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8 thoughts on “Between Books: 7 Ways to Stay Productive When You’re Not Actively Writing

  1. Great post ~ I employ a lot of these when I get stuck too. One thing I recently did is re-watch some of my favorite TV shows to find out what about the story really drew me in: was it the plot? the characters? the interaction? the emotion? Once I figure out what it is I really love, I can focus on that when I sit down to write. I know a lot of writers place more emphasis on how books make them feel, but after all, movies and television are written too!

  2. Excellent advice Julie, though I confess that, when not writing, I’m usually doing something entirely unconnected like running, going to watch a rugby match or a gig, or even doing my day job. It’s probably too late for me to become a student of writing.
    Sonnets though, there’s an idea. ‘Shall I compare thee to a loaf of bread’ sort of thing. I might try it out 🙂

    • On the contrary, non-writing things are an important part of writing, too–experience fuels the fire, and usually its when our mind is relaxed/not engaged in writing that ideas come to us 🙂

      And I would love to hear that sonnet!

  3. I am stuck on editing, I love to write (the first draft). I can’t seem to move forward when it is time to edit (like now). It is time to edit when I want to take some steps towards publishing. If I had an interested publisher I’d be editing!! Any wild ideas???

    • I feel ya– it’s definitely easier to pour hard work into a project we know is actually going to go somewhere. But that is the catch 22: A manuscript must be SHINING (i.e., revised multiple times, with critical feedback from readers besides the author, revised, revised again, and polished and revised) before it stands a chance of interesting somebody in the industry. So that does mean a lot of time, patience, persistence, and hard work. The good news: That hard work is very, very doable (although it may be less wild than you were hoping for ;)).

      Let me ask you a question. How do you write when you write the first draft? Do you sit down at the same time every day, or just put in the time when you have it, or write 500 words a day or for 1 hour at a time? If you REALLY want it– to edit– can you not also apply the same discipline to your revisions? I believe it is doable. It’s just a matter of committing to the task and figuring out what works for you.

      One last idea. If first draft writing is what you get most excited about, why not alternate writing the first draft of something with revising the first draft of something else? You could revise Project A one day, write Project B the next. Do the hard thing to get to the fun thing 🙂

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