“sailing away” by joy laskar

This is a week off in the Book Writing World, a holiday from classes. But of course there is no holiday from writing. Or rather, taking a holiday may be part of the process—you may need time away from the project in order to return to it fresh, with eyes able to make sense of it, able to return to the labor of crafting a manuscript. But it is harder to command the mind to stop daydreaming, the characters to stop reporting on their lives, the setting to stop unscrolling.

It’s easy enough to stop writing, of course. Who are we kidding? Sure, we may turn monstrously grumpy from not writing, but will that force us to pick up the pen, to fire up a blank page on the screen?

It’s easy enough to stop capturing, but creating . . . that’s another story.

So although we are not meeting for classes, our writers have various goals and are scampering or lumbering toward them, or avoiding them. Any of these can be productive enough approaches so long as you have a deadline looming, a report to your colleagues on your productivity scheduled ahead down the road. If you have to stay up all night cramming, at least you’ll meet your deadline.

Rules of the Writing Road

1)   Set measurable goals. BWW member Bree reminded us of that this month—if you say you’ll write chapter six, that may be too vague. Say you’ll write 500 words or a 1000 words or write for an hour, and you’ll know if you’ve done it or not.

2)   Set sacred deadlines. If you don’t honor your deadlines, how will the work get done? Once you aren’t being graded and you’ve lost your deadline driven post as a journalist, the main deadlines you’ll have will be the ones you declare. So you have to believe in them—like Tinkerbell, they won’t exist unless you do. You have to believe in them and live by your word.

3)   Announce your goals to someone or to a group, and report back at regular intervals on whether or not you’ve achieved them. Sure, you’ve mastered the second rule and hold your deadlines sacred. You still need people who care, who cheer you on when you succeed and push you to keep your promises when you falter, who tell you it matters and know that it does.

4)   Create a daily habit. Everybody has his or her own rhythms, and “writing” can include note-taking, editing, typing in or free writing—anything that connects you to the project. It can even be walking and thinking about your book. But if you establish a daily habit, miracles will take place. Don’t take my word for it—try it out.

5)   Finish your projects. This can take some doing, because every project could go on indefinitely, and you become a stronger writer as you go, so you could always do a better job on your book if you started it today. But what you must focus on today is finishing. Write that better book next. Finish this one now. Find the place you can leave it, push it out into the world, champion it from afar and go back to your daily habit, your measurable goals, your sacred deadlines, your group, and start again.