We're delighted to welcome August McLaughlin as our inaugural guest for the WriterStrong series. She's our go-to person for healthy eating and mental balance, all of which help YOU be BrainStrong.

Please join us in welcoming August by heaping blog love on her in the comments section.

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Imagine waking up one day to a blurry world. Faces and objects you normally see clearly are indecipherable fuzz, and when you open your mouth to speak, nothing happens. Desperate to communicate, you try to reach for a pad of paper, your computer—anything. But your hands fall limp.

This is what happened to Jean-Dominique Bauby—the former editor of Elle magazine and author of the novel turned award-winning film, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. He wrote the entire book using the one action he could manage: blinking his left eye.

Yes, we writers will write our way through any storm. Take our hands, our feet, our ability to speak or see, or contaminate us with influenza and chances are, we’ll find some way. We cannot afford to lose, however, our minds.

What does the brain need? A few primary things, according to biologists, psychologists and neurologists and extensive research—exercise, glucose and sleep. For optimized function, we also require an nutritious diet.

Eating Your Way to a Healthier Brain
by August McLaughlin

1. Eat more fruits and vegetables. We hear this all the time, and for good reason.Antioxidant-rich fruits and vegetables—such as berries, citrus fruits, tomatoes and leafy greens—are associated with improved memory and overall brain function, and a reduced risk for cognitive decline.

TIP: Eat at least one serving of fruits or vegetables with breakfast and at least two servings at lunch and dinner. 1 serving = 1 cup fresh or 1/2 cup cooked

2. Swap refined grains for whole. Refined grains, like white flour and instant rice, have had up to 90 percent of their nutritional content stripped away, including nutrients the brain adores. Whole grains, such as brown rice, wild rice, whole wheat, barley, spelt and quinoa, are loaded with brain-boosting nutrients.

TIP: Each shopping trip, buy a new or different whole grain food. Prepare a batch of brown rice, quinoa or whole wheat pasta to enjoy for the next several days.

3. Don’t diet. Dieting doesn’t simply starve your body; it starves your brain. Brain cells require at least twice as much glucose as other cells in your body. Going below your calorie or carbohydrate needs can cause foggy thinking, confusion, headaches, depressive moods, anxiety and creative dullness—not to mention hungry and deprived.

TIP: Instead of fixating on weight loss, focus on eating more nutrient-dense foods (like the ones mentioned here). This boosts your nutritional and brain wellness, and makes healthy weight control a byproduct.

4. Go fish! Fish, particularly cold-water types, like salmon, halibut and sardines, are rich in omega-3 fatty acids—nutrients many Americans lack that play a vital role in brain function. Symptoms of an omega-3 deficiency include depression, mood swings, sleep problems, skin problems and poor memory. (Blech.) The American Heart Association recommends eating fish at least twice per week.

TIP: If you don’t eat fish, incorporate ground flaxseeds, canola oil and/or walnuts into your diet routinely for similar benefits.

5. Caffein-ate with caution. Moderate amounts of caffeine boosts brain function temporarily in some people. Consuming too much, however, or more than 3 cups (8-ounce cups, not Starbucks cups ;)) can offset your blood sugar and hormonal levels, lead to dependency and wreak havoc on your sleep. Caffeine can stay in your system for up to 12 hours, according to the National Sleep Foundation, and the brain is the first thing to suffer from sleep deficits.

TIP: If you gotta have your java, drink it early in the day. Switch to caffeine-free herbal tea later in the day, which provides antioxidants without the insomnia risks.

What habits do you have that rejuvenate your writing brain? Are there particular foods or habits that make you feel sluggish? Do you have any nutrition questions for August? We'd love to hear about them in the comments!

About August

August McLaughlin is a Los Angeles-based writer and author with articles featured regularly by LIVESTRONG.com, EHow Foods, ULMagazine, Healthy Aging Magazine, IAmThatGirl and more.

Before completing her first novel, In Her Shadow, August worked in the fashion, entertainment and wellness industries, wearing hats ranging from Parisian runway model to culinary coach. Considering her longstanding passion for thrillers, she wasn’t surprised when her attempt at a memoir turned quickly into a fictional tale of suspense. She is represented by John Rudolph of Dystel & Goderich Literary Management and is in the midst of completing her second novel, Beauty Complex. 

