To All that Holds this Earth,

Sorting the burdens that weigh heavy within my mind.
Sanding down the wounds that tear at my heart.
Sifting through the depths of my weary soul.

May you shed light on the ways I have manipulated words to fit my own agenda.
May you soften the ways I can make pathways
Between “them” and “me"“.
May you remind me of the healing words I have recieved.
May you enforce protection within me against the wreckage words I have inherited.

Give me the courage to listen.
Courage to pause.
Courage to listen again.
Courage to inhale.
And then, and only then,
Give me the courage to speak.

And when my words are tempted to demean, diminish or demand,
Check my pen.
And when my emotions are tempted to explode,
Check my heart.

Steady my hands.
Steady my mind.
Steady my heart.

Steady all that propels me.
& keep me centred on all that bridges.
All that connects
And certainly
All that heals.

Welcoming a new desk to my office right as a new challenge / invitation was presenting itself was pleasant timing. A late birthday gift after years of straining my back over a desk that wasn't made for hours and hours of writing and work.

September feels like a new year for the work life and with that comes new intentions, determination and focus.

What I am carrying with me this ‘new work year’:

• Walk through open doors.

• Celebrate what has been accomplished already.

• Attend and stay open to possible ‘work’ events.

• Embrace the new direction.

• Enjoy your own creative mind.

Black text on a paper background - The Writers Safe House. A Working Writers Monthly Meet Up. Virtual.

Since closing down The Creatives in 2017, a monthly meet-up for creative and entrepreneurial-focused women, I have been on a new journey.

Finding my sea legs in what it means to be a professional writer in the media industry.

It fascinates me how my work has evolved and sharpened its focus into a documentarian and journalistic lens these past years and yet - I have been opting in on the real-life stories that find me and learning with each new project how to honour them and hold space for them.

Writers should not be limited to any one thing, but to do their best with the story in front of them.

And this brings me to where I am today,

Ready to find five other working writers who are also seeking connection and a safe house for all they are working on and journeying through.

A Working Writer

A writer who actively works and is known by their peers as a writer. (journalist, scriptwriter, playwright, songwriter, essayist, researcher, author)

Monthly meetings

With a total of six members, meetings will occur once a month for up to two hours.
A week before the meeting writers will submit no more than three pages of work to be read by the collective membership. This process is for work feedback, insight and edits are wanted on.
During the meeting members will connect, update one another on work and life and discuss the members' submissions.

*Sharing any writing is a vulnerable business. The mission of Writers Safe House is to hold space for one another and the work. To empower, uplift and be in solidarity with.
There will be no tolerance for undercutting a person’s work, devaluing an idea/project or abusing trust.

Where / When

This will be a collective decision but assumedly via Zoom.
The collective will be gracious, and understanding regarding absences but attendance will be highly expected to create and remain in solidarity.

Why

Because writers need each other.
In safe and compassionate ways.

Please email: info@byamygrace.com to apply or slide @byamygrace DM’s

I often say:

I have many projects up my sleeve.

It’s true.

At any given moment, I am shuffling between a handful of projects.

Not counting the many I have tidied up and shelved or as I like to think about the ‘they are on the back burner simmering.’
I had heard that this was a thing, but I hadn’t truly figured out how to embrace it until I realized I was doing it.

For any writer who dabbles in more than just one medium and one main project, there are many projects in various states.

Some are whims that grow long legs and start running off without me leaving me winded trying to keep up.

These are the ones you often end up seeing relatively as quick as they arrive into existence.
They are concise and already complete ideas that had been quietly processed for a long time without knowing it. Upon arrival, they land all ready to go and quickly set off.
These are fun, quick and often light-hearted meaningful ones.
Some are deep questions of the soul that slowly emerge and grow, allowing me to work on it over a long period.
These are the therapy-like ones where I often find myself weeping over them in both joy and sorrow. They are my teachers, and sometimes I think they exist for only just that, although don’t tell them I said that, for they would be sorely wounded and make a fuss.
Some are riveting and full worlds that grow legs and start running but are not marathoners and not yet sure about which way they are going.
These are the long-suffering heartbeat ones where I tend to overtime and keep hoping they will reveal something in which I may leverage it better.

No matter which one they tend to be, they exist and are in constant motion around and within me.

Projects, stories, concepts, documentaries, commentaries, essays, plays, they whir around me speaking about themselves and keeping them in their place is a bit of a job. I often find that I do more organizing of them than I’d like.

