Author: carolyncordon

If you’re a writer, who is your audience, who or what are you writing for? Writing for yourself is fine, and I’m sure for most writers, we might consider ourselves to be our first, and even main, audience.

But with our words, we have a mighty tool, words can change minds, can strengthen commitments, can bring about good things being done!

Do you have something that you feel passionately about, but are saddened because we feel you’re too small to do anything about it? Well you’re not too small, You have a voice, and your pen is mightier than the sword – so use it for good purposes!

Local papers accept letters to the editor, and will sometimes also accept well written articles – get the facts, and quotes from the experts, and tell your community all about what you’re passionate about, that you feel needs something done.

Gather your community to your cause, and you CAN make changes for the better! One person, with a crowd of like-minded others and with a voice, and the power to vote, you will become so much more than just one person!

Causes are never going to be made better if no-one ever comes to their aid. Whether your cause is climate change, a debilitating illness, disadvantaged school children, habitat for disappearing wild life, or something else, if you care about it, tell people about it, use your words to make others care too!

I have Multiple Sclerosis, and I have written about this illness, how it affects me, and others, and I have done fundraising for the MS Society SA & NT as well. With my words I’ve written about how it is for me, and how others manage with it as well, and so raising awareness.

Awareness is a tool to use to bring this issue closer to the minds of people, whether medical people, potential employers, those suffering with the illness, and the general public. Increase understanding can and will lead to greater understanding, and so life can get better in many ways.

One thing people may not understand, can lead to actions taken that affect the afflicted person, where if the general public were aware, they would not take those actions. One thing could be healthy people using car parks set aside for those with a disability.

They may only be using it ‘for a couple of minutes’, but that may mean the disabled person will have to park far from the entrance, or not even being able to find a park at all. Ignorance, is no excuse. If you’re not disabled, lucky you, make the most of your abilities, and walk!

If you’re walking your dog, and it has to answer the call of Nature, pick up afterwards, or else dogs may end up being banned from public places! I pick up after my dog, not my favorite thing to do, but I’m a responsible dog owner, as all dog owners should be!

I hope by writing about poop, I encourage others to also do the right thing!

Do you wish you had the time to do the writing you want to do, but can’t, because things keep on happening, and stop you from being able to settle in and get that writing done?

Yeah, life, it just gets in the way like that doesn’t it? Or is it you lack of focus and inability to make time for the writing? I confess, I let life get in the way of my writing far more often than I should.

LIFE:
Visitors,
television,
eating,
shopping,
going to meetings.

Only one of these things will lead to more writing getting done, the rest are things that get in the way of my writing, that I supposedly really want to do.

I just don’t want it hard enough, obviously, because if it was really so important to me, I’d get on and do it! Does this sound like your life sometimes too? If you have any tricks to stay with the so called important writing I’d love to hear what works for you!

As I indicated, one of the things on my list will in fact lead to more writing getting done. That thing is going to meetings. But that only works if the meeting is the ones I have in Gawler every Thursday afternoon, my writing group meeting.

At our meeting, we report on the writing related things we’d done in the week past, and we read our homework, which will be a response to a writing prompt. And then at the meeting, we will do a writing exercise, which will involve responding to another writing prompt.

At our writing group meetings, we try to keep away from the boring ordinary day to day fluff and guff, and stick with writing related news, because we are writers/poets/bloggers, and our writing is important enough to us to get on and do it, at the group meetings, and with the homework to present there too.

If I wasn’t a member of this great group, I might not get anywhere near as much writing done, and I definitely suggest getting involved with such a group, if you want to begin to take your own writing more seriously, at least for the writing group meeting anyway. And if you can’t find such a meeting, do what I did, start a writing group, and hold the meeting yourself.

Sometimes at the beginning there were very few people there, and in fact sometimes I was the only one there, but writing always got done. Because that’s what writing groups are for, writing!

Make your Writing Group get in the way of Life for a change!

But of course, life is what gives you things to think about, and write about. The trick as I see it, is to think on life, get ideas and thoughts happening in your head, and then you’ll have a broader range of things to write about!

The image below is of my most recent poetry collection, where I touch on many of the things I’ve thought about in response to my lived life!

#poemadayfeb anthology anthology submission Art Installation blog blogging book launch books broken ankle climate change community coronavirus cosy murder mysteries cosy murder mystery covid-19 covid 19 creative writing dogs fiction haiku ideas inspiration life multiple sclerosis Nature Philosophy poetic forms poetry poetry collection poetry forms poetry prompt Public speaking self publishing sexual abuse Stoicism what to write about words write what you know Writing writing a novel writing books writing ideas writing poetry writing prompt writing prompts

Sometimes we may get a notion inside our head that we’re not good enough, that others are better than we are, and that our life is a waste – if this is the case for you, make lists, such as these:
Reasons why I am a worthwhile person
Accomplishments I’ve made in my life
My favourite beautiful things in life
Things I am grateful for

Writing these things down can lead to other thoughts and ideas about our lives, perhaps delving back into our earlier years, and with a little thinking about things, we might learn to finally forgive people (ourselves or others), for things that have happened. There are many reasons why people do, or don’t, do things, and many times, there isn’t really a reason as such, it was just a bad thing being done, or said, and the offender not realising the hurt they’d caused.

