Hi, everyone! My name is Marisa and I am so honoured to hopefully help you pursue your love of writing!

My approach to life: follow your heart.

When I was five years old, filling notebooks with story after story, I knew that I wanted to be a writer. I wrote so many short stories when I was a kid, and then I branched out into poetry. In later elementary school years, I started writing chapter books, usually stories about kids learning helpful lessons.

- What is your earliest memory of when you became interested in writing?

- What do you like about writing?

Then, in high school, I started writing novels. I kept writing and editing them while earning my B.A. Specialized Honours in English. I was still determined to become a published author and share my stories, but I also wanted to ensure I earned regular income, so I decided to work towards becoming a magazine editor. I applied and was selected to complete a Book & Magazine Publishing certificate in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Through the program, I learned more about becoming a magazine editor while also studying the book publishing industry from the perspective of an interested writer.

- If you put aside factors and facts, what role do you want writing to play in your life? (A job? As a hobby? Both? If a job, what kind of job?)

I kept working on my books while completing four publishing internships and then started working as a writer and an editor at various digital and print publications. I've been working in publishing for more than a decade now, with experience as a freelance article writer, bilingual senior editor, magazine editor, technical writer and, most recently, UX writer.

And I'm still editing my books! It's a long process, but I've learned a lot along the way by learning about the book publishing industry in school, meeting publishing professionals, participating in writing workshops, reading books and, of course, by writing, writing and doing more writing.

Since I first started writing, some of my poems and short stories have been published. As an adult, my focus has been on publishing my novels. I'm currently editing In Your Dreams, which I (or next year, at this point. Editing, editing, editing!)

- What kind of writing do you do? What kind of writing do you want to do or want to do more of? (Poetry? Short stories? Novels? Any particular genres?)

- What do you want to do with your writing? Do you want to keep your writing private? Do you want to publish it in print or online? Do you prefer to share it privately with specific readers?

Writing is a huge part of me, but it's not all of me! My number one = my loved ones. My favourite thing to do is to spend time with the people I love. I live in Ontario, Canada, with my husband and our children, close to most of our family and friends. My favourite hobbies include writing, reading, going on nature walks, cooking, doing yoga, drinking tea and, as you now know, spending time with my loved ones. I love helping others and I hope that my writing helps to open minds, touch hearts, inspire positive change and incite laughter.

- What makes you you? What do you care most about—what matters most to you?

- What are your favourite hobbies?

- When do you typically feel happiest? What do you enjoy the most?

As outlined here, my approach to life is to follow your heart. That's why the theme of this workbook—and !—is to follow your heart and make your writing dreams come true.

- What is your writing dream?

Earlier in this exercise, we put aside "factors and facts" to talk about what role you would like writing to play. Adding those factors and facts back into the picture, what do you think you could do to get closer to that writing dream? (If you're thinking, "Uh, I'm not sure—that's why I got this workbook!" then rest assured that we will be exploring some ideas in part two of this workbook.)

My goal with this workbook is to help you connect or reconnect with your writing dreams, to address and overcome any obstacles slowing down your writing or progress being made towards your writing dream, and to help re-ignite your motivation and love of writing.

- Today's homework: think about who you are. This is something that we can still be figuring out as adults, as we continue to grow and get to know ourselves.

- Think about your writing journey—where it began, where it is now and where you want it to go.

The questions in this section were designed to help you explore those topics. Please take this time to really answer each of the questions posed here—whether in your head, out loud, on paper, on screen, or with a friend or someone you trust—even if you may feel tempted to skip ahead to day two or the "talking about actual writing" parts of this workbook.

There is some sort of magic in working through our thoughts, whether verbally or in writing. Sometimes that can help us to see something more clearly and to understand it more deeply so that we can use that information to move in a positive direction.

You're welcome to share your reflection about you and your writing journey in the comments below.

And, again, thank you again so much for joining us here! I hope this workbook helps you feel that writing and storytelling spark you're looking for.

~*~*~*

End of free preview

If you enjoy this free preview and think this workbook would be helpful, you can access it by becoming a paid subscriber to my newsletter Doing the Write Thing: https://doingthewritething.substack.com/p/workbook-start-fresh-and-reconnect.

If a subscription is outside of your budget, I understand! To help decide whether this workbook is right for you, you can review the workbook table of contents in the "Coming Soon" section of this newsletter post: https://doingthewritething.substack.com/p/writing-tip-6-read-what-you-love.

Thank you for reading, and I wish you luck on your writing journey!