Let’s be real: writing in times of stress is HARD. Writing while people are in your space all the time and interrupting you and you’ve got a ton more on your plate AND managing your (and potentially everyone else’s) anxiety? It’s a LOT right now, and often your writing will get shuttled off to the side.
So I want to help you as a writer to make the most of your writing time if you’re working from home during this time of social distancing--especially if you have kids that you're trying to suddenly homeschool and make sure they’re not bored, or if you just have people around you 24/7 with no alone time. (Introverts, I know you feel me.)
I know things are weird and scary, and it’s frustrating to not have time or energy to do this thing you love, so here are my top tips for making the most of the time you do have.
1) Be gentle with yourself. This whole situation is super stressful and strange for everyone, and it's unlikely that you can get everything done at your usual pace. And that’s okay. You're just not going to get as much done with kids at home—especially if you're working a regular job at home, in addition to your writing—and interrupting you every 20 (10, 5, 2) minutes. (This also goes for chatty partners and roommates who are going stir crazy at home!)
You definitely have to recalibrate your expectations of how much you can get done in a day. (These days, if I can knock ONE thing off my to-do list, I call it a win.) So if you only get a paragraph or two down in the time you have, celebrate that. It’s not always going to be this way—we’ll get to a new normal eventually (fingers crossed).
2) If you're intent on getting stuff done during this time, then make sure you set yourself up for it. Leave yourself hanging in the middle of a sentence or a paragraph so you can jump right back to where you left off and pick up that momentum again when you’re on a lunch break or when the kids are entertained by something other than you.
(I don’t love excessive screen time, but all of that can go to hell right now. Disney+ gave us Frozen II early FOR A REASON, people. Let the multi-billion-dollar corporation's sacrifice not be in vain. You put that on and grab yourself two hours of time.)
3) When you've got concentrated time to yourself and you're ready to write, get rid of all distractions—no Instagram, no Twitter, no Facebook, no time-wasting. Toss your phone across the room, shut the internet off, tell the kids not to bother you unless someone is bleeding, and then: head down, butt in seat.
4) Don’t force it. If you need a break after a long day of working your day job, keeping the kids (or yourself) alive, and having your family around all the time OR if you’re at home on your own and wishing for human interaction, you don’t need to fill that time with writing. Your book can wait. And remember that thinking and daydreaming and planning are all part of the writing process as well. Just because you’re not getting words on the page doesn’t mean that you haven’t done anything on your book.
I've heard from lots of people who just can't write right now. Again, give yourself some grace here--this is hard and anxiety-making. I also know a lot of people are wondering if they SHOULD be writing stories right now and if it's worth it when things are as bizarro as they currently are in the world. Let me tell you how very, very worth it it is. We need your words more than ever, romance writers. Romance is the genre of hope and empathy and optimism and happily ever afters, and we need all of those things right now. (My coping mechanism right now--and always, really--is reading romance late into the night.) So, if you can, please keep writing! ⠀⠀⠀
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This isn’t easy for anyone right now, but please stay healthy and safe out there. Let me know how you’re coping and if you have any tips on how to deal!