QWERTY Writing Life Podcast

To close out this three-part series on Realistic Creatives, authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith recap what they’ve learned and shared so far in order to answer one final practical question: “How can we alter our mindset to be a Realistic Creative … without wrecking our Dreamer status?” Listen in to a previous episode mentioned in this show: Season 1, Episode 35, Goal Planning with 2020 Vision,...

Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith continue a three-part series on Realistic Creatives. In this second episode, they identify a few characteristics of who Realistic Creatives are not. Check out the links we mentioned in the show: Writing with Maggie Stiefvater Course Season 2, Episode 4: Getting the Most from Creative Instruction, Part 1 If you want to stay in the know and help influence futur...

Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith begin a three-part series on Realistic Creatives. In this episode, they set a foundation for the topic and identify a few characteristics of who Realistic Creatives are. Check out these previous episodes that inspired the Realistic Creatives series: Season 2, Episode 38: Creative Entrepreneurship: Little Steps Every Day Season 3, Episode 2: Productivity & Eff...

Creatives talk a lot about platform and branding. We create things, but we do that for others. If we don’t have a public presence, how will those “others” find our work?   Platform and branding takes time, though, so—you guessed it—authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith are hacking this too! Listen in on a few Creative Hacks to improve efficiency for platform and branding in this final in a five-p...

Creative business owners have a unique challenge to use both right and left sides of the brain to create and then to get the product out into the world. Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith share a few Creative Hacks to improve efficiency for business. When you find ways to streamline tasks or utilize templates, you might find yourself with a little more time and/or mental capacity for the creat...

When it comes to their craft, authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith love to learn. They may not be able to be students in the traditional sense, but they can wrangle a few creative hacks in order to keep learning while improving their efficiency for craft. In this episode of QWERTY Writing Life, Joy and Mea share some hacks to deepen craft knowledge in an efficient manner. While their examples ar...

Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith take a bite out of time with another installment in their Creative Hacks series. Hear a few tips on finding Efficiency for Time. Joy and Mea share hacks that have worked for them and tips they’ve seen work for others. Check out the links mentioned in the episode: Tutorials that helped Mea cut her hair:  https://youtu.be/pkGCgg_kzcE https://youtu.be/BPS3Ts_bZV...

Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith took a deep look at what productivity and efficiency really are in the last episode. That led them to discuss Outlying Factors—those ever-changing, often evolving or unpredictable forces that somehow affect efficiency and therefore productivity. In this first in a series on Creative Hacks, Joy and Mea tackle ways to improve efficiency where Outlying Factors a...

Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith set out on a mission to understand productivity and efficiency and how to better harness each for their creative endeavors. What they discovered was that they disagreed with the common use of productivity vs. efficiency and found the conjunction “and” to be a much nicer—and more accurate—joiner. In true QWERTY style, Joy and Mea set up some QWERTY definitions...

Welcome to Season Three of QWERTY Writing Life! Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith are pumped to be back for a new season, and they’ve made several changes and additions to the QWERTY name. Listen in for the scoop, plus they’ve got some tips for you to Maximize Your Creative Time! They have found a way to do more in the same amount of time by simply reallocating and maximizing the time they al...

Join authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith for the final episode of Season Two of QWERTY Writing Life. They revisit your Top Ten favorite episodes and share their favorites as well. They let you know the highlights of their year—personally and QWERTY-ly—and close out with a tease for Season Three—yes, it’s coming! If you want to stay in the know and help influence future episodes, subscribe to th...

Culinary Manager Tony Rancatore joins his wife, author Joy E. Rancatore, to discuss Culinary Creativity and how anyone can find ways to bring creativity to the kitchen. Listen in as he shares how the kitchen allows him a creative outlet and get some tips for how it could do the same for you. Watch two of our favorite cooking shows: Beat Bobby Flay, https://www.foodnetwork.com/shows/beat-bobby-flay...

