#Freewrite

[nanowrimo]

12 Tips for Drafting Forward During NaNoWriMo (And Beyond!)

To accomplish your big writing goals, you have to focus on drafting forward. The team over at Freewrite knows how to do that better than most! Freewrite, a 2023 NaNoWriMo sponsor, is a dedicated distraction-free drafting device designed just for writers to separate the drafting from the editing process and get words on the page. Today, the Freewrite team is here to share their top 12 tips for doing just that:

Here at Freewrite, we love when NaNoWriMo comes around, because we’re all about helping writers set their stories free. We’re big proponents of the “write now, edit later” method of writing to help writers reach writing flow and increase productivity. The goal of drafting forward (and NaNoWriMo!) is to get a first draft recorded and translate your thoughts into writing on the page.

We’re going to share the top tips we recommend to writers who want to try this method but don’t know where to start. Try these out during your next writing session to see how they help you ditch the distractions and make serious progress!

1. Save research for later. (Or start with it!)

Yes, research is important. But it can also quickly turn into a form of procrastination. Complete the bulk of your research before you start writing, or, if it’s a topic you know well, commit to doing any research after. When you’re drafting and come to a place where you need to fact-check or gather information, simply leave a note to yourself right there in the text and continue drafting. 

2. Plan well.

With a timed challenge like NaNoWriMo, it helps to plan out your daily benchmarks in order to finish on time. Consider setting a daily word count goal or making a schedule for the month so you know exactly where you stand each day. Make an outline if you’re a plotter, or if you’re a pantser, spend some time getting into the world of your story.

3. Decide you’re going to write a messy first draft.

We recommend stating it outright to yourself, or maybe writing it down on a Post-It where you can see it each day: My goal is to write a messy first draft. Embrace that imperfection so that you can write more freely!

4. Silence your inner critic.

As you write, revisit your messy first draft goal and resist the urge to critique or edit your work as you go along. Instead, concentrate on getting your thoughts down without judgment. This means not overanalyzing each sentence. Did that last sentence sound ridiculous? Who cares?! Anything goes in a messy first draft. You’ll refine and revise later!

5. Turn off your inner spell-check.

Freewrite devices have no spell-check or grammar checker for a reason. Every squiggly line is a distraction, a moment that your writing flow is broken and you have to resist going back to fix typos. Even if your eyes recognize a typo, train your brain to fix it later! Remember: we’re focusing on getting out thoughts and ideas in the first draft, not grammar.

6. Eliminate external distractions.

We’ve done the hard work for you by creating Freewrite. 😉 Now, put your phone in the other room, turn off the TV, and start writing.

7. Write quickly.

This is just another way to trick your brain into writing from that deep, creative place that can’t be reached when you’re overthinking. Strive for a flow state where you’re typing at the speed that your thoughts come to you.

8. Use placeholders.

If you can’t think of the right word or need to look up a source, just insert a placeholder and keep writing. Our favorite placeholder is “xx” because that can easily be searched in editing software later. Other people like the more straightforward “[INSERT SOMETHING FUNNY]” or “[CHECK SOURCE]”. You can fill in those gaps during the editing phase.

9. Keep moving forward.

If you encounter writer’s block or a difficult section, resist the temptation to stop and dwell on it. Skip to another part in your story and return to the challenging section later. We like to add a note to ourselves right there in the draft to remind us to come back to that spot when editing.

10. No back-tracking.

Often while drafting, a brilliant sentence will come to us. But it’s describing something we just described. What to do? Do not go back, delete the first sentence, and replace it. Simply keep writing the new sentence! These redundancies are easy to correct later.

11. Experiment.

Try different styles and approaches without judgement. You can compare and contrast and pick the best one later, during the editing stage.

12. Write!

Relish in the creative flow and the freedom of having one job to do: writing. Don’t worry about grammar or story structure. Focus on the joy of creating.

With a few tweaks in how you draft, we hope you’ll be surprised by how much you write, the creative ideas your imagination comes up with, and how much fun you have while writing.

And if you try the above rules of forward drafting, we’d love to hear your experience!

Reminder: NaNoWriMo 2023 participants are eligible for a special Freewrite offer. Find all the details here. 

