Scott Oldford Site

Tag: time for writing

  • 30 Minutes, 30 Days: This Practice Can Help You Become a Better Writer

    30 Minutes, 30 Days: This Practice Can Help You Become a Better Writer

    I’ll admit it, I’m guilty of waiting for my muse.

    I’ve waited while drinking a third cup of coffee. I’ve waited while listening to mood music. I’ve waited while reading someone’s else’s work. I’ve waited while killing time on the internet.

    But, quite often, my muse lets me down. She must have a very exciting personal life because she rarely visits. In fact, I can count the number of times in my life I’ve been inspired to write on one hand.

    In September, I took matters into my own hands and set an ambitious goal.

    I wrote every single morning for 30 minutes.

    No days off, no excuses, no matter what.

    And guess what? I did it.

    I wrote when I wasn’t feeling well. I wrote after four hours of sleep. I wrote when I should have been vacuuming, doing laundry or cooking. I wrote when I had projects due. I wrote standing at my kitchen counter. I wrote in my office. I wrote with my daughter sitting on my lap.

    At first, I told myself I wouldn’t be able to do it.

    After all, I take care of a toddler all day. My first responsibility is being a mother. My second is running a small business.

    I didn’t have time to add an extra 30 minutes of personal writing into the mix.

    But here’s the thing: I did have time.

    It was time I mindlessly scrolled through Instagram or Facebook, watched random YouTube videos, read Medium articles or checked headlines on Huffington Post.

    I had that time, and I bet you do too.

    Here’s what I learned: I don’t need my muse. She can visit if she wants, but her presence is not necessary for me to create.

    In 30 days, I:

    • Published nine new posts on my blog, Freelancing Mama and drafted another 21 posts.
    • Planned out my content until March 2017.
    • Completed 30+ pages of an ebook on becoming a virtual assistant.
    • Decreased the amount of time it takes me to write a post
    • Gained more confidence in my abilities.
    • Discovered my well of ideas would not dry up if I dipped my bucket in every day.

    I finally felt confident enough to call myself a writer; I am a writer.

    Here’s how I made it happen.

    Each morning, I sat down and turned on a timer. I’d spend 30 (mostly uninterrupted) minutes writing. I didn’t check my email, Facebook or any websites.

    I used Toggl to track my time and Brain.fm to keep me focused and drown out the sounds of toddler morning TV. If I needed to take care of something, I paused the timer, did the task as quickly as possible and went right back to writing. On the weekends, I was able to hole up in my office while my husband took care of our daughter.

    I realized I don’t need perfect conditions to write. I could stand in the middle of the tornado that is my kitchen and write as if I was at Walden Pond. As long as my mind was peaceful, it didn’t matter what my surroundings were like.

    Want to create a daily writing habit? Set yourself up for success with these tips.

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    1. Get an accountability buddy

    When it comes to meeting your goals, having someone hold you accountable can make all the difference. You don’t want to disappoint someone who believes in you.

    I’m a member of an awesome Slack group called #JustWrite. My writing streak started with a week-long challenge from Sara Frandina that I liked so much, I didn’t stop. Every day, I let other members of the Slack group know I completed another day of writing.  Knowing the group was waiting for my daily check-in kept me accountable and gave me encouragement to keep going.

    2. Choose to make writing a priority

    As soon as I decided to pursue this journey, I knew it wouldn’t work unless I made it a priority.

    I couldn’t let my to-do list dictate my morning. I was going to write whether I had one or 100 projects due that day.  In the grand scheme of it, thirty minutes was not going to make or break my business, but it could make or break my writing process.

    3. Sit down and write.

    At some point, we just have to do it. We can’t wait for perfect conditions, or the mood to strike, or the planets to align.

    One my favorite quotes about writing comes from Anne Tyler; she says “If I waited until I felt like writing, I’d never write at all.”

    What’s next?

    Not only did writing every day produce tangible results, but it improved my life in other ways.

    I was more motivated to meet goals that had nothing to do with writing like cooking homemade meals and going on a walk in the evenings.