I tell them to sit still, and I’ll be back just as soon as I finish this application- and sure enough, one of them has wriggled free and having a complete meltdown because I hadn’t added this new revelation stumbled upon only yesterday.
Impatient toddlers, they all seem to me at times.

Yet,

this is the way of a writer of many mediums.

Sorting through the projects, adding a little bit here, a little bit there, sending one-off here and one-off there and realizing that one really does need a new wardrobe if it’s really to be taken out in public.

However you see your writing life and your ways of going about it all, I hope you see it.

It is a great and beautiful world full of emotions that I’d like to think we writers are the only ones who can honestly know it.

Over the summer I have been breaking a pilot episode of a new series.

The process has been equally grueling and surprising.

What started out as a simple limited series single character scope has turned into a dark and twisty tale with hooks and cliffhangers I never saw coming.

Personally, I’d like to blame my best friend.
She dangled an observation in front of me one night that had me reeling.

In fact, it had me reeling so much that the story took a 180-degree turn and has me going in a totally different direction with it.

What happens when everything you thought wasn’t what you thought at all?

A story for the ages and a story that may in fact rock my perspective for years to come.

For these write nights this coming season, I will be lighting a ‘candle’, pouring red, and letting a playlist move me into this tale.
Sometimes I may need to work from the couch, other nights I may need the privacy of my own writing room, either way…

it’s a delicious and equally nerve-wracking journey into a tale I was not expecting on weaving.

This year I was privileged to join Lynn Matheson with a project in development stage to Cynthia Knights five day crash course on creating a pitch document and a stellar logline through the PEI Screenwriters Bootcamp.

Both Lynn and I were tipped upside down with the approach Cynthia uses to the early development stages of a project.

In many ways, the information wasn’t new, and yet, that back to the basics approach that Cynthia gave us was was a game changer.

The Takeaways

• Courses with a writing/creative partner are always more fun. (built in support system)

• Spending the time reworking and truly honing a logline is a key that seemingly fundamentally simple will unlock the real story.

• Never underestimate what is beneath your ideas. You have to mine for gold.

PSA

If you have’t heard Cynthia describe the goals and intention of a logline, I highly suggest you find a way to get it straight from her.

In late 2020 I ended up riffing a pilot episode idea with my husband as we were getting ready for bed.

The more we talked, the more we got excited about the idea. Within minutes of showering, nightly skin-care routine, and plugging in our iPhones, it felt like an opening scene was taking shape.

I ended up writing that scene to humour him and myself.

I let him read it over Christmas break.

Cut to the new year, and I knew I wanted to work on this concept more, but how?

I had other projects to attend to.

So we decided to set a goal of a specific page number a week.

It has been a rewarding and fun experience.

He gets to read and enjoy the development process of making something from nothing once a week, and I get to have a specific type of accountability that keeps me current with my goals.

In this, it’s not about perfection, but about the progress and attempt to continue the narrative.

Who knows where this one will lead us, but it’s connecting us in something I am working on. It’s an enjoyable and challenging diversion that grows me and, it gives us something to discuss that is more than just “what’s the next chore that needs to be tackled?”

As 2020 came to a close I began to feel a desire to well up within me.

She was whispering to me from a drawer.

I put on music to drown her out. I tried distracting myself with meetings, with the trappings of Christmas and the approaching new year to ignore her.

I caught myself thinking about the last time we sat across from each other.

Humilation, tears, disappointment and misunderstandings.

A gulf between us.

The louder I tried to turn up my world, the more persistent she has become from her spot in that filing cabinet drawer.

This is the way it is with projects and their creator. They don’t just come easily. They are an investment and sometimes they mean more to you than you’d like to admit.

Like an ex-lover who proved to be someone who couldn’t stick around when times got tough. Who just couldn’t explain themselves honestly and true enough for the world or you to understand them. They disappeared in the fog and stayed there while you floundered trying to fill a void.

It’s a bit like this for me and her.

We needed each other and then when I thought it was our time, she made herself scarce.

So I slipped her into a big fat file folder where she has been sitting and almost busting out of and for some reason she is choosing now to make noise about it.

This year, of 2021 to raise her voice and try to come back to me, in some strange and unknown format.

I am not sure whether I should serve tea when we meet again, or perhaps I should just uncork a wine bottle and pretend to have forgotten the glasses. See how she manages that.

