Writers Tricks of the Trade ISSUE 1, VOLUME 9 | Page 34
will soar. We everyday writers generally
don’t have ghost writers like many celebri-
ties or public figures who “write” a best-
seller. We don’t have a cadre of “our peo-
ple” who take care of our every need.
For thousands of authors the very real
challenge is how to keep the balls in the air
so they don’t hit them on the head. Between
writing, posting on blogs, soliciting inter-
views and reviews, trying to find podcasts,
radio or TV gigs, editing, designing promo-
tional material, thinking about the next
project, participating in writers and read-
ers groups, re-searching local press clubs,
Toastmasters chapters and fraternal organ-
izations, plus paying attention to the family
and going to the cleaners and grocery store
along with other mundane necessities, the
list is like Pinocchio’s nose. It gets longer
every day.
W HAT IS AN AUTHOR TO DO ?
Rigid schedules work for some, but not
for others. Some authors can absolutely
commit to a number of words or a page
count per day and that target is literally
etched-in-stone. With the required writing
completed for the day, they move on to the
juggling act for the rest of their schedule.
But what if writer’s block hits? That com-
mitment to write “X” amount of words or
pages could eat up every working hour,
which knocks out the possibility of doing
anything else.
Imagine this: You’re facing a deadline.
Well, no problem because the day is tightly
scheduled. Then you, the kids or your
spouse come down with an awful cold. Now
what? Worse yet, maybe your computer
crashes or the air conditioning goes out on
S PRING 2019
the hottest day of the year. You thought
your speech to the book club was next
Tuesday, but your Outlook reminder just
dinged and you were mistaken—it’s today!
While you put on the perfect “making a
speech” suit and hop around with one shoe
on and one off, you suddenly can’t remem-
ber where you stashed that box of books.
If any of this sounds familiar, and it
should, the key to conquering the juggling
act is one word: flexibility. Life is full of un-
expected events and quite frankly there is
nothing you can do to head off those ruts in
the road. But you can devise ways to deal
with many of the roadblocks.
W HAT KIND OF A SCHEDULE WORKS FOR YOU ?
Like them or not, schedules are a valua-
ble tool even if you wind up adjusting to
conditions. A schedule gives you a frame-
work for budgeting precious time and try-
ing to make everything fit. When mapping
out your day, think about how much time
you should spend on a particular task. Then
acknowledge that probably won’t be the
case. Pad it a little. Allow extra time for traf-
fic jams, fruitless searches, chapters that
just won’t come together—things like that.
People like me, who tend to lose focus or
procrastinate, find a common timer is a
great taskmaster. Seeing the minutes tick
away often results in working more effi-
ciently as long as you don’t keep resetting it
to buy more time.
Go through your list and prioritize tasks
in order of importance. For example, you
know it is imperative to send the manu-
script to the editor, so taking time to re-
search reviewers can wait another day. Fa-
cebook posts yield hits on your website, but
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W RITERS ’ T RICKS OF THE T RADE