New Year's Resolutions? Meh...

This is the first year in a long time that I haven’t made any resolutions.  My typical resolutions are the following:

• Write xxx # of words per day.
• Start an exercise program.
• Make xxxx $ in freelance income this year.
• Post 7 blog posts each week.
• Finish and publish the next book by October 1st.
• Etc...

You get the idea.  I set lofty goals and then feel like absolute shit when I fail to reach them for whatever reason.

Now granted, it helps to have SOMETHING written down and something to work towards.  And considering that I’m STILL unemployed and have just a little freelance work trickling in, maybe I SHOULD make a few resolutions, but I’m trying something a bit different this year.

I’m going to create new habits and only focus on one habit at a time.  This month, I’m getting addicted to writing.  You heard me right.  Get myself addicted to a GOOD thing.  I’m going to force myself to set a timer at least once a day and just write for 15 minutes.  Even if I have no idea where I’m taking it, I’m going to do it.  I signed up for an online flash fiction that requires that I critique at least 4 stories a month and (suggests) that I write at least one.  I have 3 blogs of which I'm trying to grow and build traffic for.  I have Tweets to my (currently) 215 followers to create and find.  I have an outline of a book project to work on. I have freelance work to find and produce.  There is plenty of substance for this addiction.

Courtesy of Matt via Flickr

So whether it is a freelance assignment, a blog post or creative work on one of my many incomplete projects, I’m going to force myself out of the box occasionally, ignore whatever crises seem to be on hand, and take that time to write something outside of the box.  I'm going to stop being obsessed with one problem at a time.  Stop retreating into distractions such as Words with Friends tournaments with my buddies, seeking the top Bejeweled Blitz score of all of my Facebook friends, or obsessive TV series watching.  December featured a run of the last 3 seasons of Dr. Who on Netflix...

In addition, December had the death of a close friend, a washing machine that could not be repaired and needed to be replaced, a gas furnace that, was too expensive to repair, also needed to be replaced, and, of course, the holidays.  So the 30-Day Writing Challenge was a miserable, epic FAIL.

This is always the darkest part of the year for me. After the holidays are over, here in Ohio winter usually bites down hard… with gray skies and a deep, painful cold that makes you just want to roll yourself up in quilts and hibernate until the sun comes back.

But I’m going to fight this. I have to.

So what do you do to chase away the mid-winter blues?  How do you keep productive during stressful, busy times?  And what are your New Year's Resolutions (if you have any)?  Comment below.

Finding 15-Minutes to Write: Batch Your Tasks

30-Day 15-Minute Writing Challenge - Day #2

I spent my initial 15-minute session generating content for my Provocative Phrase Friday writing prompts on the Grist for the Muse blog.  By tackling these all at once, I generated about 3 months-worth of content for these posts.  Granted they still need some edits and select the perfect provocative photo prompts to complete the posts, but the hard work is done.  I spent about another 30 minutes putting together enough content to last well over 6 months.

Batching tasks is one of the ways that you can save time by handling several closely related tasks at the same time. Some of the common ways to do this:

• Make all of your phone calls at the same time
• Save errands in a specific part of town and do them in one trip
• Pay bills all at once at a specific time of the month

Finding 15 Minutes to Write: Use a DVR

Post #1 in the 30-Day 15-Minute Writing Challenge

TV is one of my biggest time wasters. If a television is on and I am in the room doing something else, I will watch it.  I try to avoid looking at it at all when there’s work to be done, but I still love TV. I love watching House, The Middle, The Office, The Walking Dead, Breaking Bad... you get the idea. 

Luckily, I have had Tivo since the first series was manufactured over 10 years ago, and never have looked back.  Since then, the rest of the world seems to have caught up with me and DVRs are common in homes now, whether purchased by the saavy consumer or provided by their local cable company.

Courtesy of the autowitch via Flickr

What does this have to do with writing?  According to Wikipedia: The average number of minutes of TV advertising for each hour of commercial television in the US is between 15 to 18 minutes per hour.  But that amount seems to be similar in the rest of the world. The UK: Between 12 to 15 minutes per HALF HOUR?!?  Germany: 12 to 20 minutes per hour (depending on the time of day).  Argentina:  12 minutes per hour. Russia:  Around 15 minutes per hour.  The Philippines:  A max of 18 minutes per hour.

