Every writer has been there—staring at a blinking cursor on a page, straining to find the words. Sometimes writing feels like a breeze, as if you’re simply riding the wave of your thoughts, and words pour out onto the page almost effortlessly. But other times, it seems like no matter how hard you try, you can’t seem to find the words. Here are some ideas to help inspire and get yourself out of that writing slump. Turn off your inner perfectionist It can be tempting to try to edit yourself as you write, but any time you’re writing something new, it’s important to just get your thoughts and ideas down on paper first. You can always go back and find that perfect word later; don’t get stuck on it. It’s not going to be perfect the first time around, and that’s okay! First drafts are always messy. Give yourself grace. Don’t compare yourself to others and especially not to the writing of published authors whose work has gone through multiple rounds of editing and polishing. Rediscover your inspiration Go back and read your first chapter or synopsis. What made you excited to write your current project in the first place? Much like a hook might work for a reader, sometimes you can hook yourself back into your own idea and rediscover what inspired you to write. Read There’s nothing quite like reading to help exercise your imagination. Even if what you read has nothing to do with your current writing…

If you seek traditional publication for your book manuscript, then it is incumbent upon you to obtain copyright permissions for any text or images which are not original. The book will not go to print until every written permission has been secured. Because publishing is a for-profit venture, an author cannot include the copyrighted work of others without permission and it is not covered under the “Fair Use” provisions given to non-profits under the U.S. Copyright Law. Using a two or three sentence quote and providing proper attribution to the published source does not require copyright permission. If, however, you use two or three lines from a poem then you must get written authorization to include the words. More than a paragraph or two from a scholarly text, or an instrument or diagram or table or whatever it is you want to include, be sure you check copyright. To find out who the copyright holder of a piece of textual intellectual property, look to the original source of publication. Find the publisher and go their website and search for their site for Copyright Permissions. For example, if the quote you want to use comes from a book published by Penguin Random House, you would enter the search terms “copyright permissions Penguin Random House” to find the link to permissions.penguinrandomhouse.com. Most major publishers have online request forms. If there is no online request form, ask your publisher if they have a form letter to submit to gain copyright permissions. If they…

When I was a teenager, I was a little hurt when my mother commented that I was a daydreamer, as in “just a daydreamer.” Apparently I spent more time than my siblings sitting and staring off into space. If I were Catholic, I would carry a bit of guilt for daydreaming, but my mother gave me Buddhism, from which I learned that reflecting on things is not much different than daydreaming. In daydreaming, the controlling mind relaxes. There is no striving towards problem solving, but rather a contemplation of the options. However, as Erik Mueller says in Daydreaming in Humans and Machines, “…when one sees a cat, one is not overwhelmed with every idea and experience associated in some way with cats…” Even daydreaming can be selective. You don’t have to worry about your mind becoming so relaxed that random unrelated images bombard you. In random daydreaming, a person’s thought usually turn to fantasies about people, on whatever emotional issues with them are most urgent at the time. But it is also possible to daydream with an indirect focus. One can go into a daydreaming mode with a particular idea in mind. It is akin to solo brainstorming, and also shares some similarity with mindful meditation, which has been described as “paying attention in a particular way” by Jon Kabat Zinn, a longtime Buddhist teacher. It is also a technique used to help interpret one’s dreams. Night-time dreams have been known to offer profound truths, such as when Watson and…