#nanowrimo #fast drafting #writing #writing advice #writing tips #by nano sponsor #freewrite

[pyromotha]

Anybody wanna write a Dad!Simon & reader/oc’s kid caught playing in the snow?

Saw this on Pinterest and immediately thought of Ghost or Johnny or Price or Gaz or fUCKING ANYBODY CAUSE THIS IS ADORABLE

My lazy ass ain’t gonna write for this (as of now lmao) but the ideas open to any of the other simps on tumblr :>

#cod mw22 #cod mw2 #task force 141 #funny #meme #love #Ghost #Simon “Ghost” Riley #Price #Captain John Price #john soap mactavish #kyle garrick #Gaz #freewrite #shitpost #random #fluff #writing prompt

[moomoocowmaid]

I have made it my mission to stay active in a niche brand’s instagram comments, deterring as many people as possible from buying their product!!!

YOU WILL REGRET WHAT YOU’VE DONE TO ME!!!

HEED MY WARNING MEN, FOR THEY WILL FORSAKE YOU TOO!!!

#crazy #freaky #betrayed #astrohaus #freeewrite traveler #Freewrite #evil #literally #anti capitalism #capitalism #terrible #awful #funny #me devouring #haha #original post #lol #text post #humor #textpost #shit post #shitpost

[clementinefight]

I dreamt about you. I dreamt that you lived in the moon’s cold rooms and that whenever you extended your arms, the arms of the moon, too, extended… Until every planet nearby thought the moon was an octopus challenger, but I knew she was only your lair, the place where your eyes went white and flashed like globes of glow, and you could finally be alone.

Having stars for dinner? I don’t know why, but I can always put myself wherever you are, like we are two bodies with one set of sight. And when I use your eyes to look into the dark, I see my own eyes in the far away lawns, missing you. And when I use your hands to reach into the emptiness, I feel my own heart there, my heart straining to keep loving you.  

***

Your suitcase pushes open with cobwebs and blue wood. So, I wear a dress of cobwebs and blue wood. And my eyes are hard to see because they are under your cobwebs And blue wood. There’s a pair of brown binoculars Way down there below the frosted needles. Everything smells like a tangerine birthday cake. A scalpel, some seaweed. My name among the dislocated feathers, A tale about the Mushroom Prince written by you. Blue owls. Brine in the bedrock. Grandfather clocks and our booth at the back of the diner. All this in a photograph, all this is a brief hex of words. Navy beans, sardines, tin cans, spaghetti and impossibly long combs of grass. In the attic, blue records and little gecko bones…

As you sleep on the moon’s white flowers, I’m rolling earthside, in the dog bed, smelling the black roses left in the cemetery for you, all dried up like pinecones now; I’ll do the funniest things to keep you; I press everything they left for you into an oil worth a thousand crimsons and fry my morning pancakes in it…

It’s unfair that you went first, as I would’ve liked to hunker down in Armageddon with you. But the beach is open all the time, even with the soldiers flying; And in the waves our song plays forever, So, I splash in the waves and chew on the green music, Which land in my mouth like bars of heavy salt, And that is like time travel, Like bringing you down from space.

#freewrite

[encyclopedia-reid]

broken walls

my heart is wrapped in chains

tightly knit under lock and key

enclosed in a glass box

with a metal door

but what people can’t understand

the key is not hard to find

the key is at the door of my mind

if you only took the time to explore

he

he took a lockpick to those glass walls

to that metal door

scratched and scraped away

without a thought of the mind resting above

and the damage he would cause

he took a torch

tried to melt the metal away

with a burning intensity

that was only in his words

he showed nothing for me

gave nothing to me

except burns and scars

but you

you explored

you knocked on the door to my mind

you allowed me to let you in softly

gently

you wrapped your soul around the mess of my head

scraping the pieces back together

you found the key

and you still

still

waited

you had patience

you found the key

but you waited to explore further

you waited until

i was sure i was safe

safe from the scratches and scrapes and bruises and burns

you found the key

you unlocked me softly

you pressed your palm

to the walls of my aching heart

my heart was wrapped in chains

tightly knit

under lock and key

you opened those metal doors

brushed away the walls of glass

unwound the chains

one by one

you curled your mind around my soul

like a cat purring inside my beating heart

you opened me up again.

