Writing has been a part of my life since I can remember myself. I wrote stories as a child and kept a diary. In my 29 years, I've written stories, books, blog posts, academic articles, proposals, a bachelor thesis, a master's thesis and a PhD thesis. I write every day. I write nonstop. I write my thoughts. I write lists. I write...
And now I'm writing a short story collection.
Through trial and error, I have come to find a productivity system and writing routine that works for me. This, of course, has changed throughout the years, but finally, I am confident that I have found the one that works for me.
Writing Routine
Writing routines are the building blocks of any writing one wants to do. If you don't have a routine to get you to your writing goal, then writing becomes inefficient and aimless.
At the moment, my writing routine consists of a simple 3-hour undistracted and focused work in my current work in progress. 3 hours seems to be the sweet spot for me. I get an adequate amount of work done without exhausting myself. In these 3 hours, I take 2 10-minute breaks away from my desk. In my working time, I do not plan, I do not eat, I do not scroll Instagram, I do not browse the web. My phone is on silent, preferably in a different room, and my focus remains on my writing project.
Writing Productivity
If you are like me and wish to write multiple pieces of work in a year in various genres, there is only one solution I have found that works: taking it one at a time.
If you're a part-time writer, it only makes sense that you'll have to juggle multiple things at once, but when it comes to writing, I'd say stick with one work at a time. I wrote my first novel while pursuing a PhD, but I wasn't writing anything else simultaneously. When I finished writing my novel, I wrote my first academic article. It is not always easy to pause a project in favour of another, but most of the time it is essential. For me, when I had to write my PhD thesis, it was crucial to pause all else and focus on that one huge project. And now, as I work on my story collection, I find it important to keep my focus there.
You have to set your priorities every time you want to start a new writing project, create a system and trust your process. It is better to take it one at a time and have several projects completed by the end of the year than tackle them all at once and have (maybe) a couple completed by the end of the year.
I have many aspirations for 2024, and I'm taking my writing projects one at a time while sticking to my writing routine.
Stay tuned for updates on my short story collection! If you haven’t subscribed to anne's world of words, please do. Blog posts go up on Fridays. Click here to subscribe and get notified of new posts. Thank You (:
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