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An Editorial Calendar - Are You Using One?

Last month, as one of the members of Lynn Terry's Elite Forum, our challenge was to create an editorial calendar for this whole upcoming year. As someone who usually writes whatever fits my mood, it was a bit daunting to suddenly become so organized. So far I've only completed the first five months, but with six blogs that is an accomplishment for me.

I post on all six sites every week at least once. Having the editorial calendar is helping me to keep up with that schedule. In the past, if I wasn't sure what to write for one of the blogs, it just didn't get updated. But with the calendar I have no excuse.

My calendar is quite general - mainly a topic I'll be writing about. Having an idea to start with helps the writing juices to get flowing. And if I want to write about something else as well, that's fine too. I use any special dates as idea starters and have a set day of the week for each blog. I've tried updating all of them on the same day and it was exhausting.

I'm also trying in 2010 to be true to my own writing voice. Not to come across as someone I'm not. That means allowing my sense of humor and my emotions to shine through what I say. After all, if I can't be me by this stage of the game, I'll never find myself. And a lost old lady is a pitiful thing I'll tell ya.

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