Writers need to have a writing schedule, one that should be everyday. At least that’s what every established author says. I don’t disagree, but as anyone who has tried to write everyday knows, it’s a struggle to keep.
I’m awful at keeping a schedule. When I was in school my excuse was a pile of books and a research paper due that was begun two weeks too late. Now, it’s a full time job, family, and wanting to just shut off for a little while at the end of the day.
A long time ago I was given the advice that the way to write everyday for a good chunk of time was to start small, and build up. Write five minutes a day for a few weeks. Then up it to ten, and so on. But, force yourself to stop at the minute mark, even when you want to write more as to prepare yourself for the next day.
I’ve mentioned previously that I think it’s perfectly normal to break your schedule and you can’t beat yourself up about it. But you also can’t forget to write.
For me, I decided to break my sporadic schedule up by (finally) taking that advice.
This is what I learned while only writing ten minutes a day:
It’s extremely frustrating when the timer goes off mid-thought, but I stuck to the plan and stopped writing. I realized the frustration at having to stop writing so abruptly helped me creatively the next day. There are days when there’s nothing to write–my creativity is squashed. Forcing myself to stop writing was like storing something for later.
But, those were the days that I was use to writing. The days I usually would skip because I was tired or busy, the ten minutes felt like an hour. I would work on the same thing I had the previous day, but I would drag my feet. By the time the buzzer went off, I was relieved, and surprisingly frustrated. I’d cut through the laziness to begin to write only for the buzzer to tell me I was done.
I learned that staring at a blank screen was better than giving up, it was better to stop writing than to over spend your mind, and that it relieved the pressure of having to produce something everyday.
So, I’d say write for ten minutes a day for a week. Just to try it. Even if you have a good writing schedule, just to see what you learn, how frustrating it can be, or how ten minutes can be too long on a day where you just want to go home and fall asleep.
Memoir of a Writer 
I agree, it’s hard. I like a clean slate but that very rarely happens so I lose my momentum while doing the daily grind. I tried the Pomodoro Technique, morning pages, wordcount, etc, etc, but what works best for me (at this point in time) is one sheet of A4 paper and writing to fill it up. Give or take ten minutes!
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That’s a good idea! For me it’s tough to do anything on days I just want to relax lol
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Once I committed myself to blogging once I say I found I was able to juggle everything else to fit it in. Now I just need to fit in more actual writing 😄
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Yeah my blogging has helped me a lot. I actually keep a schedule for blogs, which is the only reason anything gets posted 😂
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So I’ve been contemplating the summer thinking of how to get my soon to be 2nd grader to keep on track with her writing ! I think we will try this ! She HATES writing and anything that doesn’t involve outside or video games.
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Haha Yeah! You should, it helps cause it’s short, but enough time to get small things done.
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I don’t follow any schedules. Whenever I feel like I have something in my mind that I should write about, I write. I guess I should give it a try because it has happened that sometimes I don’t write for weeks 😀 This might give a regular thought flow to my writing.
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Haha I’ve definitely had weeks of not writing, but it’s like I don’t even realize it. I just kind of think ‘oops’ and try to get back to writing!
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The same thing happens with me 😀 😛
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Your advice is very close to what is recommended to visual artists. At least go out to your studio, even if you have no idea what you will do. You’ll most likely start creating something. Big expectations are a recipe for disaster.
My current project of both photographing and writing every day for a year I sometimes feel a little overwhelmed but having a specific task (walking my dog) makes it pretty easy to do at least something.
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Exactly. Another piece of advice I’ve been given is to lower your expectations. Just to be realistic with yourself. I want to get to the point of Writing at least 3 hours a day, but I know that it’ll be a long time before I can even begin taking that much time because I have so much else to do.
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Wow. Three hours is a lot! Even with nothing else to do I’ve found that a couple of hours of high intensity creating is enough to drain me for a day. More than that and I’m pressing. I spend more time than that on creative tasks, but the real core creating is limited for me or I burn out.
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Yeah it is lol it’s apparently the max amount your mind can really actively be creative.
However, don’t quote me on that cause someone else told me that lol
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Thanks for this post. I get in about ten minutes of writing a day (most days). It’s a good thing I write short poems. I also wonder if I starte writing shorter pieces because I knew my time was limited. Either way, it works for me. : )
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I love the human element to this post. I hear the “you should write every day” mantra a lot, but it’s so much easier to listen to and consider the viability of that statement (and in general, to just prepare yourself for what you’re getting yourself into with such a commitment) when it’s accompanied by an honest assessment of the struggles involved. Thanks for posting this 🙂
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Yes! It’s all I heard in college. But it’s so tough to do. I actually let myself stay at ten minutes another week because I knew It was going to be a long week. Thanks for reading 😊
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One day I would like to be a writer. I am almost 74 years old so if it is going to be, it will have to be sooner rather than later for my ‘laters’ keep getting fewer with every passing day. In December of 2016, a blogging friend convinced me to write fiction. I quickly got into writing science fiction novellas-time travel. I wrote the novellas in episodes. My goal for each episode was 1,000 words. 1,000 words a day took between 90 minutes and 3 hours. The time variance was due to which platform I used to write: tablet or computer. The computer was much faster. I may have missed writing as many as seven days in that time, never two consecutive ones until two days ago. Two days ago, I finished the draft of my 8th novella and started to proofread and self-edit my 8th. I chose the 8th novella to proofread and edit because it is the easiest to put in a form to self-publish. The other seven have some idiosyncratic writing problems with which I need to deal and to polish (knock off some rough edges and sharp corners). The combination of proofreading and editing is the first thing that has interfered with what you might call my creative, productive, writing flow these sixteen months.