Author Joy E. Rancatore reflects on some ways others’ creative legacies have impacted her life and expounds on how she actively seeks to promote creative legacy in her own life. She shares some ways legacy has played a role in her fiction and closes out the episode with a two-part challenge for reflection and action in regards to creative legacy. Check out these important links mentioned in the ep...

Authors Kelsey Atkins and Rachael Ritchey join Joy E. Rancatore to discuss a special topic: Creativity and Motherhood. With Mother’s Day approaching in the U.S., they examine how creativity and motherhood complement one another and how children can inspire creativity in adults while adults do the same for children. Stick around for three QWERTY Challenges to send you off on a mission. Get to know...

As National Poetry Month rolls to a close, author Joy E. Rancatore considers Poetry’s Creative Effects on her life and the lives of others. She dives into some of her earliest memories that made her fall in love with the medium and analyzes some ways poetry has influenced her author life. To round out the month’s poetic emphasis, Joy reads a few of her poems. If you haven’t watched a QWERTY episod...

You may have heard of character arcs, but have you ever considered how poetry books can have arcs? Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith discuss this poetic arc through the birth of Mea’s forthcoming debut poetry book, Grief Like a River. They examine how the shift—or arc—in Mea’s personal life and her understanding of the grieving process lead to this overall theme and arc for that theme and how each ch...

Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith welcome author, poet and YouTuber extraordinaire Camille Myrick on their spring Interview with a Creative episode. They discuss the themes in Camille’s poetry and how she juggles her creative projects, all while capturing the now through poetry and process. Camille closes out with a simple but powerful QWERTY Challenge for us all. Get to know more about Camille: http...

How do you find your creative medium? In this special throwback episode of QWERTY Writing Life, we’re discussing how it took us a while to land on the one creative outlet that makes our hearts sing. We’ll send you away with a special challenge to help you find yours as well. Stay in the know about episodes, our speaking engagements and what goes on behind the microphones with our monthly QWERTY Wr...

In this throwback episode of QWERTY Writing Life, we highlight the inspiration many women have filled us with as we pay a tribute to the Creative Women of Our Past, Present and Future. They have each found creative ways to make our world a better place now and for the women of the future. Here are all the amazing links we mentioned in this episode. Talk about INSPIRATION! Article about books relat...

Are you a lifelong learner? Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith proudly claim to be, and they’re giving you four benefits to learning for life in Episode 43 of QWERTY Writing Life. Find inspiration in some quotes they found and consider how you can learn more this week. As with every QWERTY episode, you will leave this podcast with a Challenge to kickstart or continue your own learning journey....

Join authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith in Episode 42 of QWERTY Writing Life for a recap of some of what they learned from the 2021 Women in Publishing Summit. They also talk about their current challenges and works in progress and share how their “creative trinity” is looking these days. They close out with a QWERTY Challenge that will help you evaluate how your creative life is going. Stay i...

How many forms can one story take? What makes a story live and thrive in one medium but not another? Does the answer lie in the consumer of the art, in the producer of the art or in the art itself? Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith discuss some of their favorite books to movies or paintings to books to movies or movies to songs in Episode 41 of QWERTY Writing Life. Stay in the know about epis...

Humor, truth and introspection collide in Episode 40 of QWERTY Writing Life. Hear a few examples of What NOT to Say to a Writer, as authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith share some they’ve heard. They continue with a few of the many kind things they’ve been told and discuss some of the purposes behind the good, bad and ugly statements creatives often face. Subscribe to our monthly QWERTY Writing...

Life sometimes throws unexpected curve balls our way. When huge life events alter a creative’s productivity or future, what do they owe their audiences? Authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith tackle this issue in Episode 39 of QWERTY Writing Life and offer a few tips to prepare before something big happens. Visit the links mentioned in this episode: “Sharing You with the World,” QWERTY Writing Lif...

The world might make us think creative entrepreneurs are all overnight successes, but authors Joy E. Rancatore and Mea Smith set the record straight in Episode 38 of QWERTY Writing Life. With the inspiration of some entrepreneurs—including the one and only Dolly Parton—Joy and Mea discuss common themes in successful business owners and the little steps striving entrepreneurs can take every day. If...