Should I play Kanye West rap or Taylor Swift’s folklore?

Should I wear a revenge dress like Diana or just show up in sweats like Meredith Grey?

You might laugh at this. You might even call me fickle, but the truth is,

she was something. She was my proof that I understood the pulse of the creative world and to meet with her again, to look her in the eyes, means I have to open myself up to possibly see that she isn’t as perfect as I have remembered or that maybe we weren’t supposed to go the distance and that is that.

But there she is, making a fuss about being relegated to a file in a cabinet.

So off I go…

I think I’ll wear my oversized sweater and let my hair down.

Entering 2021, there was a strong rising up in me to embrace the growth and shifts that had occurred in 2020, not with a rebellion, but with a spirit of quiet confidence.

Much has shifted in the personal and professional aspects of life this year that it seems the only way to continue is to merely that: continue.

Sometimes one needs a shakeup, and other times, one needs to allow the growth from before to allow the next wave of change and progression to continue.

Flow

noun 1 [in singular] the action or fact of moving along in a steady, continuous stream: the flow of water into the pond.

I have recently come into an awareness of how to harness my daily rhythms to allow me to work more openly and efficiently. Starting work at six o'clock am, getting the bulk of my tasks down first thing to free up my mind for any lingering or surprising tasks/events has allowed me the creative space to be innovative in my work.

It's easy to get caught up with the busywork. Scrolling on social media, answering emails and falling down rabbit holes when researching.

Embracing the idea that I can plan my days to flow in a natural way instead of trying to cram every second with a to-do list and inevitably numbing my mind with scrolling as breaks that were inefficient methods of pretending productivity was a game-changer.

The questions I keep coming back to:

How can I harness this new awareness?

How can I not lose what I have learned?

How can I go into a new year and not forget?

And there it came.

The concept of flow.

That you can go from one thing to another with a steady and continuous movement. That it doesn't need to crash or bang, or even shout. That it can be as simple and beautiful as the quiet confidence of moving from one year to the next.

Throughout this new year, I hope to continue the work I have begun. To push projects into production and to the writers' rooms, be them physical or virtual.

I will remember the rest that is required when working hard to create and collaborate. I will set up boundaries to keep myself from getting distracted with the mindless busywork that seeks to distract me, like fast food.

I will remember that to create is to also allow the concept of flow to produce a rhythm that is as sustainable as it is in motion.

at Lightfoot and Wolfville, Nova Scotia

Over the past few years, I have been working on a writing project and although I am by no means ready to share it publicly I can say that the heart of it is woven into everything I am and do.

It’s about what one does with a calling.

And how a calling generally doesn’t just come up out of nowhere.

It is asked for to some degree, and then in some way, shape or form, it is provided in a small way.

Something to create. Something to cultivate.

How do we tend to what we are given?

How do we create space for what something needs to be.

Like raising a child.

Or growing a garden.

It takes work.

It takes time and space.

Space to step back, take in all that it is becoming and trim and refine the edges.

To hem in where needed and to let go wild when possible.

This is the creative journey,

It is also the soul journey.

I am interested in that.

What it means to become.

There are many ‘becomes’.

We are not just one layer, but many layers.

We make choices of how we become.

I’d like to think that the years of cultivating and creating has been working to develop and ‘become’ a better version of me.

A version that will produce not just once, but over a lifetime.

A version of me that has roots deep down and brings out the best in others.

A version of me that can weather the storms and shine bright in the sun.

It takes work.

It takes vulnerability.

& this is why I share these thoughts.

I share because I know I am finding the heart of something in all of this private writing and sharing with a select few talented writers.

Thanks to Screen Nova Scotia, I was able to attend Media Xchanges Storytelling for Screenwriters workshop series with John Yorke.

An honour to be allowed to learn and dig deeper into my storytelling skillset. Something I have been seeking the next right opportunity to grow professionally. This turned out to be exactly what I needed.

What I’ve learned so far…

I learned to think more in-depth into the structural dynamics of the typical story/screenplay. Many screenwriters and writers, in general, have structures they apply to their work or writing. Three acts, five acts, beat sheets. All commonly used methods of mapping out a story. In this course, we explored not just a five-act structure but the deeper meanings and intentions behind why a structure can boost a story.

