What motivates you to write? I mean, of course if you’re a published author, you’re contractually bound to deliver a book at deadline, and if you’re not yet published there’s the drive to be published someday.

But there has to be something beyond those things. Is it to leave a legacy, to have something in print that will remain (hopefully) after you’re gone? Is it just to see your book on the bookshelf? Is it to know that you saw something through from start to finish? Is it to be able to say “I did it” ? Or is it purely the love for the written word, the driving need to put the story on the page?

Whatever the motivation, don’t lose sight of it in the mundane, day to day meeting of word count. Because often I think writers do lose sight of the pure beauty of writing.

Not everyone can do this. Though many people say ‘anyone can be a writer’, those who’ve struggled to create a book know that’s very far from the truth. Not everyone can be a writer. But we can. Celebrate it and revel in the joy of it. And never forget why you do it.

“Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.”
Mark Twain

Always surround yourself with the people who motivate you, who believe in you. And always believe in yourself. Pay no attention to those who think your dreams are unattainable. They are, if you work for them.

Happy New Year!

It’s a new year, a fresh start. Time for new resolutions, and new writing goals, or a new push to the old ones.

Do you make writing resolutions, vowing to do it differently this year?

I’ve made two resolutions for the new year:

1) I will never have an end of year deadline again (omg that so sucked. lol)

2) I need to stop procrastinating. Finish the book early! (Because I know I can, I just tend to use up every available day of my deadline. Which is stupid)

What about you? Any resolutions? Anything you want to do differently this year?

When I do the Sven challenge, or any other type of writing challenge, I always look on Mondays as a new start–a new week.

It doesn’t matter whether the prior week–or weeks–I’ve managed to have stellar output–or total crap.
Each Monday I start over with a blank slate. It allows me to forgive myself any slacking, and it doesn’t allow me to rest on my laurels if my production has been awesome.

Never look back–only forward. The only thing that matters is what you’re going to do today, not what you did yesterday.

So have a great writing week! This is the one that counts.

Have you hit it yet? The wall? That thing that stops us from moving forward?

I have. I’m there. My story is a total piece of shit and I can’t go any further. I want to print it out and toss it in my fireplace to use as kindling. It’s crap. It’s worthless. I’ve never written such dreck in my entire life.

Fortunately, I’ve been writing long enough to know I hit this wall with every book I write–the point where I realize the book I’m writing is toast and I need to start over.

So what do I do when I hit the wall? I keep going.

Imagine that with every book you write, you hit the wall, stop, dump the entire thing and start over with a brand new project, one you love. It’s so much better than the last one that wasn’t working. Your fingers fly, the story shines…

Until you hit the wall again. And believe me, you will. So you stop, dump the entire thing and start over with a brand new project, one you love. And so on and so on…

As Lauren said in her post yesterday, revisions are your friend. But you can’t revise what isn’t written.

So while I’m stomping around and cussing and hating life and this story, I keep going. I will finish. I have to finish. And when I do, I’ll turn this piece of shit into a book.

Kick that wall down or walk around it. But don’t ever give up and start over. Kiss of death for a writer.

This is a particularly difficult time to be doing the 70 Days of Sweat Writing Challenge. The holidays are approaching and there are all kinds of busy things coming up. Shopping, decorating, cooking, visiting, you name it and the next couple months will be filled with it.

And in the midst of all that, you might also have a job and kids and family to take care of. And you’re also a writer. So you have to nuture a book admist all this chaos. How will you manage it? The only way to deal with it is to learn to say ‘no’, to let a few things go.

When you’re a writer, you can’t do everything. You can’t be all things to all people. It’s a hard lesson I had to learn, and I still suffer great guilt because of it, but that guilt lessons for me all the time because my writing has to come first. If it doesn’t come first, it doesn’t get done. If it doesn’t get done, then I can’t really call myself a writer, can I?

