If you write on a regular basis then you probably already know that you have certain writing foibles. Some foibles, such as making sure your work is grammatically correct and that you keep in regular contact with your client are great and necessary. We all have foibles however, that actually work against us. I'm going to look at a few foibles and their ramifications, and then we'll look at how to fix things.
When you write for a number of clients, then it stands to reason that they all have their own idea of what makes a good article, as well as what makes good writing. One thing that they all have in common is unhappiness when a delivery date is not met. However much you love writing there are probably times when you could do with a firework under your seat to get you started.
Procrastination is not the writer's friend, nor is the type of perfectionim that means you take three times as long as the time you have allocated to write a particular article. Everyone likes to get things right and that is part of being a professional writer, but aiming for ultra excellence can work against you. That is not to say that you shouldn't provide extra value for your clients, just that some things help neither you nor your client. I have found that some of my problems in my writing business have centered around the above two foibles.
Fixing Your Writing Foibles
Most writers lose precious time because the procrastinate, they find so many important things that have to be done before they sit down and write. When this procrastination is carried to extremes it can result in an inability to get any words down on the page, which is a disaster if you want to make your living from writing. Whenever the procrastination bug hits me, and it is usually at tleast a couple of times a week, I use one of the old remedies where you aim to work on something for five minuites, set a timer and go, often this will get you past the block and onto writing. If this doesn't work then it is probably a good idea to build things into your day that allow you to procrastinate a little.
Tell yourself that you will put in fifteen minutes work after you have spent half an hour surfing without any particular end in mind, or you have read the writing blogs that you enjoy. The main problem is finding ways to convince yourself to get on with some work. You're certainly not alone in your procrastination, it is something that afflicts everyone in general and wrtiers in particular. If you want to fool yourself you need to know just what you are doing each day. It's a well worn piece of advce but keeping track of what you are doing every half hour for a fortnight, should reveal where your time is going and what methods you can use to get around this.
Perfectionism can be a real problem for many writers who can't even allow themselves to write a draft in one go without correcting and perfecting every sentence. Perfectionism is another form of procrastination, and you need to be able to write something that is good enough. Set a timer for half the time you have allocated for researching and writing an article, get the main ponts and writing around those points try to knock out a first draft without any corrections. During the second half of the allocated time, set a timer again, do a quick spell check first, then go through the article prefecting it, bearing in mind that you have to stop when the timer goes off.
These 'fixits' will only work if you can manage to trick and talk yourself into using the methods outlined above, remember that too much perfection can lead to missed deadlines and the loss of a client. Unless you can deal with procrastination and perfectionism, you won't have a writing business left. What are your fixits for getting on with the writing?
Tuesday, April 21, 2009 at 16:15