Writing: Finding the Time

One thing I often hear from other people is that they never find the time for proper writing.  And it's a perfectly understandable problem:  it takes hours and hours and hours to write out a full-length novel.  Even a good short story will take time to draft, proofread, rewrite, and submit.  When you have a day job, or a family to provide for, or a really busy social life, or you're on the road a lot, it will be near impossible to find the time to sit down at a desk in a totally distraction-free environment.

With life itself sucking up all the hours of a day, how does one find time to write anything?

There are ways.  If anything, doing the National Novel Writing Month challenge has taught me that it's not too hard to squeeze in 1,667 words a day for a straight month.  Here are my views and tips for finding the time to write:

First and foremost, you need the discipline.  Not everybody has the fortitude to sit down for hours on end; writing can be a rather tedious and lonesome hobby.  You'd have to be really motivated by your story ideas and imagination; it will need to possess you to try and express your ideas in words.  So before you really devote yourself to a project, you'll need to ask the hard question:  do you have what it takes to write? Are you the right person for a given story?

If you're past that point, then you may want to consider setting up a proper timeframe to tackle your writing.  Maybe you can block off a couple of hours every evening.  Maybe in the morning.  Noontime.  Before, after, and heck maybe even during work.  If you set aside the time, you can let your friends and family know that it is your time and you don't want to be disturbed under any circumstances; so long as they're trustworthy, you should have the peace and quiet you want.

If you're just so busy that there's absolutely no time you can block off for yourself, then you'll just have to wing it.  I personally carry around a notebook everywhere I go (to work, on trips, in town etc), so I can draft things by hand if I have any down time.  Transferring hand-written text to the computer takes hardly any time or brainpower, so if anything, it helps in the long run.  I also endeavor to keep a smaller notebook in my pocket at all times, to jot down any additional ideas that may come to me throughout the day.

All that being said, it can still be difficult to produce anything, even if you do carry around a notebook or block off time for yourself.  Inspiration and motivation can hit you at any time, and it won't always synchronize with your schedule.  Another writer I met referred to these feelings as "hauntings," because the urge to write can haunt you.  Ideally, you should probably run to the nearest computer and write your story right when the "hauntings" happen, but if this is the middle of the night or in the middle of work or something, you'll just have to wait.  Or, you may have to improvise and write in a notebook or something.  Either way, flexibility in your routine may help you.  It may also behoove you to seek some other form of inspiration to cut through any blocks you may have.  In the end, however, you'll never be able to create a system that aligns perfectly with your "hauntings," so it's best to build the discipline in some form or another.

Once you get started, it may help to establish a deadline.  Try and shoot for so many words in a day.  Try and finish something by the end of the month.  Having a deadline may motivate you to get the story pumped out.  If you write 1,667 words a day, you'll have 50,000 by the end of the month; that's only six pages a day.  You might seriously surprise yourself with how many words you can fit into a few hours' work.

Even if you peck at it little by little, you will accomplish something and be well on your way to producing a tangible manuscript.