Over the years, I've seen writers at all levels come up with all sorts of varied writing schedules.
Some people use alarms to remind them when writing time starts. Others "tag" their writing onto another activity, so there's a built-in start and/or stop point.
Some write first thing, before the rest of the family wakes up. Others can't imagine writing before they've had a coffee and their brain has woken up! Some write in 10 minute bursts.
Others write for a full morning in a coffee shop. Some need silence. Others love white noise. And others
(like me) listen to a handful of albums on repeat as they write.
There are probably just about as many different writing schedules and routines as there are writers.
So what can you do when you've crafted what seems like your perfect writing schedule ... and you just can't seem to stick to it? Here are a few questions to ask yourself and some things to try.
Are You Trying to Do Too Much Writing at
Once?
If you can't stick to your writing schedule, perhaps your schedule is too ambitious.
That applies even if you
think there "should" be more than enough space for writing.
Perhaps you have no commitments at all on Saturdays, so you're sure you should be able to write for three hours from 9 am till 12 noon. And yet every Saturday, you find all sorts of other tasks and interruptions creeping into your writing
time.
Or you put off starting, over and over again, until it's 11.45am and you've only got a few minutes left to write.
But is writing for three solid hours realistic? If you're new to writing (or new to taking your writing seriously), then it probably isn't! Three hours is a long time to focus. Writing takes up a lot of energy.
What to Do About It
- Aim for short, focused writing sessions (say, 30 minutes). Gradually build up the length if you're able to consistently stick to them.
- Break up longer writing sessions so that you have a chance to move around and mentally refocus partway through.
Are You Trying to Do Too Many Things Overall?
Perhaps you think you're being realistic with your writing schedule. You're trying to write for 30 minutes every morning, before work. You know you can focus for 30 minutes.
But again, your schedule keeps falling down. Maybe as well as writing, you're trying to exercise, shower, eat, and get the laundry hung on the line. And all too often, you end up waking up 15 minutes later, or spending longer on breakfast than you intended, or a family member interrupts you, and your writing time vanishes.
Sometimes, it's not that your writing expectations are unreasonable in themselves ... it's that you have so many other things going on in life, it's tough for your writing to fit in.
What to Do About It
- Look for ways to reduce interruptions when you're writing. Could you write in a different room? A coffee shop? Or at a time of day when you're less likely to get interrupted?
- Plan "back up" slots for your writing. That way, if your regular writing slot doesn't work out, you've got a different time you can use
instead.
Are You Struggling to Engage With Your Writing Project?
Another big reason why writers can't
seem to stick with their self-imposed schedules is because, for one reason or another, they're just not engaged with their project.
Sometimes this happens when you're trying to write something that you feel you should write. Perhaps you're aiming to write a novel in a genre you don't particularly love,
but that seems marketable.
It can also be an issue when you've been working on one project for a long time. Maybe you're facing Draft 6 of your short story and you're not exactly enthusiastic about the idea of going through it yet again.
You might also struggle if there's a lot of pressure attached to your project. Perhaps it represents really big hopes for you: creating the portfolio of sample pieces that you want to use to launch your freelancing career, writing the short story that you're going to enter into a prestigious competition.
What to Do About It
- Work on a project that you're excited about ... even if that means pausing on a work-in-progress. Switching to a different project might leave you energised to come back to the original one after a few days or
weeks.
- Take the pressure off! Give yourself some time to just play around with your writing ... without any expectations of producing something publishable or competition-worthy. (You don't even need to produce something coherent!)
If you take one thing away
from this newsletter, make it this:
Struggling to stick to your writing schedule doesn't mean there's something wrong with you.
The most likely culprit is the schedule. Try shifting things around (and don't get swayed by other writers' ideal schedules ... what works perfectly for them might be a terrible fit for you).
If the schedule itself is fine, then the problem may be with what you're trying to write. If it
feels boring or too pressured, change things around. Write something you want to write.
