Focus is my struggle - Wearing many hats of wife, mother, grandmother, business owner, as well as coaching and teaching several days a week, cause the demands of daily urgencies often to become a huge distraction from my writing time. However, through personal practice and coaching other writers, I have seen huge achievements when the combination of a designated writing time and well-defined long-term goals are set in place.
Priority
I have seen the most success in my personal life and with the clients I work with when writing time is treated like a divine appointment with a deadline. In my personal life, the best time of the day for writing is the first hour to two in the morning. I think more clearly, my house is quiet and things just come together easier. But to have this time, I have to start getting ready for bed the night before around 8:30. If I start at 8:30 I get into bed about 9:00 and I'm often asleep well before 10. Then I wake up around 4:30; this gives me quiet thinking time with NOTHING but coffee, toast with peanut butter and a computer for about 2 hours. Sometimes my schedule dictates that I need to be in town very early. Those days I will grab coffee at a local coffee shop and write before an appointment. If I'm in town at the coffee shop writing and someone I really need to talk to walks in.... I say, "I have a deadline to meet, can I call you this afternoon or tomorrrow?" If you treat your writing like a divine appointment, you will be shocked at what happens.
I have seen the most success in my personal life and with the clients I work with when writing time is treated like a divine appointment with a deadline. In my personal life, the best time of the day for writing is the first hour to two in the morning. I think more clearly, my house is quiet and things just come together easier. But to have this time, I have to start getting ready for bed the night before around 8:30. If I start at 8:30 I get into bed about 9:00 and I'm often asleep well before 10. Then I wake up around 4:30; this gives me quiet thinking time with NOTHING but coffee, toast with peanut butter and a computer for about 2 hours. Sometimes my schedule dictates that I need to be in town very early. Those days I will grab coffee at a local coffee shop and write before an appointment. If I'm in town at the coffee shop writing and someone I really need to talk to walks in.... I say, "I have a deadline to meet, can I call you this afternoon or tomorrrow?" If you treat your writing like a divine appointment, you will be shocked at what happens.
You have to guard from distractions. If your phone rings don't answer it; don't even have your ringer turned on in your divine writing time. Think about the most important person you could possibly have a one to two-hour interview or lunch with. Would you let anything pull you away from lunch with your grandmother that was born in 1837, in Texas? What an opportunity! Okay, treat your writing the same way. You can never get this time back again. Treat it like a divine appointment! :-) The most successful writers I know and work with have a set aside divine appointment for writing daily.
Goals are the roadmap to your writing journey.
Set a goal for the next year. Then think about the daily steps you need to take to achieve those goals. Give yourself some mile markers to encourage yourself and to know you are making progress on the journey. The map may change slightly along the way, but you need to start with the end in mind. If not, you don't know where you are going. :-)
My shorter term goal to keep myself on track is for the next 4 months to make sure I generate at least 500 new words each day. Five hundred words is not that many, but if I do that seven days a week that is 3500 words a week. In four months that is 14000 words, if you add that to a story you have started that is just sitting there waiting on you to get back to it..... you have made alot of headway in completing a project.
My shorter term goal to keep myself on track is for the next 4 months to make sure I generate at least 500 new words each day. Five hundred words is not that many, but if I do that seven days a week that is 3500 words a week. In four months that is 14000 words, if you add that to a story you have started that is just sitting there waiting on you to get back to it..... you have made alot of headway in completing a project.
Focus, make your divine appointments and have an end goal in mind. Do something daily to work towards your goal.
In a year, your book will be at least ready for an editor.
In a year, your book will be at least ready for an editor.
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