    Completing these 30 days also gave me a huge boost of confidence. In fact, it inspired me to submit my first guest post – the one you just read!

    So, what’s next? I’m going to keep going. I plan to write every day for the rest of the year.

    Then write every day of 2017.

    Will you join me?
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  • Can Finally Doing Your Chores Help You Write More?

    Can Finally Doing Your Chores Help You Write More?

    I was an untidy child.

    Where my brother relied on a ruler to line up his toy cars, I lived with jumbled abandon. Thank heavens our mother was teetotal, or the ghastly state of my bedroom would surely have driven her to drink.

    I can’t remember when it was — or what prompted it, for that matter — but at some point I changed. Always one for extremes, I went from being super scruffy to annoyingly tidy. It turns out being too much of a neat freak is just as counterproductive. Maybe even more so.

    I spent countless hours scrubbing every nook and cranny of my home with a toothbrush and all I got for my effort was a fleeting sense of accomplishment (and washerwoman hands). Not pretty or productive.

    I eventually let go of my compulsive behavior and found a happy medium. Now I focus on doing the right thing at the right time. But what does this have to do with writing more?

    Why mornings (and evenings) matter

    What do your mornings look like? Do you fly out the door with wet hair and a slice of toast clenched between your teeth?

    If that sounds like you, you’re either a snooze-button junkie or you’re doing stuff in the morning that you could be doing the night before. Both can make for a stressful start to your day. Rushed mornings can also mean you come home to a pile of dirty dishes, an unmade bed, or other tasks you didn’t get around to doing.

    Living like this drains your energy and saps your creativity. Is it any wonder you’re not writing more? Or at all, for that matter?

    Think about what you can do in the evenings or on the weekend that will give you more time in the morning: ironing a shirt, polishing shoes, packing lunch, etc.. Using this approach will not only give you a sense of accomplishment; you’ll also feel more relaxed knowing you have less to tackle in the mornings.

    The indisputable benefits of being a neat freak

    Chores suck, I get it, but the alternative is worse. If you get into the habit of not just staying on top of your chores, but actually doing them at the right time, your life will transform itself.

    You’ll be more creative. It will help you overcome that bout of writer’s block you’ve been struggling with.

    Messy surroundings leave you uninspired and unable to focus. The opposite is also true. Without the distraction of clutter your mind is free to create.

    You’ll have more time for the things that matter.

    You can put all that extra time you used to spend doing last-minute chores to much better use. You could write 500 words for your new novel, pitch that magazine, outline a blog post, schedule your editorial calendar for the rest of the year. The list goes on.

    It will free you up to plan for freelance-writing success.

    Whether you are already a free agent or if intend to quit your cubicle in the not-too-distant future, the sooner you start planning for your imminent success, the sooner it will happen.

    Time is elastic

    We’ve all experienced how five minutes can feel like a week or how an hour can fly by in a nanosecond. When you focus on doing things at the right time, you’ll get them done sooner. Conversely, leaving your chores until the last minute invariably means they’ll take longer.

    Why? Your head isn’t in it.

    Doing something the night before won’t make it more fun, but you’ll be focused on the task at hand and ultimately more efficient. Leave it until the morning and your mind will be elsewhere (the office, the traffic, your inbox, etc.).

    Doing the things you’re supposed to do when you’re supposed to do them is boring and nerdy.

    Obviously you’d rather be [fill in the blank], but at least give it a try before you count it out. You can thank me (in vegan cupcakes) later.

    How do you plan your daily chores so you still have time to write?

  • Need More Time to Write? Plan a DIY Writing Retreat

    Need More Time to Write? Plan a DIY Writing Retreat

    Finding uninterrupted time to focus on your craft is tough. That’s why attending a writing retreat or residency is often a highlight of a writer’s year.

    Writing retreats and residencies alike can be a fantastically rewarding experiences, but not everyone has the time or money to commit to one.

    But if right now isn’t the right time to head away for a writing retreat or residency, that doesn’t mean you can’t still enjoy uninterrupted time on your work.

    You can create your own DIY writing retreat without even having to leave home.

    Is a DIY writing retreat right for you?

