Today’s article is written by regular contributor Krissy Brady.
One of the biggest challenges writers face is striking a balance between work, writing, and personal life. Throw a writing deadline into an especially hectic time in your life, and it’s easy to become overwhelmed.
Here are five simple steps to ensure you’ll meet your writing deadlines no matter what life throws your way:
1. Prioritize Your Writing Tasks
We all have calls for submissions and magazines we’d like to pitch our writing to. We also have personal deadlines we’re trying to meet, such as weekly word or page count goals for our novels/screenplays.
When all markets we submit to offer an equal amount of uncertainty, it’s hard to decide where to start. How do we decide which submissions hold the most potential?
Don’t fret if you feel lost in this department. What matters is you’re in this department, working toward a strategy that works best for your individual writing goals.
Here’s my personal strategy, which you can use as a starting point for your own:
I have magazines I’d like to submit pitches to, calls for submissions I’d like to submit literary pieces to, and two screenplays I’m working on to help me find an agent.
When it’s time to write, and I’m beside myself with where to start, the question I always ask myself is:
Which writing projects have the highest potential to earn my living?
In order to become a full-time writer, you need to make enough money to make the transition from your current job to your desired writing job. I always work on my magazine pitches before anything else. These will help build my credentials, and will help me earn a living.
Next I work on my passion projects. I start with the calls for submissions I’ve compiled with strict deadlines, then mosey on to my screenplays.
My screenplays are last on the list, but they’re not last in my heart. I’m sure you feel the same way about your current work-in-progress. When it comes to your passion projects, let them take as much time as they naturally need to become fabulous.
2. Be Realistic, Not Negative
Creating a realistic writing schedule isn’t an exact science (I’m still trying to get a grip on mine). No matter how hard we try, there are going to be unexpected setbacks that will cause delays with our writing projects.
There will be times we’ll be unable to meet a call for submissions deadline or one of our personal deadlines, and it’s important to not feel like a failure when this happens.
What’s important is to be open to the learning experience and ask yourself why and what?
- Why didn’t I meet the deadline? Could this have been prevented?
- What can I do to prevent this from happening in the future?
Do everything you can to push away thoughts like, “Why did I bother trying? Of course I wasn’t going to succeed,” and pull toward thoughts like, “At least I tried, and I’ll do better next time.”
As they say: Feel the fear, but do it anyway.
3. Do Your Chores Ahead of Time
Have you ever noticed the second a writing deadline starts putting pressure on us, we suddenly feel the urge to organize our socks by color, and vaccuum every nook and cranny of our homes?
Take note of your typical procrastination triggers—the random things you turn to when avoiding your writing—and take care of them ahead of time. I call this “procrastinating in advance.”
Not only is my mind clear and excuse-free when I start writing, my apartment looks fabulous!
4. Allow Time for Breaks
While we crave as much time to write as possible, once we’ve made the time, we end up with stage fright. There’s a large chunk of time sitting right in front of us, and we know the blinking cursor won’t move on its own—yet, we panic and resort to Facebook stalking and random tweeting.
I’m not sure why this is—whether it’s a form of self-sabotage or intimidation—but for whatever reason, we lose our fluency.
The more intimidating the project, the more you need to strategize your time. Strip away the intimidation by breaking down the project into smaller, bite-sized tasks.
For example, there’s nothing more intimidating than pitching an article idea to a high-end magazine.
However, if you take your pitch and break it down:
- Solidify the angle of your article
- Research your idea
- Contact and interview experts
- Write the rough draft of your pitch
- Revise and polish your pitch
- Research magazines to pitch to
- Contact the appropriate editor of each market
- Follow up in two weeks
It doesn’t seem as intimidating, does it?
Work on each phase of your goal, and take a small break in between to let your mind breathe, letting go of the previous phase so you can fully focus on the next one.
5. Use Organizational Tools to Help You Stay on Track
Every writer has their own way of organizing their writing goals. Some use a Monday-Friday checklist (or weekend checklist, depending on their work schedule); some use the notification feature on their cell phone; some use whiteboards or desk calendars. (Personally, I use the calendar app on my iPad.)
Find the organizational tools that best suit you, and you’ll be well on your way to meeting your writing deadlines without fear.
If you’re unsure of where to start with creating an organizational system for yourself, I highly recommend picking up a copy of The Productive Writer by Sage Cohen. She offers a wide array of advice and solutions to create a productive writing life, and it’s the most thorough book I’ve read on the subject.
We often become overly passionate about our writing and put too much pressure on ourselves to perform at a pace that only a machine could, and end up disappointed when we only complete a fraction of what we set out to.
By prioritizing your writing projects based on potential income and the deadlines set out by publications, you’ll then be able to realistically incorporate your passion projects into the mix.
What’s your strategy for meeting writing deadlines during especially hectic times?
Krissy! You keep leading me to all these blogs I haven ‘t read before.