Proofreading and editing one’s own work is a bear. A large hungry, irritated, mother of two cubs, Grizzly Bear with sharp teeth and claws. The first time through, I read it out loud. That slows me down enough, so I don’t get back into the story and forget what I am doing. Reading what one writes out loud is more likely to show the author, me in this case, grammar, syntax and tone problems. It also allows me to catch some typos and innovative autocorrect substitutions. The second and third time through I used Grammarly, an app or software package that reminds me that the English language has two voices and I should be in the active one. It also ferrets out all those comma-based errors I have learned to make in my years of casual, non-reviewed writing.
I do need to get back to daily writing. Not just any writing, but project writing—say another novella. I write to an old friend every day. Indeed, I use that as the basis for a blog to which I attach episodes of my novellas. But, daily letters to my friend and his wife don’t count in the writing part of my life—they are important but not done to write. Back in 2014 my friend was hospitalized and diagnosed with cancer. I live some 2,000 miles away and started daily letters to keep my spirits up and his chin up while he was down. That is a whole different category of using words than writing fiction. However, using my daily letters to him as a blog and appending my daily episodes to the blog resulted in my having four readers: my friend and three bloggers who read and comment on my episodes every day.
You have heard that writing is an isolated, lonely profession. It well may be. But, I have three readers who comment daily. If you write, you know what a boon that is. You know how that can lift your spirits. Someone is reading. Yes, 158 other people have signed on as followers of my blog. So technically I am writing for them too. And, on a good day, six to eight may like my post. But, the three who comment, are priceless. Occasionally, one will comment on something amiss in my writing. Many Thanks to her. They comment on the flow of the story, the prospects for one or more character in the story or tell me someone in the story did something of which they approve, disapprove or the like. The important thing is they read and comment. Having regular readers as I have has been one reason I have churned out somewhere around a half a million words and has been one of the main motivations for my continuing to churn out 1,000 or so words a day. So, if it is possible, get a reader or two who comment on the story. My readers never give me technical writing comments. Rather they tell me how they feel about characters. Accordingly, I have used the same characters in any story where appropriate. One of my characters, a woman of indeterminant age I once described as wearing tweed like Jane Marple, as portrayed by Margret Rutherford in films of Agatha Christie novels, has been in every one of my eight novellas and the eighth one is not science fiction!
35 years ago, I heard, “Know and write to an audience.” If someone is reading what you write and making comments, your job of writing to an audience is much easier. I got lucky as three readers became my audience.
I started writing by doing a short piece of fiction about a policeman seeing a four-year-old girl jump off a swing in park He took her and to police headquarters because she was an unaccompanied juvenile out after dark. The story from the policeman’s point of view. I then wrote it from the little girl’ point of view. Finally, I wrote it from the relevant adult in the little girl’s life’s point of view. Those three pieces required a novella to explain what happened. That became Amanda7, my first time-travel novella and the next one I will edit and proof for self-publication.
My next six novellas were, to my mind logical places to take the stories of the characters developed in Amanda7, indeed, the epilogs to each of the third through the sixth novella led into the fourth through seventh novellas. You could say, the end of one novella leaves something unaddressed that requires more writing. A starting point for the next project. Indeed, since I write each novella in episodes of about 1,000 words, I make it a point to leave something that must be addressed tomorrow or later. My readers occasionally have commented on my leaving Pauline tied to the railroad tracks with a train coming full speed—cliffhangers or as I remember them from the 1950’s Saturday Morning Movies at the theatre, a stagecoach going off a cliff TO BE CONTINUED.
Cliffhangers not only keep the kids coming back to the Theater next week, and my readers coming back tomorrow, they keep me writing. I want to know what happens next too. Now since I write an episode and publish it before I write the next episode, I have written myself into many a corner. Using this approach turns writing into a challenge for an author. I neither recommend it nor would dissuade one from writing this way. I simply am telling you there are other ways to write than the experts tell you.
I read some of your posts and lots of the comments and thought, what to heck. Writing is idiosyncratic. Here is what worked for me for 16 months. Check out deartedandjody in a few months from now and see if it is still working.
Warmest regards, Ed
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