day one
Are you ready? Your first prompt is:
I feel…
That’s all. Keep coming back to those two words.
You might feel happy, scared, bored.
You might feel your leg, the wool of your jumper.
You might feel like going for a walk.
The American poet, Denise Duhamel, published a book of one thousand and one different ‘I feel’ sentences!
Keep going.
Keep feeling.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day two
Much of the best writing engages the senses – what you see, taste, smell, hear and feel. A line in a poem or a novel about what something smells like, for example, takes the reader straight there. Too often we prioritise what we can see, but going all through the senses helps us to be present on the page as writers too.
You’ve two options today, either
sit where you are and write about what you see, smell, hear, taste, feel right now. Keep going for six minutes OR
read What Does Happiness Look Like by Carol Ann Duffy. Your prompt is to write a picture like this for today.
Start with what today looks like… tastes like… etc. Be as imaginative as you dare. Does today look like a nun waiting at a bus stop, sound like a fire crackling in a fire pit?
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day three
Do you remember writing your birthday wish lists for as a child? Maybe you still do! One joy is how individual these lists can be, so write your own wish list now even if it’s not your birthday, especially if it’s not! Think big, think abstract, and best of all, think of things that can’t possibly be wrapped up. It’s OK to put world peace, but maybe you’ve always hankered for your own pet elephant too? Or even just a good night’s sleep.
Let’s remember our manners though, start your six minute freewrite with ‘Please can I have..’
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day four
Today let’s move from What would you like is What do you like? Use your six minute freewrite today to reclaim all the things you like and maybe haven’t thought about for some time. For example, what were your favourite games as a child? What would you do if no one was watching, because on the page no one is. (A quick reminder here that you don’t have to show your writing to anyone, unless you really want to.)
Start with ‘Stuff I like includes…’
For inspiration, I love this cartoon by @worry__lines on the Wellcome Institute website.
As an extra, you may want to mark some of the things on your list that you haven’t thought of for ages but you’d really like to have/do/feel back in your life. What small step could you take towards making this happen?
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day five
We’ve done a lot of wanting in the last few days, so let’s do some thanking today. The Gratitude List is something you’ve probably heard about, maybe you even write your own, so you will know how powerful it can be. Let’s keep it simple.
Your prompt today is, I’m grateful for…
Keep going. Add as many things as you can think of. No harm in repeating some.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day six
I’ve sent many of the people I really love copies of Marge Piercy’s poem, To be of use.
Today, I invite you to read this poem and start your freewrite with the prompt, The people I love the best…
Keep going. Keep loving. Explore what you love about people. Make it personal. Make it as strange as you want.
If you’re feeling brave, this may be one you could send to someone who sums up everything on your list. If you can’t think of anyone who fits all the things you would love (after all, no-one is perfect), then keep it as a reminder of how YOU’D like to be for other people.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day seven
Today’s prompt is a simple one, but a classic.
Simply write from the two words, I remember…
Keep coming back to I remember… You may find only a snippet of a memory or you may spend the whole six minutes on one memory. It doesn’t matter.
If you want an extra challenge, try alternating I remember with I don’t remember.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day eight
Here’s a picture prompt for you today.
Look at this stunning portrait, Lady with an Ermine, by Leonardo da Vinci, and when you’re ready, use your six minutes to write whatever comes into your mind.
It may be a story about the ‘Lady’, it may be how the picture makes your feel, you may even want to write in the ermine’s voice.
Remember, you can’t get it wrong.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day nine
In one of my favourite childhood books, The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge, the heroine Maria is taken to Moonacre Manor to live with her mysterious Uncle Benjamin. At least though she’s wearing her favourite boots…
And the boots she had on today were calculated to raise the lowest spirits, for they were made of the softest grey leather, sewn with crystal beads round the tops, and were lined with snow-white lamb’s wool. The crystal beads, as it happened, could not be seen, because Maria’s grey silk dress and warm grey wool pelisse, also trimmed with white lamb’s wool, reached to her ankles, but she herself knew they were there, and the thought of them gave her a moral strength that can scarcely be overestimated.