So even if I limited myself to watching 6 hours a week of live TV, I’m wasting 90 minutes of time that could be recovered simply by using my DVR to skip through the commercials. If I watch sporting events, such as an NFL game, I’m probably wasting even more time per hour.

I rarely watch a program at the time that it originally airs.  Sometimes I miss the entire series of TV shows, discovering them later on Netflix, Amazon Prime or some other video streaming service, when I have time to sit and watch several episodes in row; Like I did when I watched Joss Whedon’s incredible sci-fi/western mash-up series, Firefly when I was stuck in bed with pneumonia last Christmas.

Time is precious, so if you are going to “waste” it watching TV, use a DVR and put that recovered time to work with your writing.  Tune in tomorrow for post #2 in the 30-Day 15-Minute Writing Challenge.

The One Thing You Must Know About Writing

This is the one thing that I just wish I could remember when I have those dark days where I lose faith in myself.  Those days where I wonder why I bother doing this at all, this writing thing.  Those days where I loathe myself for not getting the writing done, ensnared in resistance and full of excuses (sometimes even good ones) about why it isn’t happening.

Yes, I’m unemployed.  Yes there are challenges, doctor’s appointments, band practice, sick kids and the never ending time-consuming tasks of eating, sleeping, laundry and the occasional home repair project… but everyone has them. And what they are is the sneaky way that resistance or the Inner Critic slip into your life and sabotage your efforts.

Courtesy of Eddie Van 3000 via Flickr

I’ve been fighting and losing the battle the last couple of months. I have good intentions, but get sidelined and manage to put off the writing for just a little while longer, or tell myself that this cover letter is the most important thing I have to do today, when, in truth, there is plenty of time for both.

Maybe I don’t like the particular project I’m working on. Maybe I’m just not in the mood to draft the copy for the sales page on my website right now, but the fact of the matter is: It is important and not having it done is preventing me from completing other tasks that depend on it. 

Maybe I’m not in a mood to write a blog post, because who’s going to read it anyway… at least that is what the critic is telling me right before I open Microsoft Word and begin typing… then decide to check my Twitter feed instead.

But if I decide to sit down and set a timer and write for just 15 minutes, and vow not to check email for that period of time, act on a random thought that occurs during that time (such is the power of the web) and focus on just getting something down, I often find myself resetting that timer for another 15 minutes and then another, and soon enough, the dreaded project is done and I FEEL GREAT!  Even if I only do 15-minutes, my brain lets me relax because it has checked writing off of today's must-do list.

That is the part that I always forget about. The guilt-free, anxious feeling erased from the rest of my day which allows me to enjoy watching some Walking Dead, stupid videos on YouTube, or reading for pleasure without that timer that seems to always be ticking in my head.

You are never going to feel that the time is right to write.  It never happens. There is always something more important, more urgent to do. You will never feel less tired, in the mood, or more inspired than you do right now.

Make a promise to yourself to write just 15 minutes a day. Mark it on your calendar, your to-do list or put it on a post it note that you carry with you everywhere, and do it.  Write for at least 15 minutes a day, during the entire month of December with no excuses and see how you feel at the end of the month.

Who's going to join me? With apologies to Tom Petty: "Sometimes the starting is the hardest part..."

Reading Elimination Tournament -- 64 Books, So Little Time

I buy a lot of books.  My particular weakness, trade paperbacks in the bargain bins of Half-Price Books, at library book sales or wherever else I pick them up.  As a result, I have a huge backlog of books that I may never get too and my shelves are overflowing, so I need to get rid of some books. So here is what I'm going to do.  I'm going to take 64 books off of my shelves and I'm going to put them in an elimination tournament.  I'd love to do this as a March Madness thing, but let's face it, even following my bizarre rules, no one can possibly read 64 books in a month so here's how the process works:

• Round #1 -- I read the first 5 pages of these 64 random books from my collection and select the 32 books that I'm most interested in continuing to read. I'm going to focus on the writing craft of these books and note what interested me (or didn't) and give you at least a brief description of why it made it (or didn't) to the next round.
• Round #2 -- From the reading of the first five pages I will organize the remaining books into "brackets" of those that are sort of alike.  In the books that I've selected is a wide range of literary tastes: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Literary, Popular Fiction, and even some award winners and classics. I will read the first 25 pages of these books and eliminate 16 of them.
• Round #3 -- The Sweet 16: I will read an additional 25 pages of these books (50 pages) and eliminate 8 of them... At this point I may "set aside" some of the books to finish later even if I eliminate them, but who knows.
• Round #4 -- The Elite 8: These books I will read to the end, or until I get bored of it, and eliminate the number to the Final 4.
• Round #5 -- Down to 2.
• Round #6 -- Determines the Grand Champion of the 2011Reading Elimination Tournament.