#poetry #lit #literature #blurb #quotes #creative writing #freewrite #writeblr #writers on tumblr #writing inspiration #writing

[vvatchword]

Freewrite Traveler versus Alphasmart Neo 2

So I have an Alphasmart Neo 2 and a Freewrite Traveler. One of these cost me about $300. The other cost me $30. And I'm about to give you a review because I love one of these things more than the other.

The Alphasmart Neo 2 is from the 00s and was used in classrooms to help kids practice typing without the distraction of a computer attached to the Internet. They come with some basic little functions like a calculator and are powered by three AAA batteries. They have eight files that can contain 10,000 words each, can copy, cut, and paste, and you can go back into the document to edit. There are no Undo or Redo functions. To transfer the files to your PC, you hook up a cable while the Alphasmart and your word processor of choice are turned on. That easy. The batteries last for-e-ver. I'm taking about years. I am on my second set of batteries and I've owned this dealio for five years or so with almost daily use. This thing cost me $30 plus s&h a few years ago. Word has gotten out about these, so they're more expensive than that these days, but not significantly so--maybe $50? You'll see some being sold for $100 or so but that's ridiculous tbh.

At the time I purchased the Alphasmart, i had already backed the Freewrite Traveler on Kickstarter for about $300. I felt pretty dumb and wondered if I would regret my choice.

As it turns out: yes. I do.

The Traveler uses the same kind of screen as a Kindle, has three files of infinite words each, is rechargeable, and can back up your work to the cloud and send your files to your email address. It's sleek, small, and exceptionally cute. I just like looking at it. But after getting it, I couldn't help but compare it to the Alphasmart, which kicks its ass every day.

Recharging sounds fine, but it runs out of juice FAST. A full day's work will knock it out; I ran out of juice anywhere from three days to three weeks, depending on how much I was using it. Inevitably there is a point you forget to recharge and wham bam fuck you ma'am, it's going to take four hours to charge now and you can't use it if it wound down to 0% while you were sleeping. It posts to the cloud, which you'd think is great--infinite words! Back it up anywhere you find free WiFi!--but to do this, you need to sign up for Postbox, a service through Freewrite, which means that if the company dies, so does the cloud feature. You can also transfer your files via the charging cable, so they thought of this, but it feels dangerous and a little disingenuous, not gonna lie.

Unlike the Alphasmart, you can't copy, cut, paste, or edit. When I say you can't edit, I mean that you can't arrow up to some previous point in the story and add or delete. The point of this feature--and it is a feature!--is to emulate typewriters and encourage first draft flow. Problem is, that's just not how I write. For $300, or whatever it's selling for now, I want to be able to use cut, copy, and paste, maybe even redo and undo, and I want to be able to go back and add extra bullshit. Also, the full-sized Freewrite has a backlight, but the Traveler does not. Why does my $300 machine not have a goddamn backlight.

The Traveler also has a hint of lag and it drives me fucking crazy. This may not be a problem for you if you hunt and peck or are a slower typist, but I type almost as fast as I think. I have gotten up to 190 wpm before. Long story short, Traveler can't keep up--but Alphasmart can!

The Alphasmart is also more comfortable to type on and takes up about as much room in a bag as the Traveler does--just lengthwise rather than width-wise, if it makes sense. The Traveler is better for a purse, perhaps, but it's just bulky enough that I sometimes found it troublesome to make room in my bags. It's about the size of a clutch when folded up.

At one point, I got caught in a rainstorm while my Alphasmart was in my backpack. The rain seeped into my backpack and ruined a book. Meanwhile the Alphasmart was like lol whatever do you feel like writing queen?

Anyway, I'm going to see if I can't sell my Freewrite. I'd rather have a second Alphasmart rofl

#alphasmart #freewrite #writing #vvatchword

[lil-miss]

GUYS GUYS GUYS

I GOT IT!!

I’M ABOUT TO BECOME A FUCKING MENACE!!!

