Good reasons for not writing are terrible excuses. Stop making excuses and start planning and prioritizing, so you can start writing (for real).
1. I’m waiting for my mother to die. (I’ve heard this one more than once.)
This is a stupid reason not to write. Look, it’s not because I don’t completely get the anxiety of maternal rejection upon reading your version of reality or your carefully-constructed words in your unique voice (because I’ve been there) but because the first drafts of your writing are going to suck and they’re going to probably be unpublishable anyway. May as well have sharpened your pencil while you wait for nature to take its course.
After all…prodigies excepted (don’t kid yourself), nascent writing is always terrible. It will take years to hone your craft, so while you wait for your mother to croak, work on your writing. In doing so, you may build the confidence you’ve always envied in people who wear Crocs and jeggings to write your best work and to publish your story anyway. (It’s not like your mom’s actually going to read your story…and if she does, have it professionally edited and then blame your editor for the parts she hates.)
Seriously, though…don’t wait. Don’t let your smother win. Yes, you are damaged, but you are damaged and talented. Don’t waste that. Put down the bottle, pick up the pen. Do it for mommy dearest.
2. I had to (chore).
If you are over the age of 5, you have f—king chores to do. It’s life. They don’t end. It’s like when I was telling my angry, reluctant middle child who calls me “Mother Goffle” (hilarious) that the requirement to eat vegetables and fruits isn’t going to go away. They will always be there, so swerve and adapt.
Chores, children, family, hobbies, education, work, etc.…all of the things we generally must do are also thieves of your precious writing time. Attending to them will not make them go away tomorrow; it will not get easier.
This is doubly true if you’re a woman; the presence and the pressure of things and people to attend to are probably greater than that of your male counterparts (I realize there are exceptions, so sit down Beavis). Joyce Carol Oates remarks on this in her MasterClass on short story noting that interruptions are all writing’s anathema.
Allow the chores their moment, but only that. When it’s time to stop, stop, and give your creativity the time it demands for you to elevate your skills to greatness.
3. The Creative Juices Aren’t Flowing
I get it. There are just some days where writing feels like work or you just feel tapped for ideas. It doesn’t matter. Unless it’s a day where you legit needs a break or a mental health day (for the love of God, write some self-care into your life…treat yourself the way you’d want Paul Rudd to treat you), then write. Write like your imaginary relationship with Paul Rudd depends on it.
If Paul Rudd isn’t enough motivation (what is wrong with you?), then work on a different project. This strategy doesn’t work for everyone, but Roxanne Gay advocates for it. She will pick up a different project if she’s not feeling her primary endeavor.
4. I Am Too Tired
I feel fellow tired parent writers on a spiritual level because by the end of the day, I am often too tired to read bedtime stories to my kids. I seriously go to bed between eight and ten depending on how the day goes. I am wiped by the end of the day, which means that my creative thoughts are nil. Even if I want to sit down and write, I am too damn exhausted.
5. I Don’t Have Time
I appreciate the irony of the statement that I’m a writer and an editor who doesn’t have time to write…but I don’t. At the beginning of the day after the kids have been taken to school, I’m usually working on material that has a deadline (you know, the stuff I get paid to do). As it turns out, most writers without a book deal or an advance don’t get paid before they publish their work (unless they use crowdfunding or have figured out NFTs (seriously, how does that work?)), which means that the blood, sweat, tears, and high-dollar time spent writing is unpaid work. Writing really is a labor of love…but equally it’s of planning and prioritizing.
I recently did a great workshop with editor Allison Williams and in the follow-up chat, we discussed how to find balance. Allison said she writes in the morning and does other work in the evening. She also said she works better with hard, actual deadlines. I feel this all so hard. My brain is at its peak in the morning; if I’m going to work on my creative fiction or nonfiction, it must be first just like if I’m going to work out, it needs to be early in the day. I also need to be prepared before I sit down to write; I need to know what I’m going to work on because otherwise, my time that should be spent writing will be suctioned to death by checking, vetting, and deleting e-mails, which is just plain no good.
Breaking Bad (Reasons)
Thus, to cure yourself of the shame of not writing despite all of your very good yet ultimately terrible reasons, here’s a summary of the things to do to get your writing on track.
1. Develop a habit of sitting down to write at a specific time of day. Habits are gloriously additive as evidenced by my history with running, going to the gym, and drinking wine (oops). Examine your habits and micro-habits (ex: checking Facebook every time you pee) for further evidence of this and commit to developing a daily writing habit at a time when you know you’re at your best to write. For me, that’s the beginning of the day.
2. Set yourself up for success by knowing the day before you write what you’re going to work on. I even go so far as to leave my previous Word document open, so I can dive right in when I log on.
3. Employ a Hemingway strategy of stopping your writing mid-sentence. It makes it easier to pick up on your previous day’s flow.
4. Minimize distractions. I give my children tablets when I’m writing because otherwise, my precious time will be interrupted 50,000 times. For you, it may not be kids; it might be a messy house or an ailing family member or a pet or another job or those damn emails that beg to steal your precious time. I don’t care if your house looks like a trailer park after the tornado like mine does…do not allow anything to rob you of your time. You will not get the time back. You will find time to clean and tidy or to vet emails (for example, do that on the toilet instead of check Facebook), but you will not find those golden hours again. (If you have an ailing family member—I’ve been there—try writing when they are resting or seeing if your partner or someone else can take over caretaking for either a couple of hours each day or a day or so a week…while it’s not fair, the reality is that you just have to make it work.
5. Believe in yourself and do the work. Writing is an extremely vulnerable act, but you must believe in the merits of your story and ideas. I have a lovely vicious cycle where in which I come up with a really great idea, outline it, flesh it out, get super-pumped to write, and then read the literary equivalent of a Renoir and feel like my story may as well be written in crayon (we will not be hanging it on the fridge). I have to actively remind myself of the realities that published writing also started in crayon and (most likely) as a pitiable first draft and with work, not hubris, it became something lovely.