Write 2014 Desert Sleuths Writing Conference - Part Two
This is part two of my notes on the Desert Sleuths Write 2014 conference held in Phoenix, Arizona.
The second speaker of the morning was author Mark Sullivan who has written his own novels and co-writes with James Patterson. Mark's topic in the Mastering Crime Fiction - A Whodunit How-to was What Really Works, Optimizing Writing Time and Increasing Productivity. A topic very near and dear to me as I struggle on a daily basis with finding time to write.
Mark explained how he was able to go from barely able to write ten sentences to writing 5000 words a day. He asked us what we do which puts the brakes on. What things do you do when trying to write that slow you down, stop you or prevent you from starting work altogether?
I know one of the ways I slam on the brakes in my writing is to never get the "car out of the garage" in a manner of speaking. I self sabotage by telling myself that I'm too tired or not feeling creative or maybe I have laundry to do. I can think of an unlimited number of reasons not to sit down at the keyboard and put words on paper. The real reason is fear. Fear of not writing anything worth reading.
If I have learned anything from my various writing groups and conferences it's that you have to just pour the words out and not worry about whether or not they are perfect. That's what the editing process is for.
Mark encouraged us to set a schedule and stick to it. Plan the time to write, whether it's first thing in the morning or during your lunch break or maybe after the kids are in bed. Whatever you pick, stick to it and make sure there are absolutely no interruptions. Unless the house is burning down I will write on Friday, Saturday and Sunday of every week from 11 to 1. I can write longer if I'm on a roll but this is my bare minimum.
My other way to put the brakes on was that I I don't have the perfect place to write. Even though I have a lovely office with two desktops, a laptop, a Mac and an iPad. That is my work place. I earn my living in that room putting in ten hour days writing specifications and dealing with clients. When I'm in that room I'm in a different zone. So I have my other laptop sitting on my kitchen table, where I can look out the back window and watch the mini zoo of wildlife that we feed twice a day. I plug in my ear buds to an old country music radio station and close out the rest of the world. And I write.
I made a promise to myself, after hearing Mark speak, that I would stick to this schedule and finish book two. Squeezed in between this time I can blog or post to Facebook (as long as it's writing related), read my author emails and work on Cocktails at Sunset, book two in the Jayne Stanford series. But I cannot: watch television, play on Facebook, read my personal emails, clean the kitchen or put the brakes on my writing. This time is devoted to writing and only that. Of course I really do need to dust the top of the cabinets, but I suppose that will have to wait.
The last note I have from this session may not have been something that Mark said so much as something he made me realize. Before I sit down to write I now take a few minutes to clear my head of all of the distractions of life. Whether it's fifteen minutes to meditate or just to breathe in and out deeply to quiet my mind. This process helps me focus on the task at hand without writing one thing and having my mind on something else.
I hope this helps you focus on your writing and get your foot off the brakes and onto the gas pedal.
Happy trails,
Leslie
The second speaker of the morning was author Mark Sullivan who has written his own novels and co-writes with James Patterson. Mark's topic in the Mastering Crime Fiction - A Whodunit How-to was What Really Works, Optimizing Writing Time and Increasing Productivity. A topic very near and dear to me as I struggle on a daily basis with finding time to write.
Mark explained how he was able to go from barely able to write ten sentences to writing 5000 words a day. He asked us what we do which puts the brakes on. What things do you do when trying to write that slow you down, stop you or prevent you from starting work altogether?
I know one of the ways I slam on the brakes in my writing is to never get the "car out of the garage" in a manner of speaking. I self sabotage by telling myself that I'm too tired or not feeling creative or maybe I have laundry to do. I can think of an unlimited number of reasons not to sit down at the keyboard and put words on paper. The real reason is fear. Fear of not writing anything worth reading.
If I have learned anything from my various writing groups and conferences it's that you have to just pour the words out and not worry about whether or not they are perfect. That's what the editing process is for.
Mark encouraged us to set a schedule and stick to it. Plan the time to write, whether it's first thing in the morning or during your lunch break or maybe after the kids are in bed. Whatever you pick, stick to it and make sure there are absolutely no interruptions. Unless the house is burning down I will write on Friday, Saturday and Sunday of every week from 11 to 1. I can write longer if I'm on a roll but this is my bare minimum.
My other way to put the brakes on was that I I don't have the perfect place to write. Even though I have a lovely office with two desktops, a laptop, a Mac and an iPad. That is my work place. I earn my living in that room putting in ten hour days writing specifications and dealing with clients. When I'm in that room I'm in a different zone. So I have my other laptop sitting on my kitchen table, where I can look out the back window and watch the mini zoo of wildlife that we feed twice a day. I plug in my ear buds to an old country music radio station and close out the rest of the world. And I write.
I made a promise to myself, after hearing Mark speak, that I would stick to this schedule and finish book two. Squeezed in between this time I can blog or post to Facebook (as long as it's writing related), read my author emails and work on Cocktails at Sunset, book two in the Jayne Stanford series. But I cannot: watch television, play on Facebook, read my personal emails, clean the kitchen or put the brakes on my writing. This time is devoted to writing and only that. Of course I really do need to dust the top of the cabinets, but I suppose that will have to wait.
The last note I have from this session may not have been something that Mark said so much as something he made me realize. Before I sit down to write I now take a few minutes to clear my head of all of the distractions of life. Whether it's fifteen minutes to meditate or just to breathe in and out deeply to quiet my mind. This process helps me focus on the task at hand without writing one thing and having my mind on something else.
I hope this helps you focus on your writing and get your foot off the brakes and onto the gas pedal.
Happy trails,
Leslie
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