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Planning for Peace by Kitty Bucholtz

December 9, 2025 by Kitty Bucholtz in category It's Worth It by Kitty Bucholtz, Writing tagged as It's Worth It, Kitty Bucholtz, menopause, organization, Perimenopause, Planning, writing

Everyone who knows me knows I’m big on planning. That’s because my brain gets all stressed out if I don’t know what’s going on, whether I have time to say yes to something, or when I’m afraid I’m missing out on something. That’s why I already know where we’re spending Christmas (with friends a few minutes away), what I’m bringing for dinner (a homemade chocolate pie, homemade cornbread, and drinks), and what I’ll be wearing (embroidered jeans, a lightweight knit shirt, and taking both a sweater and sweatpants for warmth and comfort later). All that in the first week of December! Woohooo!! And now I’m not stressed at all about Christmas. (Yup, Christmas shopping already done!)

But when it comes to still trying to balance the changes menopause is having on my brain and my energy with the goals I want to achieve in 2026…well, planning in a way that will bring me the most peace is critical. One of the things I learned is that cortisol, the stress hormone, can make menopause symptoms worse. So if I’m feeling stressed by how I’m feeling (or by how it’s keeping me from achieving my goals!), the stress actually makes the symptoms worse.

Not to mention the fact that unused cortisol (if there are no tigers to run from or I don’t walk it off quickly) gets stored as fat. Great. Talk about insults and injuries.

I bought a one-year subscription to MasterClass.com last Christmas because Halle Berry hosted a 90-minute “class” with interviews with several doctors and women going through menopause. Here I am two weeks before my subscription expires and I finally finished watching it and taking notes. There was a lot of good information in the class, but let me give you a few bullet points that fit with my topic of planning for peace.

Decluttering — I knew this was not a time-waster or procrastination technique!! But I’d let people convince me it was, and my mess has been stressing me out all year. It’s gotten to the point, I don’t even like to spend much time in my office. Several items on my to-do list now have to do with sorting papers that are currently piled everywhere, filing the important must-keep stuff in boxes I just bought, and throwing out as much as I can. I need to let go of all the old plays I wrote a million years ago…even though I don’t really want to. I never look at them, won’t use them again, and don’t have room in our small apartment to keep writing only for nostalgia’s sake. (And no, for those about to leave a comment about scanning them or taking photos, it would take me weeks to do that! I have a lot of old writing!)
Have a “launchpad” where you keep your keys, your wallet, your purse, your phone/charger, etc. I’ve never called it a launchpad, but I get the idea. I have a bowl I made in pottery class in college where I put all those things. It is so stressful when I’m rushing out the door for the train and realize one of those items did not make it to the bowl and now I have to look “everywhere” for it…because right now my brain can’t remember.
Prioritizing tasks on your list before you begin. Many days I only have a few hours of functioning brain time, so I need to be sure that if I can only get one thing done today, it’s the right thing. And if I can get 2 or 3 things done, they are things I’ll be happy or relieved got done. Much as I want to watch the last episode of The Beast in Me on Netflix to find out how it ends, that is not the best use of my limited brain-time right now! And because limited brain-time has made me perpetually behind in all my goals, when I have a good day (like today!) and can get a dozen things done, I want them to be the things I desperately needed to have done last week and the week before.
Organizational Skills Therapy — one of the doctors mentioned this and I have no idea what it is, but it sounds awesome!! I’m totally Googling it later!

So those four items are now on my list of tools I want to use to plan for peace in 2026. I have no idea what to expect next year. My brain seems to maybe be working better, but I’ve thought that in the past right before a new wave of menopause hell bowled me over. At least with these tools, I can get a few of the most important items done and choose to be satisfied with it, not stressing about what I can’t control.

I hope this is helpful for you as well! Whether you’re in need of this information or know someone you can share it with, it’s always good to have some reliable tools in your author — and life — toolkit. I hope you plan for a peaceful and joyful end of 2025 and that it spills over into all of 2026. God bless you! And Merry Christmas!

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Do You Have Time to Write? by Kitty Bucholtz

November 9, 2025 by Kitty Bucholtz in category It's Worth It by Kitty Bucholtz, Writing tagged as It's Worth It, Kitty Bucholtz, Perimenopause, time management, writing

I’ve always been one of those people who’s trying to get more done, looking for ways to be more efficient so I can do more in the same amount of time. I even taught a time management class for writers for over ten years, sharing everything I learned so people could try new ways to get more writing done. It worked delightfully well for me for years.

Until it didn’t.

Stress and burnout and perimenopause collided a few years ago, and it felt like I got hit by a train. I struggled to get writing work done while I tried to realign my health. Now on a good day, I’m working for 4-6 hours (down from 10-14 five years ago); a bad day might give me 30 minutes. It can be depressing, and that adds to the stress, which messes with my hormones, which clouds my brain even more.

But I’m still the same Kitty, wanting to share what I learn so that I can help others. So I’m writing two nonfiction books right now. One is on perimenopause and menopause for writers. I’m taking everything I’ve learned and all my resources and compiling it all, aimed at writers. I’d love to add more stories from other women writers who have gone through mental and physical health issues, especially related to menopause. Please contact me if you’d like to share your story (kitty at kittybucholtz dot com, and put “Menopause for Writers” in the subject line).

The other book is called Going the Distance: Time and Project Management for Writers. I’ve taken ten years’ worth of my lectures and broken them down into the core elements, and then I’m updating all of the material as well as adding new tips. I’ll start blogging about it soon, but I just finished the outline and I wanted to share it with you.

