Oh, boy. Now I’ve done it. I’ve put myself in the situation where I MUST write, on my own stuff, every day for the next six months. This has become a matter of write or perish.
Ever since the fifth grade, I’ve dreamed of being a successful creative writer…you know, the kind who gets published and people flock to buy and read their stories. But alas: Instead of becoming a full-time creative writer, the next six decades involved college, working, and raising a family while writing a paltry few thousand words of fiction each year.
As a tech writer, I wrote a whole lot more than that, but my user manuals and training courses would hardly earn me a Shirley Jackson award. Tech writing and teaching are good for a paycheck, but that’s not what I dreamed about when I was nine. Now that I have white hair and arthritis, I’m faced with a rather short time to fulfill my publication goals.
I need to get serious about my creative dream—now!
To that end, I’ve decided to take off work for six months to concentrate on my uncompleted writing projects, which have been aging in folders and on disks. Six whole months. That’s a long time to go without a paycheck, but not a lot of time to hammer out the salable, income-producing stories I want to finish and publish. And to make this more immediate: The six months start March 13th. Yikes.
My biggest obstacle involves myself (of course) and the bad habits I’ve picked up since I left teaching in the 90s. Since then, I’ve been a part-time contractor, mostly working from home. Without a rigid schedule to follow, and with no more children to raise, I’ve spent most of these years doing whatever suited me at the time. I might stay up until 3:00 a.m. writing and answering emails, I might sleep until noon, or I might drive to the next county to shop. I’ll work if a production deadline looms, but the next day I might choose to cook and watch movies for nine hours.
Undisciplined comes to mind.
Yet now that I have only six months to complete my own writing projects, how do I do that? Where do I start? Yeah, I know…I simply must develop and stick to a Writing Routine. I need a concrete writing schedule with a fearsome, even threatening essence. A rigid schedule that I’ll feel compelled to follow. Okay, I can see that, but…
But I’ve never had a working schedule where I had no one to answer to…no boss, no supervisor, no partner, no student, no client…just myself. I’m not sure where to start.
Last week I searched the Internet for the writing schedules of famous authors. From Alice Munro and Maya Angelou to Ray Bradbury and William Faulkner, every prize-winning, productive, well-known author I found started their days early, usually eight o’clock, writing all through the morning and sticking with it, at their desk, for three or four hours. Some stuck to this routine five days a week, while others wrote every day, period. Every one of the authors I found did this, without exception. None of them just wrote when they felt inspired to.
About his own writing routine, Leo Tolstoy said: “I must write each day without fail, not so much for the success of the work, but in order not to get out of my routine.” That’s the kind of determination I need. One that doesn’t deviate, doesn’t make exceptions, doesn’t falter. Dishes in the sink? They’ll wait. Bathroom needs cleaning? It can wait. Roast in the fridge needs to go in the oven? That can wait until I’ve finished my morning routine.
Okay, so I’m hip about developing a solid routine. However, I have one more BUT. What about the Muse? For much of my life, I’d be watering plants or dusting the piano when all of a sudden a gem of a character or story would plop into my mind. Wow. I’d drop what I was doing and rush to take notes before I lost the idea. But, if I’m following a strict writing routine, will I still get those enlightening visits from the Muse?
I have to believe I will due to a marvelous quote attributed to William Faulkner: “I only write when inspiration strikes. Fortunately it strikes at nine every morning.”
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