Making Time

Have you ever had an overpowering urge to do something at the expense of everything else in your life? If you have, then you’ll know how I feel about writing… well, at least about two percent of the time. The rest of the time writing almost seems like it comes in last place of my priorities. That’s why I frequently feel like I have to make the time to write.

Shhh, don’t tell Belgarath the Sorcerer that I’m making time! He’d start lecturing me on the dangers of messing with magic that is way over my head! It’ll be our little secret. Seriously though, if I could fit extra hours into the day, I would, consequences be damned. There simply isn’t enough time to do everything that I need, or want, to do.

It’s not that I don’t want to write, it’s just that there are so many other things I could be doing. I have friends that want to spend time with me. I have to go to work. There are TV shows I have to watch so that I can fangirl over them with my friends when I spend time with them. There are books to read. There are rooms to be cleaned and dinners to be made. And by the time I’m done with all of that, all I want to do is curl up with a glass of wine before going to bed.

So I set aside time to write. If I don’t have a particular project I’m working on, my writing usually gets relegated to frantically typing out a blog post several days before it is due to go live. Then I spend the next afternoon attempting to get ahead on my blog posts again so that I can hopefully start another project. By the time I’ve decided what I’m going to write about (naturally after making about eight false starts and drinking several bottles of wine) I’ve discovered that it is three weeks later and suddenly I’m realizing that I have another blog post due the next morning and I haven’t even looked at the topic.

When I do have a project I’m working on, I’ve found that I’m most productive first thing in the morning and during my lunch break. I think it’s because these amounts of times are limited, so I’m forced to cram in as many words as possible so that I don’t feel guilty for wasting quality word-smithing time. I’ve also learned that I’m not very good at devoting an entire day to writing. Every time I decide to set aside an entire day for writing, something comes up. Something major and important. Like watching the grass grow.

I suppose what I’m trying to say is, if I don’t have a specific project I’m working on, I have difficulties making time to write, and I have an even harder time if I give myself too large of a chunk of time to write with. Yep. I’m a procrastipants. Though it really doesn’t help that my next stage in my current writing project is editing, and I’d rather scrub the toilet out than do that.

And it really, really doesn’t help that it’s so cold out.

Seriously! All I want to do is crawl back into bed and hibernate for the rest of winter. And a good share of spring. When it’s consistently above 70, maybe then I’ll be in the mood to write again.

Until then, I’m just going to force myself to sit down and write, one word at a time.

Eliza Jaquays

At the age of six, Eliza was certain of two things. The first was that she had stories to tell. The second was that she had no talent for illustrating them herself. Talent or no, she still wrote and illustrated her first book, one that should be located and locked away if only to prevent her parents from embarrassing her terribly by showing it off alongside baby pictures. Now she spends her days writing stories that she isn't embarrassed to show off after a little bit of polishing.