How To Keep Writing When Disaster Looms

Reset and recalibrate. I made a smart move at the start of the year by taking what I thought I could do in 2020 and cutting it in half. I did this again at the start of March, so now my yearly goal is 25% of what I wanted it to be. There’s always the thought process playing in the back of my ambitious, over-achieving mind that slashing a goal to 25% is not good enough, not words enough, not impressive enough. And to that voice, I say: You can always keep going. You can always do more. But it’s also important that I know it’s OK if I don’t.

Set bite-sized, achievable goals. 1,000 words in an hour every day is an admirable goal. But it’s one I’ll fail most of the time. For starters, I can’t write 1,000 words in an hour. I’m more a 700-words an hour kind of girl (or more accurately, a 200-ish words in 20 minutes kind of girl). I’m also more of a “most days” kind of girl rather than an “every day” kind of girl. And that’s when I’m not ill or covered up with work or there’s a global pandemic at large. Bite-sized goals will look different for everybody, but for me, especially right now, that’s been however many words I can scrape out of 5 minutes. (Remember, you can always keep going, you can always do more. But if I’ve put in my 5 minutes, I’ve done what I asked of myself, even if I spend the rest of the day screaming into the void.)

Effort counts. Some days those 5 minutes are spent staring at the blank page. But it still counts, because at least I opened the Word document when I didn’t want to. At least I showed up. Don’t discount the simple act of showing up.

Reading counts, too. When I’m not in the headspace to write new words, it’s usually because I need to consume new words. Old words. Audiobook words. Blog words. Just words in general. So I try to do a lot of that, too.

Track your progress. I love data and find it immensely helpful. But tracking things in real-time is hard because I’m super-critical of my own accomplishments. A happy compromise has been to create a Google form with which I track my writing sprints. The form is connected to a spreadsheet that automatically pulls things like words written and time spent writing, but also measures other metrics, like which days and times of day I’m most productive (so I can protect them and better utilize them), which project I’m working on and where in the pipeline it falls (drafting, editing, etc), where I’m writing (office, bedroom, outside, or pre-pandemic, Starbucks, libarary, hospital, etc), and which tools I’m using (Scrivener, Word, candle, music). I’ve recently even added a mood tracker (turns out I always think I suck about 80% through a draft, who knew?) and a comment box where I can make notes of what worked and what didn’t and what I could do better next writing session. The best part: the spreadsheet collects the data automatically, so I don’t have to look at it until I’m mentally prepared to do so.

Stop using fun as a reward for working yourself to death. I used to use Cinderella logic on myself, where I was like, “OK, if I will do this thing, but only after I do this impossible amount of work first.” And then walk around for six months having zero fun because I hadn’t earned any fun. Now I pencil in fun the way I pencil in writing. Sure, there are times I have to factor in that I have a deadline coming and a ton of work to do, and maybe I can’t binge a show or play a game for three days straight that week. But even then I can carve out a little time that isn’t just work work work.

Everybody needs a day off. “Writers write every day” is not only bullshit advice, but for me it has the tendency to really throw off my writing groove. Since I moved to a four-day work week (two days writing, one day off, two days writing, two days off), I feel like I’ve made better writing decisions, had better-feeling writing days, and backtracked less often. It’s also nice to have at least one day a week that is free from day job stress as well as writing stress, a day to just veg out and do what the hell ever.

And finally:

Don’t skimp on self-care. Take a shower when you feel gross. Nap when you’re tired. Know your warning signs. Too tired or depressed to cook and clean? Move to disposable dishes and cutlery, order take-out, and stock your pantry with non-perishable go-tos. Make your bed. Clean off your desk. Take out the trash. Unfuck your habitat. Believe me, no words you write when you feel shitty or exhausted are going to be worth suffering for.

The Art of Being Not Agented

I want to talk about agents for a second.

Maybe not agents, but more specifically, the being agented thing.

And even more specifically, the not being agented thing.

Ten years ago, when I was a college student and this blog was in its infancy, before I became too cool for blogging and sold my dreams for a job at a credit union and the ability to consistently pay my bills; before I signed with an agent and parted ways with that agent and signed with another agent; before I wrote a book that didn’t sell and wrote another one that also didn’t sell and wrote another that also didn’t sell… I thought I knew what I was doing.

And I kind of did.

Kind of .

But I also kind of didn’t.

Because working with an agent is one of those things that you can’t get adequate perspective of until you’re in the thick of it.

Ten years ago, when I started querying, rejection was a terrifying thing.

Rejection meant:

I am not good enough.

Other people are better at this than I am.

This thing that is so hard for me is so easy for everyone else.

I don’t matter and I don’t know how to matter.

My stories are broken. My process is broken. I am broken.

None of these things were true.

And yet, everything I did was in service to one goal and one goal only: do not get rejected.

I don’t know what I thought would happen when I got a yes, because I don’t think I expected I would ever get a yes. But I think it lay somewhere in the realm of:

If “no” means I’m not good enough, that my book is bad, that my dreams are over, then “yes” must mean that I am a good writer, that my book is a good book, and that success is within the vicinity of reach .

None of those things were true, either.

The truth was that nothing had changed.

And when the no that had turned to a yes turned back to a no and then again to a yes, still nothing had changed.

I am the same writer in 2020 that I was in 2010 .

I still know nothing about my books until I have drafted them.

I still get to the end of a perfectly fine book and unravel every inch of it to start again, because that’s the only way I know how to make it better.

I still weep for days after turning in a draft because I think it sucks, but also because I do not like change and turning in a book is rife with upheaval.

I still get it mostly wrong before I get it mostly right.

And most importantly:

I still only kind of know what I’m doing.

The only real difference between 2010 Me and 2020 Me is that 2020 Me has ten years more experience under her belt.

Or:

Five books, nine editors, two agents, numerous writing friends (each with their own experiences to share), a contract or two, and twenty-three filled-in writing notebooks.

As I type this out, I find I have a lot to say about that period of time. And I will, one day. But for now, I want to say something to specifically those querying writers who have been at this for years, but haven’t yet found their foothold:

You are good enough. Your process is fine. It’s hard for everyone. You matter. Your stories matter. There is nothing wrong with you.

In the darkest, bleakest of my writing nights (not that long ago, I might add), I had to find a reason to keep writing that had nothing to do with the approval or acceptance of another person.

But first, I had to give myself permission to stop caring what publishing thinks.

If you’re in a place where you’re doing everything right and everything is going wrong, I challenge you to give yourself permission to give zero fucks about the outside world and really hone in on what your vision for your writing is.

Not your writing career. That’s its own thing and you can sort that out later.

I’m talking about the time you spend every day immersed in story.

What do you want that to look like?

Why is it important to you?

And what steps are you going to take to keep life and publishing and the universe and everything from taking it from you?