How Do You Make Time To Write? (Or To Create Anything Really)

I was answering questions for a couple of interviews about my writing and books recently, and one of the questions concerned finding time to write. Co-incidentally, I was discussing something similar with my mum the other day, about finding the time to work on our own important projects, when everyone else makes demands on our time that are seemingly more urgent. And this got me thinking, how does one make time to write? And am I doing this as well as I can, or can I improve?

Again, the beginning of a new year is a good time to ask these sort of big-picture questions. Anyone who is juggling multiple priorities will be wondering if they really have time to devote to writing or painting or setting up a side-business. Or you may already be making some time for this passion on the side, but you are frustrated that you are not able to spend enough time on it, enough time to really hone your skills, or take on an ambitious project that will give you a lot of traction. In that scenario, the sensible voice inside your head tells you to shelve your project till you have more time later.

Reading Laura Vanderkam's books, who studies how people spend their time, I realized that we actually have a lot more free time than we realize, or rather time that is not being used by working and sleeping, time that we can allocate how we choose. The problem is that most of us use a lot of that time inefficiently. Sometimes we take on chores or commitments that don’t reflect our values, we do things that we don’t really need to or want to, and give up on things that are more important to us, because "we don’t have enough time". At other times, we aren’t conscious of how we are using our time, and before we know it, 3 hours have gone in watching mindless TV that wasn’t even that important in the first place, or an hour has disappeared into "catching up with friends" on social media, even though we didn’t exactly send any personal messages. What could we accomplish with just 3-4 hours every week devoted to our passion projects?

One thing I have been experimenting with this week is scheduling what's important to me first, and then worrying about everything else. The famous exhortation of Stephen Covey to put "first things first" is apt here – I found that things that I want to do and naturally used to say 'no' to before thinking I didn’t have time for it, I can very often make some time for it. I just have to be more mindful of how I am using my time. I also have to be more willing to let the dishes pile up in the sink, and ignore the siren call of the laundry or the unread newsletters in my email. I won't really suffer if any of those things aren’t done right now, and instead devoting half an hour to my current WIP is more satisfying, or taking the time to find new ways to market my books which could yield more sales is ultimately a better use of my time. 

I also found strangely that the chores were still getting done; I was just getting through them faster, or perhaps batching them made it more efficient. Regardless, deciding how I was going to use my time, rather than just going about on autopilot, just doing what I always did before, actually helped me to find more time. 

Productivity Articles from the Archives

Image credit: pixabay.com

I was going through some old emails that I had sent to myself with articles that I wanted to save and come back to again, and decided that some of them were so good I had to share them with my readers. I hope they inspire you to tackle some long-pending projects of your own.

1.       Woody Allen and the Art of Value Productivity – This article from Study Hacks makes a point that really spoke to me – "be bold in conception, but pragmatic in execution". Woody Allen is so prolific because while he tries to do something new and different with each movie, he doesn’t let the reality of the final product stop him from completing it. So often we realize that the idea in our head doesn’t match the product in our hands, and we abandon it, waiting for a better time when it will 'magically' be better. There isn’t such a time, so get on with it.

     2.       How to Execute a Successful Side Project -  This article by Scott Young walks you through conceiving and following through successfully with a side project. Many of us think to ourselves, I would love to make…, or learn…, but the realities of juggling work and life push our projects aside. Scott gives tips to help you design a realistic side project and actually pull it off.

     3.       How to Trick Yourself into Doing Tasks You Dread – This article from the Harvard Business Review blog lists some ways to tackle those pesky tasks that you absolutely hate even thinking about, but need to get through anyway. The article lists the different types of unpleasant tasks that we avoid, and strategies to deal with each one.

So if you are putting off something unpleasant like cleaning out the garage, or keep procrastinating on creating that website you have been talking about, the articles above can give you helpful inspiration to get started. Don’t forget to stop reading and start taking action at some point though!

Plan (Not) To Be Productive Today

I read a lot of productivity books and articles, and try to share some of what I read on this blog. Thinking along the lines of how to be more productive all the time, can counter-intuitively, be less productive.

As I usually do at the end of one year, and the beginning of the next, I have been thinking a lot about how I spent the year and what changes I want to make. I also looked through my time tracking data to see how much time I spent working and writing and working out. What I saw surprised me – I didn’t work as much as I would like. But I didn’t do as much of consciously chosen leisure activities as I would like either. I don’t track every minute of my time, especially time spent watching TV, travelling, doing little things around the house. And I suspect a lot of my time was used up in obvious ways. But I also suspect that I 'wasted' a lot of time that didn’t really register with me, on Facebook or playing a game, waiting for something, or in between activities. Which would be ok, not terribly bad, if it weren’t for something else. I felt like I didn’t have enough time for personal projects or meaningful leisure activities.

In an effort to work harder and move certain aspects of my career forward, I decided to embrace weekly thinking rather than daily thinking (something I learnt from 168 Hours by Laura Vanderkam). This meant that I took the time to run important errands on a weekday or meet someone if that was the only time possible, and make up that time on the weekend. But this started to become a regular habit, and basically every day became a weekday – I took plenty of breaks, but no day completely off. Or I felt incredibly guilty if I did. Additionally, there were many things that I wanted to do that I didn’t give myself permission to indulge in, except very occasionally. I recently started dabbling with paints as a hobby, but seeing as this was clearly a leisure activity, I found it hard to do it when I could easily be sitting down and getting some work or house priority tackled instead. Besides, painting takes a lot of set-up and winding down time, so I could only do it in large chunks of time, which made it harder to justify.

One of the leisure activities I made time for recently...

What I didn’t notice however; was how cranky and irritable I had started to get, especially when things didn’t go as planned, and extra responsibilities were put on my plate. Without realizing it, I had started to be very difficult to be around. As a result of some conversations with my mum, and taking advantage of a slightly slower start to the year, I experimented with scheduling time to paint, and to do other renewing activities such as go for a swim in the middle of the day.

In just over 10 days, I found a remarkable change in my attitude – I am happier, less annoyed with others and even less interested in dessert (a side benefit I didn’t see coming!). In fact recently, someone asked me if I was overwhelmed in my volunteer position, as the person supposed to be helping me was probably not going to be able to. I was surprised at her question, because I didn’t feel stressed at all.

It's not easy to make time for personal priorities when the world has a hundred demands on your time. But I recently realized that the demands are going to keep coming, no matter what you do. You are better off scheduling the important things first, and along with work and family responsibilities, don’t forget to schedule something that is replenishing for you as well. I experimented with creating time to work out and to paint in my day, and then fitting my chores and other tasks around them. I also began to be aware of just how much discretionary time I waste in a day, time that could be better spent doing something mindfully, something that is totally unproductive but matters to me, and makes me more productive in the other areas of my life as a side effect.