5 Ways To Sharpen The Edge Of Your Creative Writing

Reconnecting fully with your creative Source by choosing to prioritise these crucial ingredients is one of the most powerful ways to keep your writing sharp and vibrant.
Taking regular time out from everyday life, whether it is for a short break or a longer retreat, allows you to recharge after surfing a creative wave and to gather your energy for the next creative phase.
Here are 5 ways to make the most of such an opportunity and to sharpen the edge of your creative writing at any time:
1. Understand that you need silence, stillness and space within yourself as well as in your outer environment. It is no good choosing to take some time out in peaceful surroundings if your inner chatterbox is still in full flow!
Learn to relax and still your mind as well as your body with a simple meditation technique such as observing your breathing.
The single focus will refresh you at every level and enable your words to rise up to meet the page from a deep and rich place within you.
2. Take a break from the news, on television, radio and in newspapers. In an age of information overload, you need to be discriminating about what to allow in to your mind and your heart.
Sadly, it has become the norm for the news to be predominantly about all of the pain and suffering in the world.
So take whatever action you feel is necessary to make your contribution, and then give yourself a break to focus on positive and creative information only.
3. Write a ‘Not to Do’ list as an antidote to the never-ending ‘To Do’ list. Are you constantly coming up with new ideas of what you want to write about or what you should be doing with the writing you already have?
If so, that’s fine as long as you are simultaneously letting go of anything which is no longer relevant.
Writing a ‘Not to Do’ list is a great way to simplify your ideas, clear away what is past and make way for new possibilities of creative expression.
4. Shift your awareness out of your mind and in to your body. Many writers spend a large proportion of their time working out the next twist in their current tale or how best to share a specific insight.
Valid and essential though this may be, giving your mind a break by dropping your awareness in to your body reconnects you with a sense of wholeness.
Try this by going for a walk and focus on the intricate complexity involved with the movements required to put one foot in front of the other. Breathe deeply. Then write, and notice the shift in your perspective from having a new centre of awareness.
5. Enjoy slowing down and appreciating a modest pace of life. The pace of modern life continues to accelerate as we are encouraged to pack more and more in to our already crowded schedules. Yet slowing down, even temporarily, has immensely rewarding results for writers.
Taking more time enables you to notice details which you may have missed before. It also allows you to perfect your skills of observation which provides you with the material you need to sharpen the edge of your words as they meet the page.