Skip to main content

Today's Excuse: I Get Distracted

The simplest writing advice, and possibly the best, is some verson of Keep Your Butt in The Chair. With your butt in the chair, you have nowhere to go but to the screen or to the page. If you've set aside your time, and you have finally made it to your writing space, you should be halfway there. Your writing potential is suddenly alive and well.

Your butt is in the chair.

Hmm...that Excuse Editor lady says this is the best advice-- so where's my great writing?!?

DISTRACTIONS

Take a look at where your fingers and eyes travel once you sit down:

  • "You've got Mail!" How can you ignore that little envelope on the screen? It could be really, really important...

  • "ThatChickYouMetThatOneTime is Following you on Twitter, or SomeDudeFromHighSchoolWhoNeverTalkedToYou wants to be your Friend." Tweets and Posts are like potato chips, you can't stop with just one...

  • "Down with O.P.B." --Other People's Blogs. Yes, there are some great ones out there, but are your readers looking for yours?

  • "Beige, I think I'll paint the ceiling Beige." Looking around the room for inspiration won't kill your Writing Muse, but what if your Redecorating Muse wants to join the party?

  • "Flashback." Your inner editor makes a visit and starts picking apart your last writing session...

  • "Eenie, Meenie, Minie, Moe." You have reams of great notes and ideas to work on. It doesn't seem fair to pick a favorite.
EXCUSE EDITOR TIP:
FIND YOUR FOCUS

What works for you may not work for the Writer Next Door. The trick is to discover the path that lands you smack dab in Your writing moment.


  • Ease into it.

    • You need to get comfortable in your chair, test it out, relax a bit before you start writing. Besides, you're the Princess. And that email that came in? Totally your boulder-sized Pea. You won't be able to concentrate on anything until you open it. Catching up with your Facebook friends will help your mood. You can't start your writing day without checking Excuse Editor? OK, I won't stand in your way;)

    • Don't get too comfortable. Before you know it, your allotted writing time is gone. All of your Preparing to Write turned into Not Writing at all.

      • Set a Limit-- and a timer, if necessary, to "adjust to writing temperature". Make sure it only takes up a small portion of your writing time. If you have set aside an hour and a half for writing (and that is really all you have), don't get lost in Farmville. You have real stories to grow.
  • Jump Right In!
    • You are Ready! Pencils sharpened, laptop warmed up-- you begin. Words are showing up on the page so fast you are trying to keep up.
    • Come up for air. You jumped in so quickly you are splashing everywhere. Sure, you can edit for a life preserver later, but take a breath now. Your mind is a bit scattered, and it shows. Take a few minutes to make sure your writing will be able to be saved later:
      • Morning Pages or A Freewrite-- Julia Cameron is credited with the Morning Pages tool, a way to begin your creative day. Morning pages are three pages of stream of consciousness with No Inner Editor allowed. They are usually done in the morning. I've found that after the three pages, I've either written something inspiring that helps me focus on that day's writing, or I'm glad I got such nonsense out of the way, so I can get to the work of the day (if there's something else going on in my life, I can leave it scribbled on the page for now, and focus on something else.)  Even if you decide to do a freewrite into a word document, and your writing time is at night, it helps clear out some of the clutter.
  • Watch for Sharks
    • You need to be aware of your surroundings, but trust you will be safe with your butt in the chair. You are sitting there for your writing. Only if you dangle yourself over the edge will your writing be in danger.
    • Life Preserver is available at all times. Do whatever it takes to keep you away from the predatory distractions. Close your email, facebook, the internet. Sure, if you use online dictionaries, that's fine, but be aware of how long you linger. Decide on a writing project when you schedule your writing time, so you don't get lost swimming through your pages of ideas. Pick one and stick with it. Also, decide if your writing time is for writing or for editing-- you need both, but you may have trouble doing it at the same time. Be careful of waiting to be inspired. After a time, all that waiting adds up to a wimpy word count and a character who has been stranded in a off the highway bathroom for weeks!

Not all "writing" takes place in the chair. Even before you make it there, you are thinking of ideas, trying out scenerios. However, when you do make it to the chair, make it worth your time and allow your work to move forward.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Favorites:

Chicken Soup for the Soul: My Experience

The popularity of the Chicken Soup for the Soul books is beyond extraordinary. What started out as a multi- rejected book idea has turned into a multi-million dollar book empire. More than 110 million Chicken Soup for the Soul books have been sold. Many of the books have been translated to 40 different languages. I'm proud that my personal essays have been included in some of these books, and I hope to continue being a Chicken Soup contributor. My Story I thought I would share a bit about being published in these collections. I'm very happy with my Chicken Soup experiences, and part of that may be that I went into it with little expectations at first. I started with them because I had a few stories that seemed to fit what they were looking for, and I thought I had nothing to lose. Unlike some of the other markets and contests I was looking at, submitting to Chicken Soup could be done at no cost to me, and I didn't even need to worry about a postage stamp, because they ha...
6 comments
Read more

All the Right Ingredients to Writing Advice

Last time, I talked about people in our lives that are pretty sure they know how to be successful writers, because they spent much of their time reading. Sometimes their advice can be a blessing, sometimes just the opposite. It is the same with the plethora of advice available from other writers. Have you checked out almost every book about the writing process from your local library at one time or another? Are your shelves lined with your own copies of "the-perfect-writing-advice-that-will-get-me-published-once-and-for-all"? Are you a member of multiple online writing communities? Do you hold your breath just a little bit when waiting from the critique from that "certain someone" in your writing group? Yeah. Me too. And I don't think that gaining knowledge is a bad thing. We just have to be careful. Don't Let Too Many Cooks Create a Recipe for Disaster I love great food, I savor the tastes and textures of all kinds of cuisine; but unless I have specif...
3 comments
Read more

Why Ghostwriting? Guest Post by Kelly James-Enger

Is it Time to Disappear?  Why I Became a Ghost--and Why you Should, Too I never intended to become a ghostwriter. After all, why would I spend months of my life toiling away on someone else’ s book? No thanks. I only wanted to write my own books, and that’s what I did. I soon found, however, that the life of a book author wasn’t quite what I’d envisioned. I was working long hours, yet making less money than I had before, when I wrote only articles. The reason was simple—the time I spent promoting my books left me less time to write articles and other books, which cut into my income.             Fortunately for me, I was approached by a nutrition expert about coauthoring her book. I found I enjoyed collaborating with her, but the real payoff came when we finished the manuscript. As the author, she now had to start promoting it—but I was all done! That was enough for me. I decided to pursue coauthoring and ghostwriting, and “my” next book was ghos...
4 comments
Read more