#homestead homestuck housewife #galaxy girls iz #fic writing #freewrite #freewrite traveler

[phoenixculpa]

jenny was a friend of mine

touch a dry glove to accept

passed baton from a stone

weighing ophelia down feel-

ing that resonant programming

ultra, seeing your robotic eyes

via warmth, inebriating sil-

ence finds one less alone

than searching for dazzling

innards, jading

mr. mime a dire strait

from trying times, weathering

nothing but a game, used

to bind by console, a red

light consoling this inad-

vertent distillate, tensed

up tendon unwound last

time we embraced, long

ago to another zigzagged

patterned parlor, you ran

back and forth in a blue

dress and didn’t mind when

i joked you were mine back

then, but a friend doesn’t

laugh like fourth grade chor-

us or the greeks warbling

warning in comparative

union, front desk manager

moved from the airport to

here and misses the action,

funnily airbending perspect-

ive, a chaotic consumption

withholding the chest to

flame over exerted breaths,

knowing resilience ongoing

outdoes itself, erodes pen-

sive posture uncrestfallen

#freewrite #nonsensical #purge

[rachtiouspalmer]

Where is it, the fire within you? Is it doused by a damp self contempt? Do you leave it ragged at the station alone before dawn? Have you caged its fury, clipped its wings? Does your star burn too bright for you to sleep? Do you worship your pillow in sloth? Where are your teeth? How do you sleep? Do you draw your curtains and blame the window for not being a silver serving platter? Where is the fire in you, you harvester of the low hanging fruit? Must we follow you to the grave? Must we believe as you in lower bars and easier time? Do you rise from bed only to hunt soft landings? Is this your fate? So it may be for you. It shall not be so as mine.

#poem #poetry #poetryriot #poet #theantipoetrysociety #writerscreed #twcpoetry #poeticstories #freewrite #poets of tumblr

[dyllard]

A refugee in

Strange hearts

Backpacking

A forest of

Drifting souls

In search of

A “one”

Yet doesn’t count

His own value

Never knowing

He’d always

Be just

A half

And a void

Chasing a

Modern

Starved romance

Through the

End of economy

Where no mortgage

Fits the check

And despair

His dreams of

Youth faded

To cracked

Terracotta

Just thirsty roots

Stretching for

Wine, never finding

The truth

Only inebriated

Visions of

A slivered dream

But I travel

Alone into the dawn

I’ve caffeinated

My pain to

A jittering halt

The undeniable

Fact is

Every ugly

Broken

Bitter piece

Of a shattered

Childhood

Lives inside

This 32 year old

Frame going

Through the motions

Spending time

Chasing payments

Wearing credit like

A badge of honor

Observing outcomes

Losing fire

Desire to

Witness something real

Unapologetic life

In all it’s raw glory

Let it be present

Let it be imperfect

Let me sink into it’s

Earth like the

Molecules of a

Dying tree

Let my feet ache

Knees press on

So this spine will

Rise again

As a mountain

A ridge line

Of vertebrae

Steaming

In the morning sun

A place where

A tired wanderer

May lay

Between a crook

Of granite marrow to gaze

Upon the beauty

Of living as

It was meant

To be shared

Unyielding wonder

For the beauty

That bore us

And I will

Hold us there

In a place

We’ll think

Of often

A precipice

Against sky

Two eyes

And a full heart

One

“One” - poetry by dyllard

#poetry #poem #poems #hiking #new england #my poetry #freewrite #writers on tumblr #gay writing #gay writer #nature #nature writing

[ramblingsofnobody]

Selling my Freewrite Traveler, if anyone’s interested! Looking for £400 obo plus shipping, and comes with the felt case and a USB C charger :) Let me know if interested!

Happy to ship outside of the UK but you’d be responsible for customs/taxes etc and shipping might be a bit silly, but happy to work out a deal!

#freewrite traveler #freewrite #writing #adhd #astrohaus

[nanowrimo]

10 Tips for Fast-Drafting

Every year, we’re lucky to have great sponsors for our nonprofit events. Freewrite, a 2023 NaNo sponsor, is a dedicated distraction-free drafting device designed just for writers. Today, author Ashley Poston and the Freewrite team share some tips for completing a first draft of your novel quickly:

Hello from the Freewrite team! 👋 Here at Freewrite, we love a NaNoWriMo challenge, because we’re all about getting words on the page. We asked Author & Freewrite Ambassador Ashley Poston to share her best tips for fast-drafting and getting that first draft DONE!

