Thursday, March 1, 2018

SOL 1/31: Room at the Table for Planners and Pantsers and Everyone in Between

Today I join my fellow bloggers in "serving up a slice" 
to the March Slice of Life Story Challenge  community.
Thanks to Stacey, Betsy, Beth, Kathleen, Deb, Melanie, and Lanny
 for hosting this meeting place each day in March
and for nurturing our writing lives.

As a charter member of Procrastinator's Anonymous (not really), I've been concerned about the plethora of posts that have appeared recently touting the benefits of planning ahead for our month of writing. I am here to speak to those who have not set up their posts for each day, who have not made a list of possible topics, and who have not written several posts in advance. This is my seventh year to participate, and I've never had a single post written ahead of time. I recognize that many individuals need/want this kind of advance planning, but rest assured that this challenge is possible even for the disorganized and least prepared among us! I wrote this acrostic to encourage the pantsers* in our midst! 

Rather than feel discouraged by the
Ones who are
Organized  and prepped for a
Month of slicing,

A fellow pantser* encourages you
To embrace your own style,

To remember that
Having any small thing to write about is
Enough to create a slice of life,

To provide reassurance that you will find topics and inspiration for              writing
Astounding yourself every day for thirty-one days.
Be open to the moments in your own life, and
Linger in the slices of fellow bloggers who will
Enliven your own writing and provide support for your March journey. 

(* a last minute, write by the seat of your pants slicer)

The idea of planners and pantsers was presented last year along with a badge to post on our blogs for each style of writing. I wrote A Meditation on Badges to posit that some of us fall in between and qualify as plantsers!

No matter where you fall on this continuum between those who plan and those who fly by the seat of your pants, here's to a delightful month of writing. March forward, slicer friends!

16 comments:

  1. It's my fifth year and I'm a pantser too. I enjoyed the encouraging poem! Happy slicing!

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  2. Yeah! Thanks for standing up for us!! Let’s have another great March! We’ll even live the planners!

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  3. Love the planners... and all writers.

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  4. Totally, totally, totally a pantser. One year I did make a list of 31 topics. And I think I used two of them. We can do this! And I love your anacrostic. So perfect for so many of us!

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  5. Thank you for making room at the table for this fellow pantster in year six! There are mornings during March that I wake up praying for the Muse to hit me hard as I walk the hallway to the study to write. LOVE this post, bookmarking it!

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  6. Im with you Ramona. Just let it rip!!!!! Good to see you here in the am.
    Bonnie

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  7. Love it! Thank you! You wrote my sentiments exactly. We can do this again.

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  8. Love the poem. I'm a middle of the roader. Although I do set my pages up ahead of time, I have no clue what I will write about each day. I do have lots of ideas in my writers notebook though :) . Here's to the month of March no matter how you do it!

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  9. You make me laugh! I absolutely love the format of your poem! I cannot have a blank slate for writing. Something has to be written, jotted, noted first. Then I can use that nudge when life is mundane.

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  10. Great acrostic. I must be a "planster"-- I do plan and then I wing it within the plan and sometimes outside the plan. Here's to 30 more slices!

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  11. As a member of Procrastinator club whose time is always running away from her, Thank YOU for your post.

    I thought of prewriting the posts but there are so many things in everyday, so I will be just like you writing each day. Added benefit- I will get into habit of writing each day. YE!

    Looking forward to sharing along with you.

    Purviben
    @TrivediZiemba

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  12. Perfect! There is need for all the planners and the pantsers and the planster. I love it!

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  13. Your post is just wonderful as always! PANTSERS....yes some days taht is me!

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  14. Love your poetic take on the no planning. I came without a preparation, ready to see what stands out each day and where the words take me. Everyone chooses what works the best for them, plan or no plan.

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  15. Oh, I'm so glad you wrote this and that I read it. I feel like the biggest impact of the challenge for me is the day to day nature of it. It reminds me that those story ideas are all there, I just need to keep my eyes open. Once you start writing, the pump is primed to notice more seeds for stories. I'm definitely taking it day by day, knowing that some days are much harder than others, but trusting in the process. Thanks for a great post!

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  16. I love the new term - planster? That is me as I create the template and set up my slices. I have ideas and old standbys and I have one or two in the cannon ready to go...just in case! But in all honesty, I typically wait until a slice finds me. Great poem! Happy March, Ramona!

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