploring Sensual and Erotic Writing. Check it out!

(And if this is an area you would like to explore to the point of getting published, there is a bonus session with one of the top writers in the biz – click here to find out more details and register.)

If you read the workshop description, and you’re still not sure if it’s for you, drop me a line at mday@monicaday.com and we’ll chat.

In the meantime, happy writing!