No surprise, one of her secrets is her Freewrite. But what else does Ashley do to get those drafts done fast?

Here’s Ashley:

I have a confession to make: I hate drafting. It’s the bane of my existence. If I could reach into my brain and take out my story, fully-formed, and just work on the editing bit? I’d do it.

But, alas, that’s not how writing works. (Which is a real pity because I really do love editing. The way you go in with a fine-tooth comb and just torch the entire novel, then rewrite it for the third time. It’s truly majestic.)

Though after ten years, I’ve yet to figure out a way to pull a novel, fully-formed, out of my ears. So, instead, I like making the part of drafting as painless as possible… by doing the most painful, maddening, infuriating thing imaginable.

In other words: fast-drafting.

I’ve perfected the art. I can write a book in a week if I have enough caffeine and a death wish, and with these ten tips, so can you.

1. Find your characters.

Truly, the most important part of fast-drafting is knowing your characters from the outset. In a first draft, you usually find your characters in the middle of the second-to-last chapter. (Or is that just me?) So it often helps to know your characters inside and out from the start. Not only that, but know how they’d react in certain situations, know what would be on their Spotify playlist, know whether they’d have a repertoire of Your Mom jokes up their sleeve. How do they take their coffee? If faced with ten seconds to live, who would they call? Most of these questions you’ll never answer in the manuscript itself, but it’s important to know these people in your head on an intimate level.

2. Use your time(r) wisely.

Setting a timer can be a great way to increase your writing speed. Start with a short amount of time—maybe 15 minutes—and write like the wind, Bullseye! Then shake yourself out, set that timer to 15 again, and repeat. (This is SO easy on my Freewrite Traveler, because it has a feature that keeps time for you, making 15-minute sprints easy-peasy.)

3. Outline.

In addition to your characters, you really should get to know your plot, too, and a great way to do that is making an outline! There are a bunch of different tips and tricks to outlining—I personally use Susan Dennard’s 1-page Synopsis whenever I need to hash out a plot, and Rachel Aaron’s 2k to 10k Blogpost from Ye Olde 2011.

4. No distractions!

Writing is already hard enough, but it becomes almost impossible when you have a cat pronking on you every chance they get. Sometimes, life can just be that—distracting—and you can’t do anything about it. But minimize distractions wherever you can, especially if you’re sprinting. Turn off your phone! Disconnect the internet! And here is where I tell you my Freewrite has saved my butt countless times. I’m horrid at the whole “cut distractions!” bit, but with Freewrite, it’s easy as pie. It’s a lot like a typewriter, so internet? Never heard of her. iMessages? iThinkNot. It’s just you, your words, and the mounting existential dread of existence.  

5. Compression gloves. (No, seriously, especially if you write every day.)

This is gonna sound like one of those weird ones—and that’s because it is. But if you’re planning on writing every day for at least an hour, please do yourself (and your budding carpel tunnel) a favor and get some compression gloves. Learn some hand exercises. We don’t call writing fast “sprinting” for nothing.

6. Don’t look back.

It’s so easy to get caught up in trying to perfect the prologue, but this can absolutely hinder you. Take it from someone who loves to make the first chapter perfect—you never will. I promise. Instead, focus on getting your ideas down on paper and worry about editing later. I promise that sentence you didn’t like will be there when you come back to it. It’s not going anywhere. This is another area where my Freewrite helps me focus.

7. Use prompts!

Sometimes, your brain gets stuck. If you feel stuck, or in a corner, use a writing prompt to get the creative juices flowing again! Maybe you’ll never use the scene, but that’s OK. If it means you get going again? That’s what matters. 

8. Stuck? Hit the bricks! Real winners quit. But like… not forever.

Writing can be mentally draining, so it’s important to not push yourself too hard, and to take breaks when you need it. Take a walk, stretch, dance it out to ABBA—whatever helps you recharge. And then when you come back to the scene, you’re refreshed and rearing to go.

9. Chunk it up.

Breaking up your writing into smaller, manageable chunks can make drafting so much less daunting. Instead of making the goal finishing the novel, just finish the chapter. Finish this scene. Sometimes, it helps if people set a goal for a certain amount of words a day, but I find that this often just leads to burnout a lot faster. Instead of a word count, set a goal for a scene instead. Turn off the word counter. A first draft doesn’t have to hit a certain number of words—it’s called a first draft for a reason.

