There are so many interesting people on this forum that I don't think I'll ever get round to writing my book. So can I ask you experienced scribes- How on earth do you do manage to contribute to the site and still find time to write?
Magic Seriously, I have the same problem (though lately I'm not on here so much either, and it's just my chaotic life which gets in the way...). I find I do more writing when I can't get on the internet (basically, in my free periods and boring lessons at college ). I'd suggest you put aside some time each day for writing, and keep to that schedule.
Setting aside time on a daily basis is a bit difficult due to the fact that I travel extensively with my job. I drive over a thousand miles a week and I'm not saying it has any effect on me but I keep shouting "Sorry officer I didn't realise how fast I was going" whenever my alarm goes off I will really have to get down to some serious writing because I want to escape the rat race as soon as I possibly can. Inside me there is a genius wating to escape but the way things are at the moment it may take an autopsy to get him out
It isn't easy, is it? Some have more time than others, but nobody has enough. Personally I watch less than an hour a week of TV, I'm a chronic insomniac and I hardly ever drink alcohol, which conspire to give me enough time to compose my two thousand words a day. I know a writer who gets up at 5am so as to get their writing done before everyone else in their house wakes up--seven days a week. Famous writers have done even more insane things. Philip K. Dick went the other way. He didn't have a job. In the 1950's, while trying to get published, he lived in a one-room apartment and wrote; I believe he was frequently obliged to subsist on cat food.
If you're not a natural procrastinator, you probably have no busniness being a writer. That being said, we have to have a certain professionalism about our writing careers. Seeing yourself as a professional writer can give you the motivation to set aside that time everyday and write. Butt in the chair, as they say. Skip
i only monitor this and several other writer's sites daily, in order to help out where i can... so, i don't 'hang out here' which is probably what you're referring to... plus, i don't work for anyone or have any family still at home, so my time is entirely my own... you can get to that point, too, if you live long enough! ;-) [i'm 69, so you probably have a ways to go yet]... love and hugs, maia
Work by pen and paper in a comfortable spot (like your bed) or on a computer with no internet access (like a laptop, outside). In our line of work, its very easy to get distracted because when we get out of our zone, its very hard to just get back into it a couple minutes later (at least, for me.) So when I'm on the computer, here, I'll be typing my story, get drawn out of my zone because I need a new word, or am just tired/hungry/the dogs are in my way/etc, for anything really, and then I'll say to myself, "oh I'll just check my emails for a minute." Then I find an hour has gone by and I'm late for something else. I have no time for a schedule either, so what I do is I stretch myself thin. I'll stay up an hour later or will purposely not take my sleeping pill to get writing done. I'm not saying that this is the most healthy way to do it by all means, but you do what you have to do. In your case it sounds like you get distracted to easily, so get somewhere that isn't near internet access or whatever distracts you. Get a PC with only microsoft word on it or commit to using just a pen and paper and do it whenever you can. Thats what I do, at least, and I get a fair amount of writing done; between 1000 and 2000 words a day. Good luck!
I tried using my laptop for writing without it being connected to the net, because it was a distraction, but I seem to always need it to look up things, like dictionary definitions (no I don't own a dictionary) and researching various ideas or objects.
Finding time to write is never easy no matter what. I have two children who are always full of life and bouncing off the walls until they fall asleep at night. I spend quite a bit of time online, but in having a laptop it is easy to monitor them and join in with them as all I have to do is pick it up and take it with me. Whilst they are happily playing together or having quiet time during the day I sit down to write, if I can't write I come onto the forum. As you can see from my post count I have spent many many hours online here. Also I don't sleep very much so everything that I need to get done gets done in the late hours at night and early hours of the morning when my children are sleeping. It may sound impossible for a mother of a 2 year old and a 3 year old to be online as much as I am and still find time for both my children and my writing, but it isn't at all. You just have to be able to multi-task. Something I learnt when my daughter was born. It just means that during the day I am constantly walking way from my laptop to go join in with my children and tend to them. Many mothers work from home with young ones and have internet based jobs. It isn't a hard task when you are able to manage your time properly. But recently I haven't been writing much at all so that is why I am so active. The more I write the less time I spend online.
simple. i don't. nah seriously i am having such a writers block at the moment it is unbeleivable. sometimes it makes me glad when my dad bans me from the comp cos i just go on his laptop which has no internet and write something. i have managed to write something this morning (in the poetry section if ya interested) and it is the firstthing i have wrote in ageeees. sometimes you just find ten minutes where you can write something so take it. either that or write on paper, away from the computer so as not to get distracted. or by a type writer as i am trygin to convonce me mam to buy me
I have developed the skill of learning to do two things at once. I use 80% of my brain for writing, and 20% on fourms like this (I'm also a membor of other forums, like the H.P. Lovecraft forums and the Silent Hill forums. This is why most of the things I say on here is very stupid. )
hahaa, nice excuse. i am just geniuinly stupid. and like i said, people go through oahses anyways with writing. sometimes you find yourslef constantly writing and hardly on here and other times you hardly write but have this site to make you feel better about that fact.
^ hahahaa,, and you still got that. tut tut. thanks and maths is actually my stronger subject out of most of them
Yes but I have to say that it's a solar calculator and it's cloudy today(best bit of bull**** you'll hear today I bet)
^^ oww,, thats a good excuse. thanks for that. (i tend not to do homework and have ran out of excuses since they stopped believing that my nana died for the 10th time tis month )