If your writing is important to you, if you want to make this a sustainable career, then you have to learn the word ‘no’. You have to choose the things that aren’t as important as what you thought they might be. And then you have to let go of them so you can carve out enough time to write. Because if you’re overloaded with too many functions, too many activities, too much pressure, you either won’t write at all, or the quality of your writing will suffer.

Which means you need to learn to prioritize. Of course your family is important. They have to be fed and taken care of. But there are always minor things that can be let go of. If you sit down and think about it, you can set a schedule so that during this oh so busy time of year, you can gift yourself with that precious time for yourself so you can write.

Don’t ever forget how important YOU are, how important writing is to you. And then be fierce about holding onto that time. Learn to say ‘No’. It’s very freeing.

We’re almost finished.

Are you lagging, or picking up steam? I find I really push toward the end of these challenges, trying to make up for days where my productivity wasn’t so stellar. Plus I like to finish on a high note rather than just giving up or ending with some really bad numbers.

So on this last week of our writing challenge, give it a little push so you can triumph at the end. Even if you’ve had nothing but dreck the entire time, you can still get a lot done in a week.

Start now. You’d be amazed what you can accomplish in a short period of time.

If you’re lagging, give yourself a last minute push.

And if you’re writing steadily, keep going.

What do you do when you don’t want to write? When you’re having an “I don’t feel like it” day. We all have them. When you’re whiny, not in the mood, you want to watch television, or go shopping, or go outside, or you’d rather do anything else other than write.

It’s not like taking a day off work, when you can find someone to fill in for you, someone to pick up the slack until you get back to things.

If you don’t write your book, who else is going to do it? This is writing, it’s a solitary endeavor. If you don’t do the work, it doesn’t get done.

We don’t get to take a day off and assign our writing tasks to someone else. If we don’t write, the writing doesn’t get done. If we’re not in the mood and decide we’re just not going to write today, then we get behind.

Who’s going to finish your book if not you? The answer is no one. Only you can do it.

Get to work

I’m not much for taking days off from writing. Especially with my current schedule, which is write one book, then another, then another, then…well, you get the picture. I’ve been writing pretty much nonstop for the past three years. I do love my job. But this year, since the first of the year, has been rather…intense. I have a lot of books to write in a very short period of time. And on top of writing new books, there are revisions and copyedits and galleys coming in on other books that I’ve already written, so I have to make time to do those in between making deadlines on new books. Yikes!

So in the past two weeks, I was on the last few chapters of a book that had really drained me. At the same time, galleys arrived for another book and I had a limited amount of time to go through those. Which meant I had to write and do galleys at the same time. Hey, we do what we have to do, right? I managed both projects and got the galleys off to my publisher, then finished writing the book on schedule. No sooner had I finished the book then revisions on another book arrived via Fedex. (Are you sensing my no-time-to-breathe scenario here?).

I took all last week to do those revisions, and as soon as I got those out the door, I did something unheard of for me–I took a day off. I was utterly exhausted and knew I just didn’t have it in me to dive into the next book yet. So I played on the internet, I read, I watched television. In general, I vegged. It was wonderful. And I needed it.

Sometimes we push ourselves so hard we run the risk of burning ourselves out. Really not good for the muse or for our productivity. I know we have goals and we want to produce every day. But I also think it’s okay to allow ourselves a day, or even two, to regroup, to rest the muse, to let our minds wander.

The day off was great for me. I’m ready to dig into my next book with new enthusiasm.

And I can breathe again.

We’re harder on ourselves than anyone can ever be on us. Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t make a goal one day, or one week. And once in awhile, take a day off and just let your mind rest. You might be amazed how creative and productive you’ll become when you get back to writing again.

Always be kind to yourself. It’s something I have to remind myself of often.

‘I don’t believe in writers’ block. Plumbers don’t get plumbers’ block. Why should writing be the only profession that gives a special name to the difficulty of working.’

Philip Pullman

NOTE: Sven is moving servers over the weekend. It’s possible any comments you make will be lost, but things will be back to normal for Wednesday’s check-in.