I’ve never managed to write a blog post in one minute, but here goes. My timer is set to start just as soon as I hit publish on this thing.
Here are some things I’ve tried over the last week or so while I’ve been quiet here.
(Oh, and the reason I’ve been quiet is because of household maintenance issues! Frozen pipe, ruined water heater, water softener (which is absolutely necessary for my well water), and getting all that dealt with has taken up a bit of time, but the biggest issue with it all was the anxiety this stuff caused me. I have yet to figure out how to write when I’m anxious about something. I usually turn to reading instead. This time I unfortunately turned to reading forums and blogs instead of fiction, which lead me to start a new experiment.)
My experiment of grouping my writing into one big block has failed. I’ve tried and tried to have another successful day after that first one and I just haven’t been able to pull it off.
I’m behind on my 2,000 a day word average I wanted to maintain in 2015. I usually try to avoid trying to play catch up, but I want to reach this goal, so I’m going to do something I don’t usually think is a good idea and try to catch up to my goal this month. I’ll need to write about 3,000 words a day on average through the end of the month. That’s a huge stretch for me but it’s not impossible. I can do it even though I’ve never before written that much for more than a few days at a time.
It comes down to this: It’s time to stop putting limits on myself when the limits shouldn’t exist. I mean, even on bad days I can write about 300 to 400 words an hour. 3,000 words is only 8 to 10 hours at that slow pace. I can physically write for 8 to 10 hours if necessary and saying I can’t would be an outright lie. I can read for that many hours a day if I’m bingeing, and I can watch tv for that many hours, and I can work on code for a website for that many hours, so I know that any limit I have regarding this is entirely made up in my head. I can write 3,000 words a day for a couple of weeks. Frankly, there shouldn’t be anything stopping me from doing it long-term (because I don’t always write at that slow pace), but I really don’t need to do more than catch up my goal and then go back to my daily 2,000 words.
Finally, yesterday, I started a new experiment limiting my time reading stuff. I need to cut back. Not fiction—of course not! But I read too much other stuff and end up overwhelmed with information and that makes it hard for me to concentrate sometimes. Also, all the publishing industry news can be frustrating and put me in an anti-creative mood. So it’s time to do something about it.
This experiment: No reading anything but fiction for the rest of January except on Saturdays.
I read this stuff on my Kindle and computer mostly, and sometimes on my phone. I did read a story this morning instead of the usual forums and blogs but it didn’t really help because the story was short enough that I convinced myself I could just finish it before getting started and I ended up starting later today than I wanted anyway.
What I’m hoping to accomplish is an interruption in the habitual opening of these websites so that I don’t just read this stuff out of habit. So even though maybe this won’t help with the time management issues I have, I still think it’ll benefit me. Reading fiction makes me want to write my own stories; reading that other stuff doesn’t. :D We’ll see how this goes over the rest of the month.
Well, it’s been a bit more than a minute and I really have to go start my writing today. I’m sure I’ll be back later with a report on my successful day. :D That’s the plan anyway!
I’m hoping to write a LOT of words today.