    Before planning your own DIY retreat, make sure it’s right for you. Decide what you’d like to gain from the experience and evaluate if you can get that experience from a DIY retreat or if another option would be better.

    If you’re yearning for some uninterrupted time to work on a project or time to do some deep thinking about your next career steps, a DIY retreat could be perfect for you.

    But if the primary reason you want to go on a writing retreat or residency is to meet other writers and creative types, a DIY writing retreat will likely not offer the results you’re looking for.

    Get the timing right

    When you’re planning your DIY retreat, try to pick a time when life is a little slower.

    Select a  time when you don’t expect to be working a lot of overtime, or you’re not going to be busy preparing for holidays or other events. Maybe even pick a time when the kids are away at camp or at Grandma’s house.

    Whatever time you choose, the most important thing is to put it on your calendar. Respect the time you set aside for your DIY retreat just as you would if you were traveling to a formal, organized retreat.

    It’s easy to say you’ll spend all weekend on your DIY retreat, but then the dishwasher needs unloading, piles of laundry need folding, your mom’s calling to chat, there’s a game on the TV, a friend wants you to come over for a barbecue, and the farmer’s market sounds inviting.

    No matter how tempted you are by these distractions, stick to your original plan. If you don’t carve the time out of your life for a DIY retreat, you won’t find it. Let people know you’re unavailable. You already have a commitment: your retreat.

    If a whole weekend seems like too much time to set aside, consider planning a mini-retreat. Spend an afternoon at a coffee shop or bring your notebook to the local park to have a quick  mini retreat.

    Select a location

    Now that you’ve decided when to have your retreat, you have to decide where.

    Some people work best holed up in the basement with no distractions, while others work best in beautiful surroundings.

    If home is distracting, consider getting a room in a nearby hotel. The less time you spend traveling, the more time you can spend writing and indulging in deep thinking.

    Make sure you’ll be comfortable and undisturbed and will have easy access to food, exercise, and anything else you need to get the most out of your time.

    If creativity or deep thinking is your main objective, consider a camping and journaling retreat. Go camping, bring a Moleskin and pen (or your trusty laptop), and get all your thoughts down on paper.

    You can even combine this with a home or hotel retreat by taking a few hours to be out in nature with pen and paper to gather your thoughts and ideas.

    Set a goal

    To make the most of your time, take a few minutes to decide what you’d like to accomplish.

    Your goal could be outlining a new chapter of your book, writing a few poems, or putting together a fellowship application.

    You could work on a new longform article, put together a list of pitches, or write 5,000 words of your romance novel. Whatever you’d like to do, decide ahead of time and focus on it.

    You can always change your goal as you go, but having one to start with is helpful. You can’t reach it if you don’t have it.

    Consider writing your goal on a whiteboard or large piece of paper and having it nearby so you can remind yourself about why you’re doing in this retreat.

    Whether you’re staying at home or moving to a new venue for your retreat, be sure to gather all your materials. Bring your laptop and charger, a favorite Moleskin and pens. Consider an adult coloring book or yoga mat or another favorite item to fire up your creativity.

    Plan a schedule and stick to it

    You only have a limited amount of time for your retreat, so plan to use it wisely.

    Before you begin, make a schedule of how you’d like to spend your time. Allocate time for brainstorming and creativity exercises along with dedicated time to work on your goal projects.

    Be sure to schedule breaks into your day for meals and chances to recharge. Your brain won’t work as well when your stomach’s empty.

    Avoid distraction

    Turn off the Wi-Fi. Turn off your phone. The world won’t end if you take a few hours off.

    If you’re worried about urgent messages, check your phone every few hours or use your phone settings to allow only calls from certain numbers, like specific family members.

    Ask important people ahead of time to only call you in an emergency, just as they would if you were away at a writing retreat or vacation without cell phone coverage.

    Don’t fall into an internet black hole while you’re writing. If you need to look something up for your draft, make a note and look it up later. It’s too easy to look up one little thing and then see an email and check the weather and before you know it, you’ve spent an hour online.

