Anyway, I realized I was not writing nearly as much as I should have been. Whole days would pass and I'd look back and wonder, Why haven't I written anything? I mean, the dogs got walked, I exercised, cooked the meals and took care of the promotion side of the business, but WHAT HAD I WRITTEN?
I needed bionic writing powers! But since that wasn't an option, I had to become a bionic writer on my own. Sheesh!
How did I create bionic writing powers? I made one simple change that changed everything.
I put my writing first. I gave it my best energy.
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| This is not me. |
Every day for two weeks I got to my writing chair within fifteen minutes of waking. (Including weekends and President's Day. I might even work on important holidays like Groundhog's Day and Take Your Chihuahua to Work Day. I'm that jazzed about being a bionic writer.)
At the end of the two weeks, I discovered something startling. The dogs still got walked. The meals still got made. (Just not always by me.) And I had made significant progress on more than one book. Since I showed up at the same place at the same time every day, that fickle Muse knew exactly where to find me.
I'm not alone in this bionic writing thing either.
Gail Shepherd of the awesome blog Paradoxy began rising at 5:30 when she got a full-time job. She puts in 1-1/2 hours of writing every day before work.
Gary D. Schmidt has SIX children and a full-time job. He writes two pages a day and continually produces amazing books. Here he is talking at the National Book Festival in Washington, D.C.
Louis Sachar writes two pages a day, too. And last time I checked, he won the Newbery for a little book called Holes.
Two pages a day? Oh yeah, I can do that.
Heck, I can write a dozen pages now that I'm all bionic about it.
There's only one thing missing -- that cool music that played in the background when Lee Majors (Steve Austin) was doing all his cool bionic stuff. Now, if I had that playing in the background, just imagine how much I'd be able to write!