Today write about your lucky pants, or your favourite colour, or that jumper that never fails to make you feel cosy. What garment do you have that is ‘calculated to raise the lowest spirits’. If you prefer, write about a fantasy garment. What magic power might it have hidden in its lining?
Start with the prompt, I am wearing…
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day ten
This poem, Weather Man by the American poet Patricia Traxler, is so poignant as a portrait of a marriage told through the man’s reaction to snow, he ‘watches the weather/like a lover’.
Write about your favourite weather.
Do you perhaps welcome rain ‘as a lover’ or is wind your best friend? Why do you like it so much? What happy memories does it bring? What does weather mean to you?
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day eleven
Today take your prompt from the line, I want to learn another language…
Be as imaginative or as realistic as you want. Maybe one of your goals is to learn French, write about why you want to? How will you do it? What will you do with your new language skills?
Or maybe you want to learn to talk in tree language. What might that sound like? Which tree would you like to speak to?
Six minutes, go…
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day twelve
Today you are going to BOAST BIG about your body.
This may not come naturally for many of us so make yourself some extra strong tea, and try to enjoy yourself on the page.
What makes your body amazing? What part of yourself are you proudest of?
You may want to listen to the wonderful Lucille Clifton read her poem, Homage to My Hips, first as inspiration.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day thirteen
Did you know that there’s a special name for someone superstitious who avoids the number 13? It’s Triskaidekaphobia. But today we’re all about good luck.
Write about a time you were – or felt – lucky. What happened, what didn’t happen?
Six minutes, go.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day fourteen
I was lucky enough to catch this ray of light during a walk through a thick wood recently and it stopped me in my tracks. I’d been so busy concentrating on how dark it’d been getting before that it felt like a metaphor.
Today has been hard-going and dark, but write about all the rays of light you’ve had.
As many as you can in six minutes. Don’t worry about repeating yourself. Try to fill the page.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day fifteen
Today I invite you to write about what you would like to achieve over the next year, but with a difference. Go on to this website, Random Word Generator, and ask for five random words.
Now this is the fun bit, because you’re going to insert them somehow into your freewrite about your goals for the year ahead.
It’ll feel clunky, maybe even silly, but it’ll stop you…
a) censoring yourself on what you can or can’t do because your critical mind will be busy fitting in the words, and/or
b) going over the old tired ground you might otherwise travel over. Heck, you might even have fun!
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day sixteen
Today’s prompt is simple but powerful.
I invite you to write from this sentence starter, If I were my own best friend (who loved me very much) I would tell myself…
And finally add a PS… my best friend is so proud of me because…
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day seventeen
When was the last time you danced, even if it’s just in your mind? Watch this clip and freewrite about anything it makes you feel, I want to dance….
You may even find yourself following the rhythm of all those taps!
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day eighteen
If you’ve been writing daily so far, congratulations! You’ve probably realised just how much you can achieve in six minutes and hopefully it’s become a habit you can take forward.
Today you’re going to think about what helps you write.
I invite you to alternate between I write best when… and I don’t write when…
You may want to break the rules and give yourself a little longer for this exercise, ten minutes perhaps? But still keep your hand moving, still don’t worry about repetitions, crossings out, handwriting or anything. Just get the words down.
That’s all. Leave it in your journal, you’re going to look at this again tomorrow.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day nineteen
Begin today by turning to your writing from yesterday and read through it, underlining anything that surprises or interests you.
Now use this to write yourself a manifesto for your future writing practice based on your discoveries.
You can look at other manifestos to get an idea of how it could work for you.
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!
day twenty
Recently I’ve been writing about deliberately ordinary things with two poet friends. We give each other a prompt every week, and these have resulted in poems about such magical objects as tomato soup, running socks and a bookmark.
Today look around your room and find the most ordinary object you can find – it may be a box of matches, or a biro, or your reading glasses (I’m looking at my own desk now!). Write about that.
You may want to concentrate on a purely physical description and try to paint it in words? Or it may pull out a memory or two for you. Don’t worry if you stray from the object, this is just your starting prompt.
Six minutes. Go!
#30everydaywords
Share your writing, thoughts, or what your daily writing practice looks like using the hashtag #30everydaywords and tag me on instagram or twitter - @sarahsalway. I’d love to see what you write!