    After the retreat, take time to review (and schedule your next retreat)

    Spend the last few minutes of your retreat assessing how it went. Were you able to accomplish your goals? If no, why not? Were you distracted? Did you not have enough time? Did you have a comfortable space? Were you procrastinating?

    Taking some time to think about (and perhaps journal) what went well and what you’d like to do differently next time. Then get your next retreat right onto your calendar.

    Have you ever planned a DIY writing retreat? What did you do to protect your time?

  • 6 Ways to Make Time to Write: A Guide for Busy Parents

    6 Ways to Make Time to Write: A Guide for Busy Parents

    Four years ago, I felt busy.

    I never seemed to have enough time to get everything done. I loved my work — writing and working with writers — and I worked on fiction projects sporadically.

    Then, just over three years ago, my daughter was born.

    I realized everything I thought I knew about time management no longer applied.

    A lot of the great advice I’ve come across on things like procrastination or time management seems to be aimed at twenty-somethings with no kids.

    As a parent, a huge amount of time is taken up not just by children (feeding them, playing with them, getting them to sleep) but also by child-related chores (washing bottles, endless laundry and mopping up).

    I wouldn’t change it for the world. I love my kids.

    But I also love writing — and I’m not willing to put it on hold for years while the children grow up.

    Quick note: Whether you’re a stay-at-home parent or a working parent, life with kids is manic. I’ve worked everything from almost-full-time to not-at-all over the past three years (depending on my husband’s schedule) and finding time to write has always been a challenge.

    Why all that great time-management advice no longer works

    I’ll admit, to my slight shame, I wrote my fair share of posts on time management when I was in my 20s and — in retrospect — had few responsibilities or commitments.

    Lots of good advice doesn’t really apply when you have children. Here are some common tips I see over and over again (and these days, I want to scream “but you don’t have any kids!” every time I read them).

    • “Become an early riser”: Sadly, my one-year-old has taken this advice to heart, and normally wakes at 5:30 a.m., derailing any plans I might have to get some work done first thing in the morning. 
    • “Switch off the TV and save 2-3 hours every evening!”: my husband and I normally collapse on the sofa with our dinner and watch an episode of something. But the rest of the evening is taken up with household chores and actually having a chance to talk to one another without two children shrieking over us. 
    • “Get a full 7-8 hours sleep, you’ll be more productive”: I’m sure this is true; sadly, it’s also quite often impossible! Our kids supposedly sleep through, but it’s pretty common for one of them to be up for an hour or more in the middle of the night.

    I’m sure you’ve come across your fair share of time management advice that’s pretty useless for parents. Share the best — or worst! — of it in the comments.

    Of course, plenty of writers do have kids and it’s perfectly possible to write when you have a family.

    Here are a few things that can work:

    1. Get in the habit of writing in short bursts

    Pre-kids, I thought I only wrote well when I could spend an hour or more working, especially if I was writing fiction.

    These days, most of my writing is done in 30-minute bursts. When I had a newborn and a toddler, I used to write for just 15 minutes while their midday naps overlapped.

    Although writing for very short periods of time might feel weird if you’re not used to it, you can clock up words surprisingly quickly if you write daily.

    I’ve made more progress on my current novel in the last four months than on almost anything I’ve written previously, writing for just 30 minutes every day.

    Here are some ways you might fit short writing bursts into your day:

    • 6-6:30 a.m.: A 30-minute slot before everyone gets up (if your kids sleep later than that!) 
    • 12:15-12:45 p.m.: A 30-minute slot during your lunch hour, if you work full time 
    • 5.30-6 p.m.: A 30-minute slot between the kids’ meals and bathtime, while your partner plays with them (this is when I normally write) 
    • 9-9.30 p.m.: A 30-minute slot once you’ve had a chance to unwind and relax in the evening

    If 30 minutes is too much of a stretch for you right now, start with 15 minutes or even 10.

    You might want to check out Write a Novel in Ten Minutes a Day by Katharine Grubb, who homeschools her five children and still finds time to write!

