recession and the writer

Darren Rowse over at Problogger has some tips about recession-proofing your blog.

Now, I don’t earn any income from blogging (though, full disclosure, I did sign up for the Amazon Associates program and use that when I link to books I review), but I liked that he said to not panic and stay positive. There is a lot of doom ‘n’ gloom out there; in the news, in the IRA statement I made the mistake of looking at (yikes!), floating around like miasma in the air. People are concerned and with good reason, but it’s no good obsessing over every point drop in the stock market.

For one thing, worrying kills creativity. I’m a world-class worrier, so I know this all too well. It’s something I’m vigilant about guarding against, because all it does is make me miserable over things I cannot control, a (grumpy) bear to live with, and saps the creativity right out of me. So, here are a few of my personal tips for keeping worries at bay:

Prayer. I may not be able to control my circumstances (or the stock market or the elections or the economy) but I can lay my concerns at the feet of the One who does.

Write it out. The act of writing down my worries is cathartic, it’s emptying myself off all that pent-up stress and putting it away elsewhere.

Turn off the TV. Granted, I haven’t received a TV signal in six years, so that makes it easy. *grin* But the media seems fixated on bad news (sob stories sell??) and it’s pretty easy to panic with all that doomin’ and gloomin’. I’d rather get some hot chocolate and curl up with a good fantasy (escapist) novel.

The Simple Dollar has some suggestions for remaining calm in such economically hard times.

What about you? Are you concerned about the economy? Is it affecting your writing? How do you deal with your worry?