Just Add Rain and Write
Sunday, August 26, 2007 at 18:37 This summer, my husband and I stayed in Paris during the month of August. Our friends thought we were nuts. Paris is usually hot and muggy in the summer. They all took off for the beach, the mountains, and other faraway places. The city itself seemed to urge us to go. One by one, shops, restaurants, and cafés shuttered up as their proprietors headed for their country homes. Even our local market shrank to a few anemic stands selling bare essentials.
It rained the entire time.
It was the perfect summer.
With few distractions or obligations and nothing tempting me outdoors, I could finally indulge in a more regular writing rhythm. I scheduled my handful of Alexander Technique students for the afternoons and carved out the mornings for writing.
It paid off. I finished a first draft, dove into a rewrite, knocked off an ebook, and took on a few jobs.
But now, the season of la rentrée (literally, "the re-entry") is upon us. All those people who left in August are returning en masse. The city suddenly seems twice as large and twice as loud. La rentrée designates the start of the school year and, for many—including yours truly—the start of the working year.
Sigh.
What can I do to maintain this wonderful momentum I've built up? Here's what I've come up with:
- Commit to delivering. Deadlines work for me. Even self-imposed, arbitrary deadlines. (Deadlines with a paycheck attached work even better.)
- Keep an output agenda. About a year ago, my husband started keeping a log. His goal is to write one page of new material a day and won't go to bed until he makes an entry. He's stuck to it so far. I hope to stick to it five days a week.
- Make writing a priority. I'm already pretty good at not letting myself get distracted, but I could get better still.
- Exercise regularly and take time for myself. I let this one slip last spring, and it took me all summer to recover.
If anyone has any other suggestions, I'd love to hear them. How do you manage your writing time?
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Reader Comments (2)
No, the ebook I wrote is "Joining, Creating or Running a Screenwriters' Group." You'll find it in the navigation bar under FREE STUFF.
And yes, Robert Rickover's Alexander Technique site is very thorough and informative. Check out my teaching site, too: http://www.alexisniki.com
Alexis