    2. Use plans, systems, templates and checklists

    Once, you could probably sit down and write uninterrupted for three hours (even if that only happened on the weekend). As a parent, there’s a good chance you’re forever being interrupted.

    If you don’t have any sort of writing schedule, you probably spend a fair amount of time trying to remember what the heck you were going to write next.

    I’ve always been a fan of plans, templates and checklists, but as a parent, these are becoming even more valuable. For instance, I no longer decide on a blog post topic on the spur of the moment: I plan my content calendar a month ahead of time — and I’ve been blogging more consistently than I ever did pre-kids.

    Here are a few examples to help you implement systems that work for you:

    It’s well worth coming up with your own templates and checklists for tasks you find yourself doing on a regular basis.

    Note: Planning isn’t just for writing. Having a meal plan for the week or having a checklist of household chores can make parenting go much more smoothly. Check out Planning with Kids for lots of great tips and ideas.

    3. Don’t try to write with kids in the room

    I’ve tried a few times to write while looking after the kids (usually while they’re watching TV) and … it just doesn’t work.

    It’s incredibly hard to focus or get any sense of flow when you’re constantly being interrupted by small people — or when you need to keep glancing up to check they’ve not climbed on the windowsill, again.

    If your children are happily occupied, use the time to get on with something mundane — like washing dishes or sorting laundry or going through emails — so you cut down on the chores you need to do in the evening.

    That way, you can have child-free writing time later on.

    4. Swap time off with your partner

    One fairly straightforward way to get some extra writing time is to ask your partner to take the kids.

    Chances are, for this to seem fair to both of you, you’ll need to take the kids to give your partner some free time at some point.

    For instance, you could take the kids out to the park for two hours on Saturday mornings, and your partner could take them for two hours in the afternoon. You both get some much-needed time to yourself — but you also get plenty of time together as a family too.

    If you’re a single parent, kudos to you — I have no idea how you do it! Can you rope in a friend or family member to help out once a week? Or if that’s not possible, can you swap childcare with a friend each week?

    5. Book a writing retreat

    While this can seem more like a dream than a realistic prospect when your kids are small, a writing retreat can be a brilliant opportunity to boost your progress and motivation.

    A retreat could be anything from an informal half-day spent in the library to a weeklong escape to another city (or even abroad). As a parent, you’re probably going to be looking at the shorter end of the retreat spectrum.

    I went on a great one-day retreat hosted by Lorna Ferguson, who blogs at Literascribe, at the start of March. I looked forward to it for weeks beforehand, got loads of words written, and felt enthusiastic about carrying on.

    6. Let go of perfectionism (as a writer and as a parent)

    I think all writers have at least a little bit of a tendency towards perfectionism.

    We often carry ideas around in our heads for ages before daring to set them down on paper, because the act of doing so inevitably makes them real, rather than perfect.

    As a parent writer, you can’t possibly live up to some “perfect” standard – not when it comes to your writing, and not when it comes to your kids.

    And frankly, it doesn’t even matter.

    A good blog post — well-structured and clearly written — will be infinitely more useful to your readers than a perfect blog post that only exists in your head.

    And when it comes to your children … well, my kids watch more TV than they ideally should. I definitely do not create balanced, organic meals every day from scratch. My house could not, by any stretch of the imagination, be called “tidy.”

    It’s not perfect. But my kids are happy and thriving and I get to carry on with the career I love.

    Whatever writing and parenting challenges you’re facing right now, I wish you the very best of luck.

    It’s not easy to juggle both. But it’s definitely worthwhile.

    Parents, tell us your secrets to successfully juggling family and writing!

  • How to Discover and Protect Your Most Creative Time for Writing

    How to Discover and Protect Your Most Creative Time for Writing

    About a year ago, I discovered Charlie Gilkey’s concept of a productivity heat map.

    His idea is to map how productive you are throughout the day to identify your personal productivity hot spots and low points, so you can plan your creative time appropriately.

    When you see swaths of red, highly-productive times (Gilkey calls these “novas”), you know you’ll get more done if you schedule highly creative tasks then.

    I already had a vague idea of when I worked best, but I had never been so scientific about figuring out exactly when I hit my creative peaks.

