by Patricia Bradley, @PTBradley1
Today we celebrate the 247th birthday of the United States. For many of us we will celebrate with our families as we think about the freedoms we have. Many of us will fire up the grills or pack a picnic and go to the beach or wherever it is we like to go to get away from our everyday lives.
But if we’re under a tight deadline, some of us will even work—putting our backside in the chair and translate that story playing in our head to the computer screen. That will be me. I don’t know how many times I’ve said, “I’m not going to do this again.”
This being getting behind on my word count. The deadline is looming and now I’m under pressure to produce. Why do I do this???
Well, I’ll tell you why I do it. 1. Life gets in the way of writing. 2. I haven’t gotten in the groove of disciplining myself to write everyday…because… see #1. And that’s what it comes down to. Discipline.
Even as I let life get in the way, I know I should be exercising that discipline. So, here are a few suggestions for you…and me:
- Write first thing every morning. Make a pact with yourself to write a Nifty-350 before breakfast.
- Stay off social media or at least set a timer and when it goes off, stop reading that cute kitty meme and get back to work.
- Turn off your internet if you can’t police yourself.
- Turn off your inner editor. If you can’t there’s a great program that will help you. It’s called Most Dangerous Writing App. If you stop typing, what you’ve written will disappear, so there is a great incentive to keep writing.
- Make sure to get up every hour or so and move around. Set your timer, if you need to.
- Pray (Actually that should be first).
- Discipline. Discipline. Discipline. It’s the only way.
Now go fire up your grill and make something good for your family…and remember what the Fourth is all about. Freedom. Many lives have been given to ensure this freedom we have.
No sooner has Alexis Stone been sworn in as the interim sheriff for Russell County, Tennessee, when a serial killer dubbed the Queen’s Gambit Killer strikes again–this time in her hometown. Pearl Springs is just supposed to be a temporary stop along the way to Alex’s real dream: becoming the first female police chief of Chattanooga. But the killer’s calling card–a white pawn and a note with a chess move printed on it–cannot be ignored.
Pearl Springs chief of police Nathan Landry can’t believe that his high school sweetheart Alexis (he refuses to call her Alex) is back in town, and he can’t help wanting to protect the woman he never stopped loving. But as the danger mounts and the killer closes in, can Nathan come through on the promises he makes to himself to bring a killer to justice before it’s too late.
Patricia Bradley is the author of fifteen Inspirational Romantic Suspense books set in the South. She is the winner of a Selah award, and an Inspirational Readers’ Choice Award. She’s been the keynote speaker at several conferences where she also teaches workshops on writing fiction.
She and her two rescue kitties call Corinth, Mississippi home, and when she’s not writing, she likes to throw mud on a wheel to see what comes out.