HARVESTING THE BUZZ

There are moments in life that are just so amazing they leave you with a buzz, that feeling you're on fire and everything is right with the world. For writers, especially those starting out, those moments can be few and far between. It's important to make the most of them, to use them to help keep you going through the lean times. But how?

I went up to London yesterday for a general meeting with a production company whose dramas I've been a fan of for many years. The meeting went extremely well. On the way home I was worried the high I was experiencing would evaporate after a few hours and the motivation it created would be diminished. I began to wonder if there was a way to harvest the buzz I was feeling to use another day when the doldrums were upon me. In the past, I've kept a feedback folder, where I used to put all those lovely emails of praise to refer to when I needed. I have no idea where it is today, probably somewhere in the black hole that is my office cupboard, tucked somewhere at the back and now home to a family of spiders.

So what could I do? It was an idea of my wife's that helped to provide the solution.

A jar full of goodness.

A couple of years ago my wife Susie told me about an idea called the Gratitude Jar. She kept a jar in the kitchen and instructed me and the boys to write down anything that happened that we were grateful for and put it in the jar. Then on New Years Day we would open the jar and reflect on all the great things that had happened to us as a family over the previous twelve months. But as usual with these things we did it for a few weeks and eventually forgot about it.

As the South-West train zoomed through the countryside to Poole I thought, "Why can't I use a Gratitude Jar to keep a track of all my highs as a writer, so they're there when I need them the most?" So I've nicked one of my wife's empty jars she was saving up to make jam with and I've put it on my desk where it will be in view every time I sit down to work. When something good happens I'll write it down on a Post-it Note and pop it in the jar. By the picture, you can probably tell there are three BUZZes in there already. January is already proving to be an awesome month.

The next time I'm in a slump I'm going to grab that jar, pulls out some of those BUZZes, read them and perk myself up. You might like to try it too.

Happy writing!