Busy Day? There's Still Time to Write!

I found this great piece titled Writing and a Busy Life? Four Tips for Making it Work by Elisabeth S. Craig. It's on a wonderful site I've recently discovered that encourages, inspires and promotes women writers called, Women Writers,Women Books

She's a busy woman, as are so many of us! Busy with work and kids and home-some days the demands do seem endless. I am always happy to read something motivational that not only gives me tips, but gives me encouragement as well. And Ms. Craig's article definitely does that!

A couple of her tips that I particularly liked were: 1) use little downtime moments to brainstorm characters/plots/settings; 2) Set realistic writing goals that you have an shot at achieving.

This second goal is SO appropriate for me-and something I've recently embraced. Yes, I can write 3000 or more words in a day. I can write a chapter in a day. But can I do it daily? Sadly, no, and I doubt few do. We all have our inspired days, but those days come as the result of days where you spend more time researching and writing, or editing and tweaking. It's the in-the-trenches writing that sets us all up for those gold medal, marathon moments.

That's one reason I am truly enjoying participating in a current writer's challenge. I set an extremely modest goal of 250 words a day. I knew I had editing to do on two other books while writing the sequel to The Shell Keeper (not to mention researching Colorado's wine country for this book!), so I knew there would be days when little writing was done. Still, if I can glue myself to the keyboard to crank out 250 words, it often turns into more.

Yesterday it turned into 1361 words! If I'd set an unrealistic goal of 3000 words a day I would have had a down day for certain. But instead I felt good about myself, the process, and the book. In so many ways writing is a mind game, but clearly it's a game we can set ourselves up to win!

Click HERE to read Ms. Craig's article!