August's Blog - Savor The Storm
August on Twitter and Facebook

Writers In The Storm is starting a new series this month that we think y’all will love. In addition to our regular contributing bloggers like Kara Lennox, Shannon Donnelly and Susan Spann, we’ll be opening the door to a whole new you with this series of posts.

Many of you have expressed interest in our name.

We chose Writers in the Storm because every writer must weather the storm within –  self doubt, rejection, deadlines, and balancing our writing passion with everyday life.  Not to mention the storm raging outside - the paradigm shift in the publishing industry. It takes a lot of courage and a lot of tools to survive in this business and we want to do our part to help you be strong.

What do we mean by “strong?” 

Think about those New York Times Bestsellers on your auto-buy list. Their writing leaps off the page in technicolor. They’re almost always full of all-around awesome but usually, there’s ONE area where they particularly excel. (We took a quick poll so we could give you examples. :-) )

• Linda Howard – Sex
• Janet Evanovich – Humor
• Stephen King – Horror
• Dean Koontz – Evil
• Christine Feehan – Otherworldly
• Suzanne Collins – Tension
• Karen White – Setting
• Barbara Samuel - Characterization

Strong writing equals strong sales and there’s a ton of good habits, work and kismet that go toward the making of the strong writer. Writers In The Storm will present blogs over the next few months that target one particular facet of strong writing and really explore it, using writing examples (in the tradition of Margie Lawson) to bring the point home.

There’s a multitude of ways to be strong:

Business Strong

Perseverance Strong

Creativity Strong

Craft Strong

WriterStrong!

We’re brimming with ideas and are excited to get this party started. Our first WriterStrong guest is none other than August McLaughlin, an amazing nutritionist and health writer at LIVESTRONG.com. August will be giving us pointers on how to stay BrainStrong.

Note: Please let us know if you have a recommendation for the WriterStrong series – your feedback is always invaluable!

On Monday, we talked about your innate strengths. Please share them with us in the comments, if you didn't get the chance to do so before. We'd also love to know the areas where you'd like to be even stronger? Who are the authors on your auto-buy list? What makes them so strong??

Fae * Jenny * Laura * Sharla
Writers In The Storm Bloggers

This week, Writers In The Storm is kicking off a new series for the Fall...sort of a "Be All That You Can Be" series for writers. The inaugural post comes out on Wednesday.

In honor of this, our own Jenny Hansen gave us today's blog about discovering what you're good at and doing it!

What Are Your Strengths?

CELEBRATE THEM!

As a corporate software trainer, I’ve got to be ON each day I’m in the classroom.

It doesn’t matter whether I was up all night with a screaming baby or if my best friend and I had a fight. Nobody cares about those things when they come in for a day of Word or Excel or leadership training. They’re focused on what they need to learn and it’s my job to deliver.

There are personality types who would hate my job. They’d get tired by all that “on” business. I see it a little differently. Every day that I walk into the classroom, I know:

• All my problems get checked at the door.
• I’m going to provide a service.
• I’m going to have a fun day.
• I’ll get to see people learn, and light up over what they learn.

Do you see a trend with perks I listed above? It’s me, me, I, I. Even though it doesn’t look like it. Training is a vacation from my own busy head where I get to focus on other people. It works for me because it plays on some of my innate strengths.

Let me explain what that means.

I went to a training conference last year that changed the way I see the world, especially the creative world. The keynote presentation -- “Building a Strengths-Based Organization” -- shined light on a disturbing trend:

Society, starting with our schools and continuing through our workplace management teams, puts a mighty amount of focus on improving our weaknesses.

After hearing some speakers at that conference, I started thinking crazy thoughts....

What might happen if these organizations put the same amount of energy in developing peoples’ strengths?

What kind of mountains could we move as writers if we applied our efforts toward being stellar at the things we’re good at, rather than focusing all our energy on our “faults?”

I’m not talking about turning into a bunch of narcissists who can do no wrong. I’m talking about making it a primary goal to discover your innate strengths and spend more time playing to them.

