Creating a Daily Writing Habit Means Being the Boss of Yourself
By: Shaunta Grimes
Tags: Creativity, Productivity, Habits, Ninjabyob, Writing

I wake up thinking about writing.

On a really good morning, I’ve dreamed about my novel the night before and the writing just flows super easy. I know exactly what I’m going to write.

On a less good morning, it’s painful to pick a few words out of my head and it’s even worse knowing that they suck so bad there’s no way they’re going to make it to the final draft.

After I’ve worked on my novel, I write a blog post. Like I’m doing right now. It’s 8:45 in the morning. I had a decently good time working on my novel and wrote 1000 words in forty-five minutes.

I’m getting close to the end of this one. I hit 71,000 words today.

By ten most mornings, I’ve worked on my novel and written a blog post. The rest of the day is pretty scheduled. I teach classes, work on writing classes to teach later, coach clients, send emails, work on projects.

All of that is part of my writing business. I count it as writing.

But it’s the first work — the work on my novel — that I have to keep the tightest rein on. That’s the work that it would be easy to let slip. And it really is a slippery slope.

I could get so caught up in the things that feel like writing, that I actually just let my novel go all together.

Writing is Your Job

This is what I have to remind myself of, fairly often.

Even when I don’t have a book contract (and I don’t, at the moment), fiction writing is my job. I’m the boss of it. No one is going to fire me if I don’t show up. No one is going to insist that I keep to a time clock.

I am the boss.

If I want to be a novelist, I have to show up to write my novel. And I have to do that regularly. Religiously, even. Because this is the hardest work I’ve ever done. It would be so easy to let it go, without even realizing I’ve done it.

I could wait until I have more time. Or until my muse shows up and I’m inspired. Or until I have an idea that I can’t ignore.

I could wait for a thousand things and the next thing I know, I’ll be 90 years old, wishing I hadn’t let my novels go.

Teeny, Tiny Goals Are Small, But Mighty

As the boss of my novel-writing business, I schedule myself for ten minutes of work a day. I’m a freaking slave driver — that’s ten minutes a day, with no days off.

Day in. Day out. Every single day.

I can write one page in ten minutes. If I never work more than my scheduled time, I’ll write a novel a year.

Can you see how mighty that little goal is? A novel a year — ten minutes at a time. The only thing that can possibly stop me is if I don’t show up.

Your teeny, tiny goal might be different from mine. It might be smaller. Maybe ten minutes isn’t the powerful trigger for you that it is for me. For me, I’ll write my ten minutes rather than break my streak.

But maybe you find yourself skipping your ten minutes pretty often. That’s okay. Make it smaller. Write for five minutes a day and you’ll finish a novel every other year. Unless, of course, those five minutes turn into more on some days.

Schedule Small; Leave Room For Overtime

The key here is to schedule your time religiously — ten minutes a day (or less) — set it stone. Not just any ten minutes. Ten specific minutes. You’re on the clock for your writing business, after all.

But don’t squeeze your ten minutes into a hole in your schedule so tight that there’s no room for overtime.

If you’re on a roll, you want the space to keep going.

My goal for today was to write for ten minutes. That’s about 250 words. I wrote 1000 in forty-five minutes. Overtime.

My writing is hard scheduled for 8:00 to 8:10 a.m. every morning. But I don’t have something else scheduled at 8:10. I have time to keep going, if I’m feeling it. If my story is flowing and it’s a good morning.

Take a look at your calendar. When do you have time where you can schedule your writing? Pretend someone is offering you a job. A tiny one. They’re going to expect you to show up for ten minutes a day, with an option for overtime if you want it.

But those ten minutes are non-negotiable.

Be a Hard-Ass Boss

I am the most driven boss I’ve ever had. No one has ever expected more of me than I expect of myself.

I wouldn’t work seven days a week for anyone else.

I wouldn’t show up to do work that has no guarantee of pay for anyone else.

You are your own boss. And for a while, maybe even for a long time, you’re going to have to be a tough enough boss to keep things going even when you have no real indication that the work your doing is going to have the result that you want it to.

You don’t get to know if you’ll be a successful writer until after a lot of work is done. That’s the way this business works.

You have to expect a lot from yourself, because for a long time, no one else will expect it from you. You have to be willing to drive yourself. You have to expect yourself to show up and do good work, even when you don’t feel it.

That’s where a daily writing habit comes from. It’s not a feel-good exercise, although it does feel good. It’s a practice. And it’s a job.