    With the heat map model, I learned I have three chunks of time best suited for creative work: Midmorning, early afternoon, and after dinner.

    Turns out, I’m fairly useless around lunchtime, and I get incredibly antsy in the late afternoon. That’s the best time for me to run errands or do physical work.

    I also learned — and this really surprised me — my blocks of creative time aren’t created equally.

    I do my best in the mornings on things that need intense concentration, like revisions and line editing. The afternoon is much better spent working on nonfiction and client work. And my time after dinner often nets me some of my most creative prose as my tuckered-out mind drops its self-censoring guard.

    (Gilkey provides a free heat map template if you want to find your own nova time.)

    When you know when you work best, you can take better advantage of your creative time — rather than just spinning your wheels.

    Taking advantage of creative hot spots

    Finding your creative hot spots is one thing. It’s quite another to find the time in your day to take advantage of them.

    Your creative hot spots likely won’t come at convenient times, especially if you’re working a day job, raising a family, or, you know, living life.

    Sure, it’d be convenient to write on your lunch break, but if you’re like me, that’s when your brain completely melts down. Or maybe you keep trying to get up at 5 a.m. and work then, but every word you write before 10 a.m. is complete gibberish.

    When I worked full time as a copywriter at a catalog company, my work day fell smack in the middle of what I knew was my best writing time. Worse, my brain was too fried at the end of the day to get much done if I tried to write then.

    It’s a huge reason why I decided to start work as a freelancer. It was a big risk, especially at first, but now that I’m established it’s allowed me to prioritize my creative writing during the hours I do it best.

    Obviously, it’s not a solution for everybody. But as you examine your own life, are there smaller changes you can make?

    Can you creatively consolidate more menial tasks to your lower-energy periods to open up space for creative work during your nova periods?

    Have you figured out when that time is? Good.

    Now block it off in your planner in permanent marker.

    We’re getting to the hard part.

    Protect your creative time with your life

    Knowing when you do your best work and scheduling yourself to do it is only half the battle.

    The other half is fighting like hell to protect that creative time.

    At its foundation, practicing your creative art is a fundamentally impractical thing, isn’t it?

    It’s the tip of the pyramid when it comes to our hierarchy of needs. It’s not food, or clothing, or companionship (though it can be a gateway to those), and so it’s easy for our brains to shunt it to the back of the queue.

    Only after we have everything we need for survival and comfort should art take mental space, right?

    Don’t fall into the trap.

    Don’t fall into believing that making your art is less important than your other needs.

    Instead, tell the hunter-gatherer part of your brain to protect this precious thing with all the ferocity you would protect your home, food source, or family.

    How do you protect your creative time?

    First, you have to protect your creative time from yourself.

    Set your writing priorities. Hide your phone. Install Freedom on your computer.

    Stop saying yes to coffee dates in the middle of your creative streaks.

    Stop pretending mindlessly clicking through Wikipedia is research.

    Put your headphones on, crank the music, and write.

    You have to respect your own time before you can expect others to respect it. Others will make demands on your time: Bosses, family, partners…It’s only natural. It’s up to you to train them that you’re not available during certain times.

    I protect one day each week where I only work on fiction. I never let a client give me a deadline for Wednesday. If they suggest it, I’ll negotiate a different day.

    I refuse to take phone calls, meetings, and lunch dates on Wednesdays. I don’t tell clients why. I just tell them I’m unavailable. I’ll still check my email throughout the day to make sure there are no fires that need to be put out, but Wednesdays belong solely to my fiction business.

    It’s harder to make those ultimatums when it comes to family, but that’s another place where taking yourself seriously first is crucial. If you treat your blocks of creative time as unimportant, then it becomes easy for those around you to do the same.

    But if you’re truly dedicated to making your creative time count? Your dedication will eventually become infectious.

    Have you ever mapped your creative peaks and valleys? I’d love to hear how you protect your creative time in the comments!

  • Making Time for Writing? 7 Simple but Powerful Productivity Tips

    Making Time for Writing? 7 Simple but Powerful Productivity Tips

    Do you ever sit down to write for a couple of hours, only to find yourself with only a paragraph or two to show for it?

