How do Busy People Find Time to Write?
Tuesday, June 15, 2010 at 5:00AM
Photo via flickr
Do you want to write a book but are having trouble finding the time? Unless you are an author by trade and write as your “job”, finding the time to write can be a daunting task! You have a family, a job, and a million other responsibilities which makes you keep putting your writing off because you can’t seem to grab an extended period of time to start the writing process. But some of the busiest people write books. They manage to carve out little bits of time everyday on a consistent basis to write something. It is not so much how much you write each time, but just that you keep writing a little every day.
"Much may be done in those little shreds and patches of time which every day produces, and which most men throw away."
Here are some suggestions that may help you find a little bit of extra time to sit down and write. If you can take some of these suggestions and do them consistently, day after day, you will find that you soon will have a page, then a chapter, then eventually your book! Again, it is not so much how many pages you crank out at each sitting, but more getting into the rhythm and just getting something out each day. Everything will then fall into place.
-
Instead of watching TV every night, take one or two hours to write.
-
Keep a pad of paper with you to write while you are in the carpool, or waiting for your kids to finish soccer practice.
-
Get up an hour earlier or stay up an hour later. Make that YOUR dedicated time.
-
Get up at your regular work day time on weekends and spend that time writing.
-
If you can change your work schedule to work 4 longer days then you could have one day of interrupted writing if you work better with longer intervals.
-
If you spend time playing Sudoku, crossword puzzles or online games, consider giving them up until you finish your book.
-
If you spend a lot of time in the car for your job, start taking a recorder with you to record your ideas and put them onto paper later.
-
Use online notebooks such as Evernote to keep track of notes and organize your ideas. Then you can be more efficient in the shorter time frames you may have for writing.
-
Think of what you may already have written in a blog or articles you have written. Start with them as a base and work from them.
No matter what trick you use to find yourself some time, make sure you make it consistent and let your family know that it is YOUR time. Don’t have your phone in the room with you and disconnect the internet so you are not tempted to check your email just one more time. Even just an half hour a day, on a consistent and uninterrupted basis, will eventually turn into that masterpiece that you have always wanted to write!
How do you find time to write?
Reader Comments (6)
When I wrote my children's chapter book I got up at 4.30am, every week day, and wrote for 2 hours before getting ready for my work day. When I came home from work I also wrote for another 2 hours. But....I had my mother living with us at the time and she cooked every evening.
I sent my manuscript to my editor just four months after starting. The time from idea to book launch was just over 12 months.
Megan
congradulations on your book. If you have a goal to accomplish you can usually find the time. I think the busier a person is the more time they seem to find. Thanks for your comments.
That's how it has to be. If you want to have more time, you have to sacrifice the time you spend on non-essential activities. I do this with my writing. I also try to do this with my family. If I didn't, we would never see each other.
Hi Julia, it's amazing how we can find time once we make the commitment to do something. I find that if I only spend 1 hour a day on e-mail and not have it open all day like I used to, I find a lot of time to do more productive things. Finding time to write blog articles is also one of those things on my priority list. Thanks for the tips!
Anna
There's a change in mindset about time that helps (me at least) in taking advantage of those short periods of time that crop in in the day to day. Instead of thinking "I only have 30 minutes, I better hurry up." or worse "I can;t do anything in 20mins so I won't even try." I try to look at it like "Oh look, I have 30 (or 20 or even 10) minutes that I get use to make a little progress".
Kerry
Looking at your time from a positive rather than a negative perspective is a great idea. Thanks for the tip.