Writing Schedules

Writers write. It's a simple fact that anyone who's ever made a serious stab at being a writer has at least heard of. But for some, finding even an hour in which to squeeze some writing time can be a daunting task. Things like the Time Finder in Chris Baty's "No Plot? No Problem!" can be useful, but what about when you're not trying to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days? What about all the other months of the year when you're just trying to carve out some time for some article, poetry, or short story writing? There's a certain amount of discipline involved, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who's periodically tossed up my hands and gone, "No way. It ain't getting done today." Too many of those and I lose my momentum, my drive, my place in whatever project I was working on.

Those of you who try to fit writing into your busy schedules: how do you handle it? Or are you in a place where you hit the end of the day and wonder where it went, and why so much of it was spent doing things other than writing?

Making Time to Write

In "No Plot? No Problem!", Chris Baty introduces the Time Finder, a tool useful for figuring out how in heaven's name you're going to find time to write a novel in a month. The Time Finder is great for NaNoWriMo, but it's a bit too powerful for establishing a regular writing schedule. If you want to choose now to whittle away all the little time-wasting activities in your life, you can go ahead and use the Time Finder as it's written. Personally I can give up leisure reading and Internet surfing for a month, but not indefinitely.

Instead, I'm going to use this tool as a kind of starting point for discovering those activities that are truly cuttable - mostly the little time-wasters that nickel and dime me out of productivity.

I filled out the Time Finder a few days last week and discovered, not entirely surprisingly, that the Internet sucks away more of my time than I intend. I've actually considered going offline during the time(s) I should be writing. Then I have to find another source of music, since I usually listen to a local classical music station over the Internet while I'm writing. It's very staticy over air, unfortunately. Still, that's doable for me. I just have to hit the discount and thrift stores and see if I can pick up some cheap classical or ambient music. I'm always bored with the music I actually own, which is why I listen to radio.

Once you find some time into which you can shoehorn a bit of writing, you need to decide on a writing goal. From experience with National Novel Writing Month I know that I can generally crank out at least 800-1000 words per hour. So I set my daily writing goal, initially, at 800 words, or one hour a day. Sounds doable. So I look at where I can carve out an hour, or perhaps a couple of half-hour sessions for writing.

Later on I'll lengthen the session or increase the target word count. Getting the habit established is my primary concern. You may have an idea of how you work as a writer and a person with things to do, so your method may vary. The point of the Time Finder is to dig a little writing niche out of the less-than-useful sections of your day. Trim out fifteen minute sessions if that's all you can manage. Some people work better in short bursts, others prefer to sit down for a while and get the day's work banged out all at once. If you don't know how best to schedule your writing, pick a session length that fits into one of the spaces you've made with the Time Finder and start with that. After a few days you'll begin to see whether you tend to sit longer and write or get antsy halfway through the session. And then you adjust accordingly.

The important thing is to sit down and write every day. This is advice which has been bandied about by writers for many years, and some disagree with it. Again, you know yourself, and if you're not sure, you'll find out once you give it a shot. It could be you work better with longer sessions less often during the week. I suppose the most important thing is to write. Whether you write every day or sequester yourself away for half a weekend, turn up at the keyboard or notebook and give your Muse a place to play. She'll be happier if you do.

Pressure and Deadlines: The Fire Beneath Your Butt

"Writers are attuned to deadlines. Most, as students, wrote their term papers the night before they were due. We are energized by impending doom, motivated by a sense that now the work really must be completed; someone is waiting for it." -- Susan Shaugnessy, Walking On Alligators





"A deadline is, simply put, optimism in its most ass-kicking form. ... Because in the artistic realms, deadlines do much more than just get projects finished. They serve as creative midwives, as enthusiastic shepherds adept at plucking the timid inspirations that lurk in the wings of our imaginations and flinging them bodily into the bright light of day." -- Chris Baty, No Plot? No Problem!

Raise your hand if you've ever written a term paper on the bus on the way to school because you'd put it off for two weeks. Yeah, that's what I thought. Anyone who's done any writing for a class, whether it be a term paper or a short story, knows how it feels to wake up with the cold realisation that it's due. Today. And it's not finished yet. It may not even be started. "Crap," we may think, "and I was going to really try to do a fantastic job on this thing this time. Oh well. Let's get it banged out so at least I don't get an incomplete for not turning it in."

My school life was full of such thoughts. As a long-time hard-core procrastinator, I frequently stuck my fingers in my metaphorical ears and sang, "La la la, I'm not listening!" when I had a project to do. It's the most difficult for me to get started. Once I get the work begun I find I build up a sense of momentum and it's easier to carry on. But when the realisation dawns that this five-page paper I've conveniently shuffled to the back of my mind for two weeks is due in three hours, some of which need to be spent doing things like eating and riding or walking to school, panic sets in. And panic is never, in my experience, conducive to writing something as pedestrian as a term paper.

It can be useful for fiction writing, though. National Novel Writing Month is a perfect example. Your plan is to write about 1600 words each day. Not a big task. If you start to slip, though, if you miss a day of writing, or put up a low word count for the day, the task gets bigger. Now you need even more words to catch up. At the end I'm usually behind at least somewhat, and that 'Oh My God I have to HURRY or I'll fail!' feeling sets in.

And I write. I write like the house is on fire and sometimes it's contrived and stupid, with wooden dialogue and idiotic plot leaps. But sometimes it's good. Sometimes my characters surprise me, for good or for ill. When a secondary character suddenly runs off to war unexpectedly, it can be great for the word count, but potentially bad for the plot, which spirals off in an unintended and perhaps useless direction. More often than not, though, I find that those side-tracks can lead to more character development and even a subplot all their own.

There's a feeling of triumph, of accomplishment when a thing is done. When I've finished up in here, particularly after beating Blogger with a stick on the days I'm composing my initial post in it, I feel like I've made a checkmark in a worthwhile box. "Well," I think, "that's finished. Maybe now I should feed the cat. She's been trying to paw my door down for half an hour."

I write here in this blog six days out of seven. Even bloggers get a chance to rest, right? I sit down and write nearly every day because I know someone is reading it. And even if those people aren't waiting with bated breath for the next post to appear, it means something to me that they're waiting. They're anticipating. And it gives me the motivation to deliver. Even on days when my mind is being crazy and coming up with all kinds of weirdnesses, it's part of the process and it's my dim hope that someone's entertained by it. My audience forms my deadline, the expectation that I'll produce this blog (nearly) every day, and gives me the motivation to write.