I love this picture. Looking at it brings back nothing but positive memories. Sometimes part of my therapy is to exercise near a basketball net. Starting out with a few bank shots under the net with a gradual increase in distance. When I reach free throw distance I might stand at “the line” for several minutes and try ten or twenty shorts. Just to see if I still have any range. Gradually, I might get further out to “three-point distance” and take several long shots. When I played some ball on the painted courts, there was nothing more rewarding to me than making a shot from long distance.

This week in between writing work for clients I’ve found myself attempting to assemble the hundreds of pages of notes that are everywhere in order to see what they can become. I’ve realized I may never keep up with the lot of it. For example, I took a line about learning to cook as a simple act of survival and it ended up becoming an essay-styled piece of nearly a thousand words. Saved it for a potential submission down the road.

The very next line in the same page was “old hockey photos”. By chance, I just located a team photo of my first year of hockey as a kid. This multiplied into a piece about the photo combined with some early hockey memories. I touched on how the game has changed, how we had to wear a horrid amount of equipment and things like that.

I’m going somewhere with this. It’s good to be busy with writing. I have a daily need to work and observe my thoughts about the craft and trade. Even if I do not get to the page or screen I can still be working by just the virtue of planning to work. Mindfully.

Whether you are working on client project or your own stuff, it is damn good to be working. If you have notebook pages of ideas kicking around, I recommend finding a few minutes each day and spend the time developing content around those ideas. They do not have to be perfect of course. Give yourself some credit and allow yourself to just be in the moment of developing the content. Working the words and writing out your thoughts on that one ideas. Keep writing on those notebook pages. Keep taking notes on your phone if that works. I am doing both these days. You will never run out of work. A single thought can multiply into longer pieces which could become easy standbys for submissions to potential clients.

@WriterDann