How does this benefit you? Free books!  If you want a book that has been eliminated, just let me know and I'll give it to you (either in person, or ship it to you for the media mail shipping cost (probably $2.50).  Unless the books in the final rounds absolutely enthrall me, causing me to add it to my Fiction Hall of Fame, chances are that most of the "winners" will be available for you as well.

Getting that Writing Project Started

Every writing project is overwhelming. When I finally decide to start a new project, no matter what it is, I have a moment where I feel my stomach flutter and a heaviness in my chest.  The closest feeling I can compare to it is the anxiousness before the first day of school as a child; a mixture of excitement and dread.  The thrill of learning new things, mixed with regret for the loss of freedom.   

There is nothing harder than staring at a blank screen in your word processor wondering to yourself, "What the hell was I going to write about?"  This always gives your Inner Critic a place to slither a few doubts into your head, and start the negative chattering: "Why are you doing this?  Don't you have to steam clean the hall carpet? Wouldn't you rather read the next chapter in The Hunger Games instead? You don't have a clue what you are doing, do you?  The words will never make it what it is in your head... so why bother?"  And on and on.

Any time you take on a new project, whether it is a technical magazine article involving a lot of research and interviews, starting a novel, or even weeding all of the flowerbeds and planting flowers in them, when you face the enormity of the task... your Inner Critic is ALWAYS going to advise you to procrastinate.

Take a deep breath, and take 15 minutes to list of every single task you need to do in order to complete the project.  Items on the list can be as big as conducting an interview with a the premiere expert in the field or as small as going to the post office to buy stamps to send out query letters with SASEs.  Do not stop writing until the 15 minutes are up. If you are running out of ideas for more tasks, look at the existing ones on your list and see if you can break them into even SMALLER tasks.

If you look at it as one huge project, it is daunting. But if you tackle just one of the little tasks on the list, and work on it until you are finished, it is not so bad.  You might even feel inspired to start another. You might become addicted to the feeling of sweet victory when you cross another task off.

Pretty soon you notice that you have a chapter done, then two, then ten, and then you have a first draft completed, then a second, then a final, and the next thing you know, you are shopping around for agents and publishers. 

This is at the heart of what this blog is about: The 15-Minute Writer: How to Achieve Your Creative Writing Dreams in 15 Minutes a Day.  This blog helps you develop the skills necessary to become an excellent writer, teachs you how to break down these huge writing tasks into manageable 15-minute tasks, and shows you how to manage your time to get these tasks done.  

Get a timer, or use a timer app on your iPod, smartphone, or the web, set it for 15 minutes and begin chasing that dream today!

Spring Cleaning Your Writing

It is hard to believe that May is already here. With all of the rain we've had over the last 6 weeks, the lawn has already gotten away from us and we already are behind on our annual battle with Mother Nature.

Spring around our house always signifies some sort of spring cleaning, where we get rid of the stuff in our lives that isn’t working. 

A few of years ago, I had a lawn mower that was 6 years-old and falling apart. If you could get it started (and each spring, that was a big IF)  it rattled and wheezed… mainly due to several stupid things that I did to it… like when I replaced the blade for the mower and installed the new one on upside-down, causing it to rattle and vibrate considerably, cutting the grass with the dull edge of the blade, and then being too clueless to realize what I had done… at least until all of the bolts on the mower started vibrating right out of their sockets, causing major parts of the mower, such as the gas tank, to simply fall off. 

My friend Matt, after taking a look at the situation and laughing at me for what I had done, thought that the solution would be to buy another used mower, which in his capable hands, worked great... but a week later when I tried to get it started (after about an hour of yanking on the pull cord, wheezing and swearing).  I failed miserably.  I gave up, loaded the two beat-up and barely-functional mowers onto the trailer headed toward the Stoutsville Auction (an annual event which raises money for the local firefighters), and went on down to the locally-owned Toro lawnmower dealer and bought a brand new mower with a 5 year warranty.