We saw this practically through examples and by applying it ourselves to commonly known work and creating our interpretation of a plot in group work. I was amazed by the joy and camaraderie I felt in the group work.

It was apparent everyone was happy to use their creative skill sets, bounce off ideas and work together. Seeing that collaboration is something I need to find and seek out more often. It's easy as a writer/creator to stay insular, but these moments of collaboration remind you why you do what you do.

To connect, share and find meaning. It's what drives storytellers.

How I am processing it & what I hope to work on in the next month…

John Yorke's Roadmap to Change structure technique was a mind-shift for me. You can know things intuitively, but having the words for them is also essential. That is something that I hope to hone in on and practice more in my craft over the next month and beyond. I believe I have a knack and skill set for a story, but I have lacked the vernacular to discuss the weak points, the strong points and the overall elements of a story.

Gaining this skill set is a massive part of what I have needed and am excited to be growing in.

Until our next session in two weeks, I’ll be putting this knowledge to use.

Characters.

They are my catnip in the story world.

One of my goals this year is to better delve into the world of character development. It seems like a natural part of the writing world, but it is also one of those intricate parts that have no end. Only they, the characters, can reveal to you who they are and what motivates them. Just like people, this takes longer than a short chat. One needs time and a refreshing beverage between them.

In the real world, people are in constant motion.

They have their ways, and they're why's. I find that as I watch them at a distance, I can see the glimmer of childhood pain that sits there behind their own eyes. See the way they tug at their collar with a self-conscious tick. A small gesture becomes something that informs the world on a subconscious level who they are.

Characters are reflections of who we are.

They should be more than just two dimensional. What makes a character succeed outside of one single scene and into multiple scenes is how multi-faceted they are. When we treat our characters as if they are real and vulnerable people, we create not just better plots, but a platform for real and raw human quality work.

Currently, I am practicing taking my characters and working on holding them with a new reverence and understanding. I am asking them the tough questions and working to hear them differently. New. Characters, just like people, have so much they aren't telling you.

Depending on who you are, you might need to pour another cup and listen awhile longer.

We like to think that something that was made has been crafted out of genius, ease and good ol’ fashioned hard work. Often times, we view our favourite works of art, be them paintings, films, plays, broadway musicals, songs etc as something mystic, gifted and heaven sent. We view their existence in our space as something we have acquired because we are owed to have it and it should come easily into our presence. We view those who created these things as someone who works hard at their craft and sacrificed all their time and energy to make it. We also in the same token, view them as someone who chose creativity over hard work.

All of these things are true.

None of these things are true.

The truth is,

the flow of creativity comes both easy and hard. It can feel as if it’s all come out of you at once and it can also feel as if it is like trying to squeeze water out of a rock. Utterly possible and impossible at the same time.

In every creative project that I find myself in, I also find myself at war with everything else.
It’s almost laughable at how time and time again this happens.

Right now, it’s as simple as needing nine separate writing sessions to re-write a draft.
All I am wanting is nine days to do it. I could even make it work in five days if I had to.
Yet those five to nine days, of days without a child in my care, allude me and a few scant hours here and there are not the way to put forth your best work. (any true writer / creative knows, you simply can’t perform your best work the moment a countdown begins. You need, as all athletes need to do before they do anything, a warm up.)

So here I am, showing up at my desk early on a Monday morning and doing my best to fit at least one of the nine sessions in while my husband takes vacation hours to get the ‘little’ to and from pre school and hope upon hope that when he returns I will have succeeded, at least, with one of the nine sessions and that I don’t waste the precious time that we are sacrificing to honour the creative call.

Truth be told,

if I didn’t care, if I didn’t have any real desire to create good work, I wouldn’t be here. I would just say “to hell with it” and leave the ideas as ideas on the cutting room floor of my mind.

The real work is in battling the real life that tries to come against starting anything. Doing anything from noting.
The timing is never right.

So it’s do or don’t do.

And I guess I am too stubborn and intrigued to not do.

So I do.

Picture of Joan Francis Goodday Lugar in Canadian Women’s Army Corps uniform.

Finishing up the roughest of the rough draft

on this one woman show on my grandmother has me a bit shaky.

Rough drafts are exactly that. Just a ‘draft’ of what something could be and nothing smooth or connected about it. I sense the holes in the story and the places that need more refining. Yet I can also sense that it’s time to put this in the hands of those I trust most with my unedited words, concepts and a re telling on my grandmother.

