Victoria KimbleThis was not the greatest summer of writing for me.
I still got up every day at 5:00am. I got ready and got down to my computer around 6:00. But most days I couldn’t make the words come out. I have an outline all ready and every time I look over it, I love the story even more. But I couldn’t seem to get the words beyond the outline. As a writing mom, I only have from 6:00 to 7:00 every morning to write. I watched those minutes fade away as the summer morning sun rose higher each day, and I had very little to show for it.
Stuff like that can destroy a writer. I think every person who dreams of being a writer imagines that it will be easy to sit down and write, especially if they’ve been able to carve out a good writing time. And then every person who actually writes will at some point realize how false that idea is.
This all brings me to my writing tip:
Go with the flow and adjust your goals.
It’s good to have goals as a writer. Goals are one of the main motivations that actually get us in the chair to put the words down. But allow yourself the freedom to adjust your goals if your life has shifted for a little while.
I believe part of my problem was the fact that for the past three years, I’ve been able to write 1,000 at a time. This summer those 1,000 words were just not coming together every day. So I faltered. I couldn’t even bring myself to type one word some days, knowing that I wasn’t going to make it to 1,000. My summer has been so busy for a variety of personal reasons, and my writing was affected.
But I had a breakthrough this week, because I adjusted my goals. I’m not able to write 1,000 at a time these days. But I can write 500 words. As soon as I stopped making 1,000 words my goal, the 500 words each day started pouring out. I can’t wait to see what 500 words will come out tomorrow.
I wrote my first book Soprano Trouble 500 words at a time. A goal like that can and will produce a finished product.
Are there any goals you had set that just don’t work right now, and now you feel stuck? Hit the comments and let me know! I hope you feel the freedom to adjust your goals so that you can move forward. Don’t worry…you can always adjust your goals again in the future.
Julia N. White
Michelle Kaderly Welsh
Misha
I have a very busy life and do t have much time to write. I think a good goal for me would to be to write a couple times a week.
That’s a great goal! Nice and measurable. Good luck!
This post is so true. I really don’t come up with a word number goal because I can’t usually reach it. I try to be flexible and just write whatever I can when I can. After a while it adds up.
It does add up! I wish I could remember that more often. That any words added are beneficial, no matter how many there are.
Great tip. I had SO wanted to finish a skeleton of the book I’m currently working on by the end of summer vacation. I don’t think it’s going to happen and I was really discouraged by that, but then put things in perspective and realized, like you said, I can create a new goal. So I will do that…thank you!
Good for you! I guess the real point is we should make our goals work for us, rather than becoming slaves to our goals. And if our goals work for us, then we’re the boss, and we can make them do whatever we need them to. 🙂