And I haven’t had a problem with it since. The saved time and aggravation alone while using this mower has paid for itself 10 times over. Sometimes spending extra money does solve a difficult problem better than buying the cheapest or easiest solution.

So what’s not working in your writing life? What are those little writing obstacles that prevent you from sitting down at the keyboard day after day?

Does your old computer take 30 minutes to boot up?  Are you missing deadlines because of watching the season finales of your favorite TV shows? Are you spending too much time writing email and not enough time writing your novel? Are you still editing that manuscript instead of sending it on to the agent or publisher as you had intended months ago?

Well, May is the perfect month to change all of that.  Inventory the things that inhibit your writing. Are you not writing because your desk chair is uncomfortable? Get a new one. Are you spending too much time playing that addictive little Solitaire game installed on your computer instead of writing?  Delete it. Do you have a mouse that doesn’t quite work right, or a keyboard that makes your wrists numb after 30 minutes of typing? Trash it! Get rid of distracting clutter in your writing space. Throw out magazines that you always had planned on reading, but never have. If you can’t make the time to read them now, you never will. Pitch those pens that don’t work.  File or toss those “important” papers that are piled everywhere. I am as guilty of this as anyone.  If you saw my office right now, you’d know this to be true.

But, sometimes you just need a little fresh air and some encouragement to get rid of the bad habits that have inhibited your writing during the long winter months and start spring with a clean slate. So make that list, get out your broom, and start cleaning!

Finding Moments with the Muse: 6 Ways the Pros Find Time to Write

The statistics are in. We work longer and harder now than we ever did before. Two-income households, the difficulty of balancing work and family life, information overload and more all suck time away from our writing. But guess what?  The best-selling pros faced the exact same time crunch as you do now, and here’s how they worked around it.

Write early in the morning

Drag yourself out of bed a half hour early everyday and write.  This will give you three hours and thirty minutes of writing time a week.  Many famous authors have taken this approach.

Anthony Trollope woke up everyday at 5:20am before beginning his full-time job at the post office, and wrote 250 words every 15 minutes.  He regularly produced over 40 pages a week.

After her husband died, Mary Higgins Clark wrote from 5 to 7am, before her 5 children woke up for school.

Write at night

If your energy level is high enough, try staying up a little later each night after everyone else has settled down for the night.  This was the preferred method of Dostoyevsky.

Colleen McCullough worked as a Research Assistant during the day, and wrote two drafts of The Thorn Birds in 3 months, averaging 50 pages a night.

Write during coffee breaks

When your co-workers are taking their coffee or smoke breaks, stay at your desk, or find some place where you can write in a notebook.  If you get two 15-minute breaks a day, use one of them to gain an extra hour and 15 minutes of writing time a week.

John Grisham used this approach while working as a lawyer.  Whenever he had a few minutes, he would write.  He wrote during court recesses, while waiting for client meetings, or whenever he could squeeze it in.

Write when the kids nap

J.K. Rowling often let her baby sleep while she wrote about Harry, Ron Weasley and friends at a local coffee shop.  Try to flex to the baby’s schedule or write a couple of times a week during the kid’s “quiet time.” 

Or do what Anne Tyler, the author of The Accidental Tourist and Breathing Lessons, did and write while your kids are at school. Tyler wrote from 9am to 3:30pm every day.

Go into the office early or leave a little bit later and write

I try to do this a couple of days a week, and it seems to work well. Not that I am any sort of a famous writer or anything, but taking 15 minutes at the beginning of my work day really does help get some writing done.

Use a tape recorder and dictate your work during a commute

Barbara Cartland, one of the most prolific novelists of all time, dictated most of her novels using a tape recorder.  They probably were not dictated during a commute, more than likely they were dictated lounging on an elegant divan, with a couple of foo-foo dogs on her lap… but you get the picture.

Schedule writing office hours during a weekend or day off

I get up early on weekends.  An hour later than when I would normally wake up for an average work day, but when it is still quiet around the house.  Two books: The Weekend Novelist and The Weekend Novelist Writes a Mystery by Robert Ray explore how to write using the weekend hours to produce a novel in one year. 

These ideas, combined with a few unique ones of your own, should help you find at least 3 to 5 hours each week to get that writing project done.  What are some of your tips and tricks for finding time to write?