    It’s really easy to get distracted, especially if your work involves online research. One link leads to another and another and … oh look, a cute cat video!

    I’ve been freelancing and writing novels for the best part of eight years now, and I still sometimes find myself scrolling mindlessly down Facebook when I really should be writing.

    If that sounds like you as well, here are the seven tips that work best for me to stay on task. They might be just what you need, too.

    1. Turn off your internet connection

    This might sound way too simple, but turning off your WiFi or unplugging your Ethernet cable can drastically improve your concentration. You might want to put your phone out of reach, too.

    Sure, it’s not something you can do all the time, or even for your whole writing session. But if you notice yourself feeling the slightest bit distracted, it’s the quickest fix I know.

    Don’t tell yourself you should just be more self-disciplined, either. There’s no point using up precious willpower resisting the lure of the Internet when you could just switch it off — and save that energy for writing.

    2. Write down your intention when you begin

    Next time you sit down to write, take ten seconds to write down what you intend to do: “Work on chapter 10 of my novel for 30 minutes” or “Edit blog post for client” or “Update About page on my blog.”

    Again, this might sound a little silly, but it forces you to be clear about what you actually want to get done.

    If you work from a to-do list, circle or star the item you’re going to work on first. You might also want to note the second and third to-dos to help you stay on track if they’re all short tasks.

    3. Sit quietly for three minutes at the start of your session

    Do you ever begin a writing session feeling distracted, stressed out, or a bit overwhelmed? If you have to get your kids off to school before you can write, you have a day job and write on your lunch hour, or you’ve got a ton of other commitments, it’s tough to sit down and focus on writing.

    Sit quietly for just three minutes at the start of your writing session, breathing slowly in and out. Don’t try to think about your writing or to-do list. Just give yourself a chance to be quiet and still.

    Three minutes might sound like it wouldn’t make a difference, but it does. Give it a try!

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    4. Set a timer and write until it goes off

    I find this one works incredibly for most writers, but not all. Give it a go, but if you find yourself feeling pressured or blocked, just try one of the other tips instead.

    At the start of your writing session, set a timer for, say, 15 minutes. Tell yourself you will write (and nothing else) until the timer goes off.

    If 15 minutes is easy, build up the length of work bursts. I like the Pomodoro system of 25 minutes on task, followed by a five-minute break. But feel free to experiment with this one before you commit!

    5. Listen to soundtracks or classical music

    Some people like to work in silence. If that’s you and you’re staying focused, great!

    Personally, I like to have some music on. It helps drown out distracting noise (the kids at home, or other people in the library) and it seems to help me focus.

    If you’re the same, try film soundtracks or classical music. If you put on music with lyrics, it’s easy to get distracted listening rather than writing. You might want to consider finding a few favorite instrumental albums to play only when you’re writing. It can be a reliable way to get into a writing mood.

    6. Take regular, planned breaks during your writing session

    Noone can stay focused for hours on end. For most people, somewhere between 20 and 45 minutes is about right.

    Plan in advance. Don’t just take a break once you start to feel a bit distracted. Knowing you only have to write for a certain period before a break can really help you to focus.

    Ideally, don’t take a break just after finishing something. After a break, it can be hard to get back into writing. Instead, write the first sentence or two of your next piece or a prompt to kick off your next task.

    7. Make sure you’re physically comfortable

    Taking regular breaks lets you move your body and balance some of the effects of sitting at a desk for much of the day. While you’re at your desk, though, get as comfortable as possible.

    That might mean investing in a new chair (or even sitting on an exercise ball), propping your monitor up on books, getting a more ergonomic keyboard, or simply making sure you have a drink of water and some healthy snacks on hand.

    If your back, neck or arms are aching, it’s going to be hard to stay focused — and you may well be storing up health problems for the long-term.

    If you’re struggling with focus, pick one thing from this list to try — and tell us what you’ll be doing.

    What’s the one key thing that helps you to focus when you’re writing? Share it with us in the comments!