Thankfully, I know that there can be joy in the sharing of the roughest of rough drafts. It’s a bit like a conversation. You pass the precious story on to hands and eyes that will tenderly yet firmly sift through the ideas, concept, movements and point out the golden threads and the rough edges that either need to be cut out, sanded or just explained better.

Humility.

This is where I let my ego take a back sit and listen.

The more I have written on my paternal grandmother, the deeper my respect goes for her and the more saddened I am not to have her in this stage of my life. What would I have learned about her now if I had known her as this version of myself? I want to kneel down by her as I used to and lean my head in close in a way that always baffled her and made her chuckle. Pat her hand and feel the well worn skin as she talked about some adventure she had as a younger woman and how ‘devilish’ she was.

She had a way of telling a story that was physical, composed and in real time. As if the memory was so close she could touch it.

It is still early days for this project but as I let go of my first draft and welcome feedback, I recognize that it’s time to loosen up the reigns and do my best to be that younger version of myself who listened to her voice, took in all her facial expressions and asked the leading questions to get the story to unfold deeper.

We grab our inspiration in various places, here is a sampling of where mine has come from:

Sarah Polley

I think it’s safe to say there is nothing that I have taken in by Sarah Polley that hasn’t moved me. Most notably, Stories We Tell and Take This Waltz. Both of these pieces, one documentary and one fiction, has left me in awe about the complexities of life. I found peace and solidarity with the concept behind ‘Take This Waltz’ as it shows the process of a woman coming to terms with her choices in life, finding out her why’s, her how’s and how maybe life is not as simple as we thought it was. Stories We Tell gave me a deep dive as a human and storyteller how perspective and personality is everything. We are marked by our families, our DNA and our circumstances, no matter how we may fight it all.

Diana Gabaldon

This year I have been quite literally taken by Diana’s Outlander Series. I have only read four out of the eight already published in the series. (apparently there is to be 10 books in total.) What grabbed me with Diana’s writing, is her ability to weave together a time travel concept into history, romance, adventure, and so many more genres. She writes her characters deeper than three dimensional and has a way of making everything mundane in a persons life an integral part of the story. You believe in the characters as much as you believe in yourself, because that is how much she is able to give you in her writing.

Maya Angelou

Although I read ‘I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings’ when I was a teenager, I fell in love with Maya’s words as I listened to her in various interviews. Interviews such as these: ‘Power of Words’, ‘Be a Rainbow in Someone Else’s Cloud’ , Best Advice Given, captivate me & still does. Her words are timeless, empowering and insightful and I turn to them when I need reminders to come back to myself, my values and my worthiness as a human. I will always hold her brevity, sincerity and intolerance for inhumanity close to my heart.

Elizabeth Gilbert

What I love about Elizabeth Gilbert is that not one of her works is remotely the same. Every book she has ever written is a complete departure from the last. It’s as if she shows up for the project and let’s it speak and if anything, the only thing that I can put my finger on about her, is that her own personal physical voice has a distinct soul to it that speaks of raw unashamed re-learned childlike abandon. My favourite of her works: ‘Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear’, ‘City of Girls’ and various of her clippings of words captured on the internet.

This short list didn’t even touch on ‘Anne Lamott, Amy Sherman-Palladino, Shonda Rhimes, The Brontë Sisters, Liv Constantine’…. it’s an endless list.

What writers or people inspire your work?

Creative writing lends itself well for me to write in the evenings.

In particular, I find there is something magical about writing in the summer evenings. The window by my desk open, allowing any small breeze to come in, a train rumbling by and shaking everything including my heart, the light dimming slowly as the summer sun relents to bed…

I light a candle, put on my twinkle lights, pour some white wine and turn on some music to enter into a state that can only be explained by writers.

If I could, I would stay in that state forever. It is a lot like bliss and ecstasy mixed with a bit of earth to meet you where your feet are. Somewhere in that state you are both high and grounded at the same time.

An excerpt from my write nights:

“Words are like rain.  They pour out of us and seek to cover the dry parts of our lives.  Like rain, words can come in a pitter patter, or a flood.  Like rain, words can be a deluge or a storm or even a simple dewy soft and tender pattern of affection.”

On set with mama. 2019

Over the past year I have been on a journey on what it means ‘for me’ to be both my daughters primary care giver and to be active in my chosen career.

What I have found thus far:

I schedule around the time with my daughter.