Many people never reconsider things, because they’re too bound up in the things in their own lives to think further about reactions caused by their doings, because there’s something else they have to do, or at least, they think they have to do. At such times, there won’t be time for anything beyond doing, doing, doing, no time for reflection.

As I’m aging, I’m finding more and more interest in my own doings, and thoughts, and while I don’t call myself a learned person, not it a formal education way, I do feel my thoughts are becoming wiser as I’ve matured. I’m currently middle-aged, and remembering things, forgiving myself, wondering but not blaming …

If I were to follow the ‘Writing Ideas For Those Who Need Them’, I would come up with quite long lists, because I’ve been concentrating more on such things. If you feel you only have a few things to write down on those lists, then it is definitely time for you to think further about your life, and find more things. There are always things to be grateful for, if you think about it – the sun coming up and lighting your day, nice food eaten, a cup of coffee (or tea) in the morning to begin the day, The glorious night sky on a clear evening, rainbows, and in Australia there are the gorgeous birds to be seen, even in the cities and suburbs!

And there is always someone who cares about you, at least a bit, even though you may not realise it. Some such people care because that’s their job to care, some are your relatives and they care about family even if you don’t know it. And the people you see as you go about your daily life, some of them may have good memories of times with you.

When things go well, the memory of it doesn’t always hold the attention, but the bad things almost always to – thinking about our life can help to remind us of the good times. For instance, I am right now remembering the time my year 8 High School teacher praising something I wrote at school, and while I don’t remember the exact details, the warm and fuzzy feeling of pride is still there, and I’m feeling it again!

And my beautiful things list, will always have tall trees and flowers there, but other people may have other beautiful things – a person, perhaps, or the memory of a sporting moment when everything went well. Other beautiful things for people could be animals, and I would include birds for sure, I love watching the birds around where I life.

And as the President of a successful writing group, I certainly would declare I am proud of that! And my books I’ve written, poems that hit the mark for me and for others, I’m proud of myself for that as well.

**********************

If you’re feeling a bit flat in life, these things may help to lift you, at least I hope so. If you can’t think of anything for these lists, please consider seeking help, there are so many good things in life to remember, experience, and look forward to, for each and all of us. Life is a Good Thing To Live!

That photo above, one of my own, or one of the lovely eucalyptus trees at our place, isn’t it gorgeous? Yes it definitely is, elegant and shady, home to a great many creatures, Beautiful!

Being good at writing poetry is something I can proudly claim for myself, so I do. Being able to write both rhyming and non rhyming poems, that other people have enjoyed reading, or hearing me read is a fine talent to have, in my opinion.

My abilities at keeping track on what I’m supposed to do regarding monies that come in, because of my writing, in keeping with what the government would want me to do about it – I’m absolute rubbish at that. It seems to my mind, that I make next to nothing really, from my writing, and if you balance out my earnings over a year, the figures are tiny, and not worth mentioning.

I’m not sure ‘they’ would agree with me, and to be honest, putting these words down her feel a bit dangerous – what if ‘they’ are keeping track on what I write here? I actually doubt many people actually read what I write on my blogs, apart from just a few people, and they’re not the ‘them’ I need to worry about, regarding my income.

Having this disability Support Payment is a welcome thing for sure, there is no doubt about that, but the rules are difficult to follow, often, and getting things wrong can be scary! I’m hoping things may change, with this change in government we have in Australia now, but who knows? I suppose time will tell …

I did vote for the winners for the recent Federal election for a change, so I was good at picking the winner there! If only I could do the same thing picking the winners at the harness racing! Haha, the winners there are the people who don’t gamble! And that’s me, so Yay to me for that one!

What else am I good at? Listening, I’m good at that, listening, to others talking, but also talking in an engaging and friendly way, that brings other people into my talk, so they don’t feel excluded. This is a good talent, because some people are happy to just listen, it’s more restful not having to come up with things the others with them will like to hear …

And of course, chatting with a range of people, and enticing them to talk can lead to some fascinating insights in life, that I may never have realised if I hadn’t begun the conversation …

So creative writing, and useful conversation, tick, tick, is that enough? Yeah, it is, and family and friends I love, and who love me. Trees, birds, beautiful skies to gaze up at, Life, yeah I’m good at enjoying life, for sure.

I love living in the country, and seeing sights like this, when I go somewhere!