Pic: My husband and grandson at the Utah Jazz game
Fourth day in a row of getting 10K words and I am feeling it on my arms. But getting my daily wordcount goal feels terrific! So far since Monday this week, I have written 40,623 words and have 9,377 words to go to reach 50K.
The nice thing is, with this project, I have been able to get all my sprinting done during the day so that when evening comes around, I don’t have to worry about it.
I’ve done NaNoWriMo on and off over the years, and I remember one of the earliest times taking the whole day and night to get my wordcount goal. Nowadays I try to be more efficient about it. Here are some of the things I do to get a full day of writing by end of business day:
1.I sprint as early as I can. I walk the dog first thing, shower and then get down to business. I used to shower at the end of the day, but that still means disruption just when I am getting in the groove of my writing.
2.By sprinting with others, I keep myself accountable. When I don’t, I fritter away the morning.
3.Between sprints, I take care of phone calls, design ads, interact on social media, run laundry, and do other in-house errands. Some things really do take under 10 minutes.
4.I clear my mind of worries. I write down to-do lists in my planner, and schedule them for days when I am not sprinting. I keep my Saturdays free for catch-up.
5.I set a wordcount goal for each day that is realistic for the time I have. This week luckily I have had open days on which I could write.
6.Once I reach my goal, I stop. I am sometimes tempted to work throughout the night, but I consciously don’t. I need to rest my brain and sometimes I even think of plot twists for the next day.
7.I might type slower during harder scenes, but in general, I keep typing. This is very important for me to get consistently high word counts.
8.With my free evenings, I tend to go to bed earlier too. Which means that I am alert during the day. Makes a HUGE difference in my productivity.
9.I practice intermittent fasting, which means that I eat one big meal a day. So I usually don’t have to stop for breakfast or lunch. I might grab a snack later in the day, but I can easily do that during my breaks.
10. Between sprints, I stretch, get up, run outside with the dog and in general move. This gives my body and brain a chance to regroup.
I used to have a hard time having work-life balance. Over the years, I have learned to do this better. Like today, after I reached my wordcount goal, I spent the evening at a Utah Jazz game for my husband’s work party where I saw my kids and the grandbaby.
Aiming to observe an 8-5 work schedule and write 10K during the day is worth it!
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