Finding your strengths:

We did an exercise in the conference pre-session where we listed the things we were good at – we had 60 seconds to scribble them down off the top of our head. We were directed to find the skills we’d always been good at.

[Go ahead, grab a piece of paper and scribble yours down. We'll wait. Stop thinking! Just start scribbling a list of the things that are easiest for you, whether they have to do with writing or not. You can do a writing-specific one later if you want.]

Now stare at that list and be honest with yourself about how much focus you put on those talents. It's interesting to me that most people don’t “see” their innate skills as anything nifty or unusual. In other words, they don’t see their own "specialness."

Back to the conference...

The abilities people came up with were amazing – there was so much talent in that room and the majority of it was not being used the workplace, where we spend at least 50% of our waking hours. How sad is that? These abilities were being relegated to the hobby side of the fence.

I did that with my writing for years.

Just to give you an example, my innate strengths, in no particular order, were:
Writing, teaching, motivating others, doing hair and learning software.

I felt extremely lucky when I looked at my list.

Life pushed me early into a job I am uniquely suited for. Except for the “doing hair” part, my innate strengths describe the perfect software trainer. No wonder training feels so easy…it draws on at least three areas of my innate strengths, so it doesn’t feel like work.

This brings me to another worrisome trend:

I’ve noticed a disturbing trait that’s common to creative people, in this case writers. Many writers seem to think that, because they have weak areas, they're bad writers.

REALLY?

I have a question for you perfectionists:
Why is it acceptable for multiple attempts when learning to ride a bike, or dance the tango, or knit but it’s an “epic fail” to write a few books before you get good at it?

Note: Lots of first novels remain unpublished for a reason. They were practice for the other books. (If you're still in doubt, read Laura's Dust Bunny Books post.)

I don’t get why it’s expected to take years to learn a musical instrument but it’s not acceptable sit down at the writing page and have less-than-perfect prose fall from your fingertips.

It doesn’t mean you’re a slacker just because you like to do the things that come naturally to you. In fact, I’m going to take this further and issue you a challenge:

Pay attention to the things that are easy for you and try to do them more often. The easiest way to bring your “A” Game to your writing life is to play to your strengths.

In American League Baseball, they can use pinch hitters or pinch runners. Why can’t we do a little of that in our own writing groups? Here at Writers In The Storm we have:

• Pinch World Builders (Fae Rowen)
• Pinch Steamy Scene Pros (Sharla Rae)
• Pinch Description Writers (Laura Drake)
• Pinch Theme Builders (that would be me)

I've got several "writing weaknesses" that have driven me nuts for years. Until I went to this conference and got some perspective on this need for perfection.

My list of writing "weaknesses":

• I can’t write a transition to save my life. I've had it take me an entire page to get my characters from an elevator to the front door of a building. (Yeah, that was embarrassing.)
• I want to cover my eyes when my characters’ clothes come off.
• I can’t figure out how to build a space world.
• Fight scenes give me fits.
• The thought of writing a full-length novel makes me sweat.

Does this make me a crappy writer? No! It just means that my strengths lie elsewhere. I have to go to my A-Team to get my “A” Game sometimes. And that’s OK.

I want to know when the Writing Police decided that we have to be great at every single aspect of our writing.

Even though the 400 page novel makes me sweat, writing a single scene gets me all fired up. That’s the way I’m wired. Writing short is fun, and falls into the playtime category. Writing long (as in a novel) is extremely hard for me. But, since it’s a dream of mine to publish novels, I keep at it. Plus, I'm learning Scrivener which is a scene writer's nirvana.

We need to keep learning and pushing ourselves...but maybe we can all get an early start on our New Year's resolutions and stop beating ourselves up over not being stellar at everything. Deal?

What are your innate strengths? I’m not talking about the things you’ve learned to be good at. What were you always good at? Share your uniqueness in the comments section – we want to hear about it.

Happy Writing!
Jenny

p.s. One of the things I am good at is making people laugh. If you need a Monday giggle, hop over to More Cowbell where we're talking about Missed Connections. (Oh Lordy, these people are a crazy hot mess.)

About Jenny Hansen