Editing hurts. Yes. It hurts when someone cuts your words, rearranges your sentences, deletes your creative use of language, etc. It hurts. The first thing a writer has to do is leave their ego at the door. Most writers write with passion and passion doesn't always reflect good grammar or proper use of punctuation. I recently edited for the CEO of a large corporation. She was taken aback by my edits and questioned if she wanted someone cutting her writing up like I did. But, while she might be a great CEO, her grammar, word choices and sentence structure were lacking. Most people, when writing with passion, give little thought to how their words are put together. The words spill out with feeling while grammar is laid aside. And that's ok. That's actually how it should be. We should write with passion.....then hire a good editor to make our points flow well and be cohesive. We editors make your passion shine by clothing your writing in easy-to-read prose with good ...

This half-hour long video of Taylor Swift meeting with some young kids discussing reading and writing is filled with sound advice for any writer of any genre. Taylor partnered with Scholastic to provide 25,000 new books for NYC schools. Taylor then donated her time to do this webcast with these great kids. This webcast is worth every minute of it's short 30-minute length and I highly suggest all writers listen to and watch the video .  A few of my favorite quotes from the webcast are: "Journaling is what made me discover that I loved poetry and poetry is so close to song writing in concept." "Writing your feelings down simplifies them." "If you make writing something you look forward to, who knows where it will take you?  Who knows if you'll start to think about story lines and you'll decide that you want to write a book someday?" "There are so many things you can discover about yourself if you write." ...

Do you have a plan for your writing? Did you write it down? One key point I tell my writing students is to have a written plan, much like a business plan, for their writing. A written plan is so important. In my soon-to-be-published revised edition of my writing book, I go into more detail about this. In a nutshell, this graphic explains why you need a written plan: There's power in writing something down. Writing it down makes it real and tangible. You can reread it. You can use it to keep you on track. A written goal is more viable. It grows from an idea to a possibility then a reality. Write often. Write well. Just write. ~Tricia

I recently met a woman with a story to tell. She found out I'm a writer and began to tell me her story, in a nutshell, and said she'd like to write a book about her story one day. Her story is interesting and intriguing. I asked, "Why not now?" She said she was going to wait till her children were out of college and didn't need her so much. Then I dropped a bombshell on her. I said, "It's too late to wait, you've already started," and when she looked at me in surprise, I explained that the thinking process of any book, article or blog post is part of the writing process. Yes, it's too late to wait; you've already started if you are so much as thinking about writing a book. Write often. Write well. Just write. ~Tricia

Everyone writes, every day. Whether it's a Facebook status update, a tweet on twitter, a blog, a thank-you note, a recipe or a list, everyone I know writes and they do it daily. Did you know that writing for publication is different than any of this other writing? Writing for publication is different because you are suddenly writing for someone else, not just yourself. You switch from simply getting your point across or your information shared to making it sell, and that's an entirely different ball game. Learn how to write for publication with my e-book , Write, Then Publish. Today . You will learn why writing for publication is different and the steps you can take to make your writing appealing to publishers or e-readers. Click here to download the book today! Write often. Write well. Just write. ~Tricia

Do you learn something as a writer every single day? I try to. I subscribe to a number of writing blogs as well as writing websites and try to learn from these other authors every day as part of my overall business plan. Today, I found this article, 5 Mistakes I've Made in Writing by Frank Viola to be very helpful as well as familiar. I've taught these things in my writing workshops and seminars. Read the article and learn what Frank Viola, and I, have learned from decades of being writers. Happy Writing. ~Tricia

Jeff Goins, one of my favorite writing bloggers, calls it the 5-Draft Method . I call it revision, but it's all the same thing. If you're going to write a book, you are going to write it more than once before it's written. Even then, when you think you're finished, you will probably second guess yourself about it, wondering if this or that could have used more revision. You will ask yourself if you should have had it edited at least one more time. This side of the writing process tends to surprise people. Be not surprised. Whatever you have written will need to be revised again and again. Revise to the end. Then, before you second guess yourself out of publishing altogether, just publish it and move on to your next project. There is much writing to do. ~Tricia