Scheduling Time to Write

I hope you had a lovely Christmas and are enjoying some down time (and reading time) in this in-between period. I always love this time of year, the days after the craziness of Christmas and the excitement and motivation a new year can bring.

Thanks to those who commented on last week’s post. Great to hear your thoughts.

I’m not even going to bother reporting in on my word count goal for the last week. It was well below the 10K I had planned but as usual I underestimated how much time I would have in the lead up to Christmas day…which brings me to this week’s post topic: planning.

Yesterday I sat down and mapped out a draft schedule for my writing/working week. This time last year I signed up to Sarra Cannon’s HB90 course and absolutely loved some of her ideas – listing all your tasks and things you want to get done in a day/week/month/quarter and year, then prioritising, cutting some of them completely off your list, and also working out how many hours you realistically have in a given day and week to get things done. As mentioned above I’m a chronic over-estimator when it comes to how many things I can do in a day. There are always things left over on my list which get bumped to the next day, some of which never get done.

And while we’re on lists, when I use them and actually schedule I get a whole lot more done. The problem being that when the lists get too long, I panic and then stop making them – and then achieve even less. For the last six months I’ve been list-less and have operated purely from what I can hold in my head – not an effective way to operate. So, using some of Sarra’s suggestions I sat down yesterday with a brand new bullet journal and planned out my ideal week including writing time, podcast time, teaching and mentoring time, and also time to ride my horse, hang out with my dogs and exercise.  I also scheduled in time for visits to my mum in the nursing home and kept most eventing free for reading and TV watching with my family. Weekends are dedicated family and riding time – unless something goes seriously awry.

Acutely aware of my tendency to cram too many things into one day, I worked on blocking out certain times for my writing and, after listening to Michelle Barraclough’s chat with Mark Smith a while back on the Writers’ Bookclub Podcast, I’ve decided to block out 2.5 hours in the morning 6 days per week, along with a couple of two-hour blocks on weekday afternoons. That means an early start, but it also means I’ll get the writing done – if I leave my phone on the charger and if I remember I’m writing a draft and it doesn’t have to be good, just done.

I’ve pencilled in all the other things mentioned above and worked out how many hours per week I need to spend on each of them in case there are unexpected interruptions (and there are bound to be!) so I can then make up the time at night or on the weekends.

For the next few days I’ll be writing whenever the whim takes me but come January 1st I plan on implementing my new schedule and being much more disciplined. In conjunction with some writing sprints with my buddies from The Inkwell and that January 31 deadline I’m hoping that the morning writing sessions will become a habit and a great way to start the new year.

How about you? Do you schedule in writing time? What are your writing plans for 2023?