Ways to Write

Every author has their own way of getting words on the page, ways that enable them to write and complete manuscripts on a regular basis. As anyone who reads this blog on a regular basis knows, this is something I struggle with. I have the best of intentions at the beginning of each week and at the beginning of each day, but most days something invariably happens that steals my writing time whether it be scheduled or pop up appointments, something my mom needs me to handle for her when I get home from work, or my family member who likes to drop in to visit during my designated writing time.

About a week or so ago I asked my fellow authors for ideas/advice on how to get my writing accomplished on a more consistent basis. I received a lot of really good ideas. I've decided to try out a couple at a time and see which ones work for me and which ones don't.

One of the suggestions I tried out last week was to work in smaller time increments. Instead of blocking out a full hour and a half at a time, use whatever free time I have even if it's only 10 minutes here and 10 minutes there. I guess you could say it's the equivalent of sprinting but without the timer. This worked much better than I expected. I was able to get 45 pages revised which is more than I've gotten done in a while.

The other suggestion I tried out was typing one sentence relating to my current manuscript into my phone before I went into work. I did this in the parking lot just before I went into my office building. Doing this seemed to keep my story at the forefront of my mind. I quickly jotted down notes about anything that sentence triggered - part of a scene, dialogue, etc - that popped into my head while I was at work so I wouldn't forget it and have it disappear into the ether, never to be recalled. Yes, that has happened to me in the past when I didn't write something down because I was so sure I'd remember the scene/dialogue/setting detail the next time I was able to get to my manuscript.

I'm going to keep using these two methods and am going to try two more suggestions this week.