The 10-chapter book will include the following topics:

Chapter 1: Your Story — Looking at the successes in your past, how does your brain create the best environment for writing?
Chapter 2: Mastering Self-Talk and Cultivating Joy — Creating attitude habits that increase your creativity.
Chapter 3: Dreams, Goals, and the SMART System — Turning goals into dreams is more than just will power; it requires systems to make it happen.
Chapter 4: Prioritizing to Conquer Fear — What to do first and what to do next seems easy at the beginning of the day, but how do we keep working on what’s truly important to us while living in the real world?
Chapter 5: Finding Your Available Days — One aspect of reality is that for most of us the answer to “How many days do I have to write this year?” is not 365. So how many days do you have?
Chapter 6: Translating Goals into Word Counts — This is where we take the real number of writing days and figure out how much we can write or, vice-versa, figure out how much we need to write to hit our goal for the year.
Chapter 7: Habits and Rhythms — All of us have our good days; it’s the rest of the time that gets us down. So how can we create an environment for more good days?
Chapter 8: Flow and Energy Management — So many things can help us get more done in a shorter amount of time! We’ll look at commitment, daydreaming and white space, physical and mental health, distractions, prewriting, and more.
Chapter 9: Organizing Your Writing and Your Workspace — The crucial organization needed to avoid stress and wasted time.
Chapter 10: Progress, Rewards, and Reassessment — Sustainability is the name of the game here! What’s the perfect amount of writing work that keeps you moving forward long-term without burning you out?

If this sounds interesting and helpful to you, let me know! In my post here in December, I’ll start sharing some of my tips and ideas so you can plan for a good writing year in 2026. It’ll be worth it!

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What’s the Answer? by Kitty Bucholtz

October 9, 2025 by Kitty Bucholtz in category Writing

I’ve told you before that I’ve been struggling the last several years with my creativity. Most of it seems to be a result of changes in my hormones during perimenopause and menopause. But before that I realized I’d gotten pretty deeply mired in burnout. Slowly, my creativity has been coming back, ideas have begun to flow again, and this past month I’ve been plotting away on my next superhero book. Yay!

The ”how” is partially from balancing my hormones with hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and partially from several small things that have made a big difference. I got a scholarship to attend Author Nation last year, and it really helped energize me. There I met and decided to have a weekly check-in with some writer friends who are “more like me.” (I’m not going to try to explain the specifics; when you’re with people who get you and to whom you don’t have to explain your thinking, it’s so freeing! It really helped open the valve on my joy and creativity.)

Book cover of The Artisan Author by Johnny B Truant

That led to me backing a Kickstarter by Johnny B. Truant a couple months ago. He wrote a book called The Artisan Author: The Low-Stress, High-Quality, Fan-Focused Approach to Escaping the Publishing Rat Race based on the class he taught at Author Nation last year. (Release date November 4, 2025 – look for it!) I decided to back the level that included a 10-week college-style class based on the book. We’re just a month in and I’ve already met so many more authors who feel like I do – like, I started writing, and particularly self-publishing, so I could write my way. Then, in trying to learn how to sell books, I got caught up in all the reasons I “needed” to change this or that so that my perfect readers could find me on Amazon and other vendor sites.

I wrote a more detailed post on Substack if you’re interested. I talk about self-publishing and using your voice and standing up for others. Here is the ending to that post. I hope it gives you something to think about. It’s worth it.

YOU have more power than you realize. That’s the actual tagline. So let me encourage you to use your words. Use your power. Even if you believe the exact opposite of me, use your words. A world that becomes more and more homogenized becomes more and more unsafe for “the other.” Love isn’t just for the people like you. To Love means to take care of the widow and the orphan, the illegal immigrant and the transgendered neighbor, the politician and the farmer.

That’s how Love becomes the answer.

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Are You Contaminated? by Kitty Bucholtz

September 9, 2025 by Kitty Bucholtz in category It's Worth It by Kitty Bucholtz, Writing tagged as community, encouragement, Encouraging Words, Kitty Bucholtz, writing

This weekend I saw some friends who moved away five years ago. What a wonderful surprise! At church, one of the pastors asked them what it was like to visit after so long, and one friend said something that made me laugh.

He said, Coming to this church, you get contaminated. People are so friendly and loving and kind, it brings out those traits in you. Then we all learn and grow together.

What a great way to look at it! Getting contaminated, but in a good way! It made me think of us. Outside of church, I’ve never known such an encouraging, helpful group of people like writers. No matter what’s happening, outside or inside our community, we end up coming together and helping each other through.

I want you to just sit in that for a moment. Think of all the writers who have encouraged you or taught you or held you together when it seemed things were falling apart. Think of all the times you’ve done that for others. This kind of contamination is our super power!

Let’s never forget it. Keeping up this strength individually and as a community is so worth it. 🥰

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Kitty Bucholtz, Featured Author

September 1, 2025 by Kitty Bucholtz in category Featured Author of the Month tagged as Featured author, Kitty Bucholtz, romantic comedy, Superheros, Write Now Workshop Podcast

September featured author Kitty Bucholtz is a writer, podcaster, and a book coach. She has combined her undergraduate degree in business, her years of experience in accounting and finance, and her graduate degree in creative writing to become a writer-turned-independent-publisher turned coach.

She writes romantic comedy and superhero urban fantasy, often with an inspirational element woven in. She loves to teach and offer advice to writers through her WRITE NOW! Workshop Podcast.

Kitty has also created the Finish Your Books Coaching Program. Find out more about either 1:1 Coaching or Group Coaching on Kitty’s website. http://kittybucholtz.com/

Besides Kitty’s Coaching Program and WRITE NOW! Workshop Podcast, you will find her here at A Slice of Orange on the 9th of each month writing It’s Worth It.