10. Practice makes more practice.

Like anything else you do, writing takes practice. I know I can easily hit 5k a day, but that’s because I’ve been writing professionally for a decade now. If you’re just starting out, don’t compare yourself to anyone else. (In fact, this is a great rule of thumb regardless.) Everyone writes differently, and everyone writes in their own time. No one ever asked Van Gogh how long it took him to paint sunflowers, did they? No one told Monet he was taking too long on his water lilies. Writing is an art, so let yourself enjoy it.

I hope this helps you, at least a little, write your next sexy dragon-shifter book! (Or whatever you’re working on.) Godspeed, and just remember: only you can write the idea in your head. Different writers can be given the same exact prompt, and every single story will turn out differently. Keep your eyes on your own paper, your heart full of joy, and chase that story only you can tell.

It’ll be worth it, I promise.

—Ashley

Reminder: Camp NaNoWriMo 2023 participants are eligible for a special Freewrite offer. Find all the details here. 

Ashley Poston is the New York Times and USA Today best-selling author of The Dead Romantics. After graduating from the University of South Carolina with a bachelor’s in English, she spent the last decade working in the publishing industry before deciding to pursue writing full-time. When not writing, she likes trying various arts and crafts (she’s currently addicted to building miniature rooms) and taking long walks as an excuse to listen to Dungeons & Dragons podcasts. She bides her time between South Carolina and New York, and all the bookstores between.

Top photo by Djim Loic on Unsplash  

#nanowrimo #writing #fast drafting #first draft #ashley poston #by nano sponsor #freewrite

[ramyeonpng]

It’s like when your computer somehow downloads a virus and it’s slowing processes in the background but you’re just trying to watch a Youtube video in the front and it’s not buffering because your computer is about to die.

#quotes

#computer #freewrite #freewriting #thoughts #lucy dot txt

[supertrainstationh]

I’m at a library with this thing and the Wi-Fi seems to connect but when I log into the cloud based backup system it just repeatedly asks me to enter my email.

Also this thing’s keyboard is loud enough for me to be self conscious while using it here and I press o. The keys as gently as possible.

Actually sitting at a desk and putting words into it feels nicer than I expected, especially since this has a screen that actually displays text entered in real time, unlike the other Freewrite models.

Okay time to get out my Pomera DM 100 from almost 20 years ago to actually be able to do some useful work on my next project.

#Freewrite #Freewrite alpha #Alphasmart #Astrohaus #disability tools #writing machines #word processors #tech

[graceful-stranded-thoughts]

the age of dreams

#Writer #writing #Creative #freewrite #dreams #poem #Poetry #rambling #random

[tapwrites]

Freewriting Exercise to Stretch the Writing Muscles

This exercise helps you get used to writing, and get used to not judging or editing yourself while writing, to let the words flow.

People can find it hard to get back into writing after a hiatus, or struggle to write more than a few words before they start nit-picking their work. This is even good for people who have never done creative writing before!

Start a 5 minute timer. (An easy way of doing that is searching Google for "5 minute timer" and it'll start one!)

Write. Start with a word. Then another. Keep writing, and don't stop! It doesn't have to make sense, it doesn't have to be good, no one has to see it. You can't stop writing for more than a second for any reason! No time to think! (Not sure what to write? Pick something you see and begin describing it. Or look up a short prompt and use it as the first words. Just continue the sentence!)

When the timer goes off, you're allowed to stop. But if the feeling takes you, just carry on as long as you feel like it.

If able, try handwriting instead of typing. Handwriting is slower, so your brain has more time to mull over what to write next.

When doing the exercise in a group, you could read what you've written out. As you listen to what others have written, look for good things to point out. (They'll probably only notice the bad.)

If you manage to do this once a day, you'll build up "muscle memory" of sitting down to write and actually writing for a good amount of time instead of your editor-brain interrupting.

Maybe you like what you wrote enough to edit it, or expand on it. Who knows? In one of these freewriting sessions, you may come up with some interesting ideas for your next story!

#freewriting #exercise #writing #freewrite