In a recent post, I made the claim that you can accomplish whatever writing goals you have set in as little as 15 minutes a day. I know that might sound unrealistic. It’s hard to get in the mood to just sit down and force out words.
We’re all writer’s here and I know how hard it can be sometimes to get those words out. I know for sure there were times where I spend a couple of hours on a “writing” session and wrote exactly zero words.
Another problem that comes up when you’re talking about squeezing in words whenever you have freetime is writing routine. If you have a very stringent writing (or pre-writing) routine, you might need to skip it if you’re pressed for time and squeezing in words when you have a couple minutes.
And I get it. I used to have this huge routine that could take up to an hour if I wasn’t paying attention.
It involved all sorts of crazy things, including making sure that all of my desktop applications were open in the “correct” order in the taskbar.
But none of that matters anymore. What matters now is being able to overcome that weird combination of OCD, superstition, and procrastination and being able to write without the “prep work” when there is not a lot of time.
I did that tonight, in fact. I had ten minutes in between things right after the kids went to bed and I figured, why not see what I can do. In 10 minutes, I wrote 158 words. For me, a slow writer, that’s pretty good. Especially considering the fact that when I first started working on fiction, there were nights where sat at my computer for 3-4 hours and had less words than that.
And that leads me to the point of this post.
I just want to share the simple strategy I’ve been using with my fiction lately to help reduce the amount it takes to start writing. It’s nothing earth-shattering, and you’re probably already doing it, but it’s a second-nature thing and you probably don’t even realize you’re doing it.
So what’s the big secret?
Write in your head.
And that’s it. I hate to over simplify things but that’s the basis of it. After the kids are ready and dropped off and I’m in the car by myself, I take advantage of the quiet time to focus on one thing. Only one thing. And that is “what scene do I want to write (or finish) tonight?”
I take a few minutes and just kind of brainstorm what the next scene in my WIP will be. And then during the day, as I have time, I plan out the details of that scene.
This helps in a couple of ways. First, it forces me to continue thinking about my current project. While planning that single scene or part of a scene, I’m still considering the bigger picture and how that scene fits in the overall plot. And second, just keeping the scene in my head gets my subconscious to work and little ways to improve it keep slipping in.
Then at night, after the kids are in bed, I get to work and write the parts that I had planned out earlier. And with the “thinking” part already out of my head, the “writing” part is totally easy.
So like I said, you might already be doing this and not knowing it. But once you know, you can better use your focus on the scene and get those words written.
This works for me. What works for you? Leave a comment and let us know!
