Writers! Ever feel like your mind is getting spammed during your busy day? Offers, requests, questions, announcements, lots coming at you while you’re trying to get your work done? As a writer, when story ideas are flowing fresh and sharp in my mind they need to be quickly set into notes and tucked into a writing notebook, else risk getting corrupted by this spam. Evernote has a great product online to help you preserve thoughts first, then store other important stuff into designated notebooks. Keeping a small physical notebook or pad and a pen is a smart backup when you’re in an area where you can’t use your smartphone or the internet. You can photograph and upload written notes into Evernote when you establish connection.

Many writers live in remote areas and/or for other reasons don’t have regular access to internet service. They’re not current with technology, relying on hand-writing their stories on paper or typing into a word processing program, with no knowledge of merging files, etc.  I’ve traveled to many remote places, myself, and scribbled on my fair share of napkins, then had to transcribe them and coordinate photos, business cards, and recorded interviews. If you’re into travel writing or other non-fiction and are still doing this, you’re punishing yourself. There are YouTube videos to clearly demonstrate how to make your job so much easier by using this technology.

Fiction writers?  A web clipper browser extension in Evernote lets you capture whole webpages into your notes – photos, links, text, et al.  If you’re imagining a character for your novel, you can find likely candidates’ pages as well as places to consider for the setting, etc, and place them right there in your story outline so you can connect emotionally. I also like Scrivener as a writing tool, but its coordination across platforms is more limited.

Once I’ve got story ideas safely stored, I can relax knowing they’re safe, then I sort out important incoming messages from the outer world and deal with them, sometimes into categorized notebooks. What’s usually left over is mind spam, which is relegated or deleted. The process feels like a nice teeth cleaning while simultaneously receiving a bank deposit. Refreshed and empowered, I’m a better writer and a more efficient person.

If mind spam has been lingering in your mental inbox, realize it can be dangerous to your creativity and productivity. Get help from today’s technology and YouTube videos that can show you how to use it. It’s exciting, fun, and worthwhile to professionalize your process. You can still keep your ratty old notebooks for nostalgia and security’s sake. If you don’t have a device to access the internet, check for a library near you.  Take your light out from under the bushel.