Now, how to “procrastinate in advance” on the Internet…
LOL So true! Perhaps pre-scheduling social media posts would fall under that category? *snorts Hope all is well! XO
Thanks for the tips, Krissy! This really spoke to me. I had three writing deadlines this past week, and felt like I was running to catch up since they took much longer to complete than I thought. I’ve tabled my passion projects. I’ll definitely check out Sage’s book and also the idea of writing in chunks.
My pleasure Debra – I’m happy you found the tips useful! I totally know how you feel! Even with my most realistic writing schedule, I still can’t seem to finish what I set out to by the end of the day, lol! Everything always takes longer than I think it will.
I went through a huge learning curve this summer in terms of being more productive with my time, and I look forward to sharing more tips with you in the future. Happy Monday! :0)
Excellent advice! Especially about your “procrastination triggers”. Somehow I only notice the cobwebs in the corners and the roses that need pruning when a deadline looms. Got a big deadline in 10 days, and suddenly my house and garden are screaming for attention. Thanks for this. Will RT.
I’m really glad you enjoyed the post Anne! LOL It’s so funny you should say that – I had an assignment due this morning, so yesterday what did I do? Took out the garbage, did the dishes, and bought a new plant, LOL! Which of course I had to put into a decorative pot right that second. It’s funny the things we put ourselves through for the sake of creativity. :0)
Hope your writing is going fantastic!
There are days I wish I could clone myself. Organization is so important, and so hard… I missed my deadline on my first two published books by months. Now I seem to be back on track.
Great tips!
Congrats on getting caught up Diana! I’m so behind at the moment my head is spinning with where to start. Luckily, I’ve been meeting my concrete deadlines, but as for personal goals they’ve been suffering. I do have a strategy in place that will hopefully put me back on track for October 1st. Fingers crossed! :0)
It’s really all we can do – promise ourselves we’ll do better, and forge ahead to make the necessary changes. It’s funny how it’s so easy to create bad habits, and so hard to make good ones, lol!
Steven needs to be with someone that rellay cares about him. In pictures I have seen of him lately he doesn’t look healthy to me I am Worried!!! I look forward to meeting him I hope someday soon.
Definitely great tips, Krissy. This last month, I booked myself for several projects, reading and writing, and one way I’ve survived was by making a list (like you mention). Then, focusing on the project at hand. Little by little, I’m getting through them all.
What I love most about your tips is the reminder to be realistic but not negative. I’ve used weekly goal sheets I found once from Jane Friedman (http://bit.ly/OgfxmS), which were so helpful. But in the past, I’ve filled them with projects only a staff of ten could complete in seven days. Be realistic. Yep.
I totally know how you feel! I’m famous for overbooking myself. I create a list that I would have to be a machine to complete. Even if I were to cut out eating, sleeping, and going to the bathroom, there still wouldn’t be enough time, lol!
I’m still learning to reel myself in – this week’s list is going better than my past lists, but I still have some tweaking to do.
My issue at the moment is trying to figure out how long each task will take – as you know, snags happen, so my lists become inaccurate almost immediately.
I’m on a mission to figure this out though – I think it would help us all out in a big way. Will share in a future blog post, perhaps? 😉
This post is very timely. Someone shared it with me when I asked a question about prioritizing. Thanks. Here’s hoping I find the right (write?) balance.
I’m so glad you found the article useful Heather! The thing that always comforts me when I’m behind is that we’re in this together. We’re all making our way through unfamiliar territory and setbacks to reach our writing goals – it’s why I enjoy chatting and blogging so much – it’s so inspiring that we’re all going after exactly what we want!
Especially now, when my to-do list has turned into a scroll, LOL! 😉
Oh, if there would only be a magical method to eradicate procrastination… I fall in its trap so often. Thank you for the great suggestions. I wish your post could also give me a kick in the *%$ 🙂
Thank you,
Iulian
LOL I wish it could kick me in the ass too! This week has been especially brutal for me in the procrastination department. It seems to hit me in phases, and I really hope this one’s over soon. 😉
I’m just glad it’s something we all go through and we can vent about it when we need to. I’m looking VERY forward to my to-do list turning into a to-done list.
Hope you have a fabulous weekend! XO
I really enjoyed reading this. I thought I was the only one who procrastinated when I finally get time to write. The internet is so distracting. Thanks for the great tips.
I totally agree with you Khaula – TV is evil too! Being that my ultimate goal is to become a screenwriter (and hopefully a TV writer one day to boot), I feel like I’m betraying my industry if I were to get rid of my cable, LOL! So I’ve picked specific shows to stay on top of, and that’s it.
I’ve found that streamlining my focus to specific blogs, specific people, and specific shows have made it so that I can schedule in my procrastination (which sounds ridiculous, but it’s really been working wonders for me).
Hang in there – I KNOW you’ll find a routine that works for you! :0)
I couldn’t agree more with Krissy. I used this same formula too, when I participated in Nanowrimo 2011. I probably would not have finished without it.
I’m so proud of you for reaching your Nanowrimo word count goal! Are you participating again this year?
I won’t be able to participate this year, but I definitely want to next year – first of all, I need to figure out where my damn novel is going, LOL! My protagonist is just as stuck as I am. 😉