Before a new work week begins, I sit down and see where the windows of time will be where she is on a visit to a grandparents, will be doing activities with her father or anyone else. Then I schedule in my work after that. (notwithstanding, previously arranged meetings, appointments or filming shoots.)

I honour the work and my daughter.

There are days I would rather just kick it around the house or goof off with a friend, but I realize if I don’t show up for both my daughter and my work I become resentful to whatever has distracted or is keeping me from either.

I grow at my own right pace.

As I grew into this motherhood thing, I realized that I valued my work and wanted to grow and mature professionally in a manner that was steady, healthy and challenging in all the right ways. My pace and someone else’s pace will be different and that’s okay.

What I wish others knew

I work really hard to be present.

I give you and my life 100% of me, which is naturally just a part of who I am as a person. It also means I can drain my reserves quickly if I am not managing myself properly and keeping margin in my daily life.

I love being there for both my daughter and my work.

There is nothing that makes me happier than having a day with a meaningful activity with my daughter and getting some work done amidst it all.

I need you to reach out to me too.

I take maintaining relationships seriously, and I have realized that although I am the driving force in many relationships, I need someone else to take the drivers seat off and on.

*A Note on ‘Being Busy’ & Celebrating the Exhaustion…

There is this unfortunate celebration of the woman who is balancing everything and continues to take on more and more. We like to enjoy saying ‘look at her, she does it all!’ We don’t take the time to look at how all of those things are affecting her personal and professional life in ways that are unseen. We just see the list of tasks and roles and celebrate , like it’s a ticket to success to be run into the ground with nothing but a few hours to sleep at night.

fyi: that’s not long lasting success. That’s a fast ticket to a burn out. I won’t be boarding that train ya’ll.

Everything in stages

After spending a day story boarding her life, I took another step into the direction of writing a one woman show about my grandmother, Joan Francis Goodday Lugar by beginning that first draft.

Because of her importance in my life and the weight she carries, I have found myself caught between the urge to see this fantastic, complex and very straight forward woman characterized on stage in her many facets and the anxiety that I will get it all wrong and not serve her story properly.

I press on.

Baby steps have been taken to start taking the storyboard onto paper and I have given myself this year to meander in pulling it together. I trust that I will be able to see that final first draft by late autumn of this year and begin to hone it after.

What I see when I look at the photos of her, is a strong capable, woman who was beyond her time. She was sharp as she was tender and quippy as she was also observant.

As work and projects have shifted,

it became very clear that I needed new business cards.

Here is what blew me away about looking at past cards I have had for byamygrace until now:

Every year I become more and more who I am supposed to be.
Every year is a refinement and these little cards are a testament to the journey.

Looking at this business card I feel truly connected to what I am presenting more so than ever before.
That is me and it clearly states what I am about.

It is hard in the moment of the slog of ones own work and creative pursuits to see the story that is being woven together with every action, every day, season and year… but when you pan back and see the progression over years, you begin to see that you have been growing, changing and becoming.

It has led me to the realization that every little thing is progress and there is room for just a bit more growth in every small and simple thing we do.

*“Baby steps and short breaths. Anything is progress. You sustain my every moment.” - Steffany Gretzinger

I have a confession to make….

Up until this year I have 90% of the time written & done my work on this website / blog in real time. Meaning: you were seeing it right after I typed it up, slapped on an image, and pressed ‘publish’.

I think one of the reasons I have done this for so long, is that in the past I have had a specific writing style that I shared online that this thrived with. It was the times I was the ‘least planned’ and the most ‘unedited’ that it received the most impact and appreciation. I thought that in order for me to remain impactful I needed to remain ‘unplanned’.

& to a certain extent this remains true.

I still continue to have the most meaningful written and in person interactions when the words flow without much forethought. I write my speeches that way, my letters and cards that way …etc.

& yet, as life has evolved I need to learn the art of ‘batch work’ to give room for other things in my life.

Thus far I have been able to deduce this means:

Blog Writing

Setting aside half a day monthly to pre write the next months posts.

Interviewing

Interviewing at least 3 people a session rather than one at a time.

This will hopefully provide me with more time to play in my creative writing projects that aren’t seen here…and allow me some much needed breathing room in my personal / professional life.

*this post is vastly inspired by Jenna Kutcher’s Goal Digger podcast various ‘kicks in the butt’ regarding all things ‘batch work’.