I'm very sporadic. It's a fault. My husband is always amazed at the amount I can write in one sitting when I actually sit down and do it, and continues to remind me that if I didn't slack off, and wrote daily I would be extremely prolific and likely more successful.
And that is where I eventually want to be. But first I have two more years of school before I can make it a full time adventure. I hope that I can get some good experience in the meanwhile from this site. I don't think I will start submitting anything until I feel more confident in my work. I think by December I will start getting that confidence and will start making that leap into the world of rejection. lol
@ Brandon, That is one of the main reasons I am one here. I am getting more comfortable with being told there is work to be done on my submitted pieces. I am slowly getting out of the mindset of write and forget. I'm learning a great deal about the rewrite process.
I agree with Brandon. The workshop is honest, but rarely mean. If anything, I have built confidence in my writing through getting reviews. It is a scary first step, but look at it this way--the first writers' group I was in did in person reviews. I had to look people in the eye while they told me what was wrong with my story! It is much easier to take it like a professional in this format, and not just want to take your typewriter and go home.
Obviously sometimes nothing gets written. But when I do write it is usually (and ideally) in four hour blocks first thing in the morning during my daily coffee binge. And if things are going well, momentum builds and six hours will pass like cream. But I write slow and I always have.
And I have a really hard time writing after that initial output. For several months I managed to get up at five every morning and write for two to three hours before work, but I found that hard to maintain. Maybe with longer days ahead I will get that rhythm going again.
Something every single day seems to work better for me than large chunks less frequently. But everyone is different. Binge writing works great for some people.
I'd have chosen "less than an hour a day" if it was an option, as I'm not consistent. I don't even write some days, or a lot of days. So I'm not very prolific. But I'll get on a roll with a few days in a row or a good stretch at a time.
I'm also a musician and I do songwriting. So I need to divvy up my time. The way I look at it is that creativity is creativity. As long as I'm getting that out. I try to work on technique as well as songwriting. You need to work on technique in order to have the tools to express yourself the way you want. This applies to writing too, which means taking some time and doing some exercises, practice, if you will. I've been doing a decent bit of exercises over the last week which is leading me into my next story.
I have a full time day job. In a perfect world, I'm productive at work (I don't hate my job), go to the gym for an hour, work on my instruments for an hour or more and work on writing for an hour or more. And read. And socialize. Obviously there's not enough hours in the day to make all that happen so I try to fit in some of each during the course of the week. But I try to keep a focus on a) being creative; b) being social and enjoying life outside the apartment. I getting a little better at the balance.
My man Jerry Garcia once sang, "it all rolls into one..."
I write fiction when I'm inspired to write it. Usually at night but I am also working on a Master's degree so I have to dedicate half my time to writing papers so I don't always get to write for fun. Plus I have dedicated a large amount of my time to being editor to the anthology and writing query letters to publishers, then sometimes just looking for markets and contests to try to send stories into can take hours of research. You don't just want to submit blindly but to see what kinds of stuff they do publish first. So my life does revolve around writing but not always in the exact increments I may like. I think most writers need to spend half their time writing and the other half researching.
Most days it seems maybe half an hour, most of it not amounting to anything. When a story takes over, probably 3 or 4 hours, the same for the days following until I finish it, that's when I have a good story boiling in my gut and know what I'm doing. No solid story, not much writing.
I am writing late at night with my lap-top on my lap and the clock ticking away. I look over and see it is 2 am and think holy shit I have to go to my day job tomorrow! Once I start writing it's hard to break away. I'm excited about all the advice for re-writes, but I keep post-poning the re-writes and doing new things instead. I need to do the re-writes! Maybe I am avoiding because it will be challenging? Maybe I need to get my self psyched up and do the re-writes!
@Covewriter, your post reminded me of some advice of Ethan Canin's (Iowa Writer's Workshop) that I try to pass along apropos this subject. He says:
"Write when you are supposed to be doing something else. Write when you are at work. Write when you should be on your way to the Airport to catch a flight. Write while you are driving. Okay not that last one, but you get the idea."
Like today. I knew my wife and I were due at a get-together and suddenly the writing became more prevalent. It always seems to accelerate when something opposes it, if that is the right word.
I try to get four hours a day, sometimes six to eight hours if I'm in the last quarter of a novel. Being involved with a novel makes this easier, obviously. I try to never skip a day, either. If I'm tired I have a strict 500 word minimum. Pretty easy to meet in an hour or two depending on distractions.
I'll go a couple weeks without writing any fiction after a 100,000 word first draft. At that point I start to feel discombobulated. Writing fiction once more cures that.
I read about 8 hours a day. Reading and learning and taking notes is a very important part of my writing process. Actually most of the writing process for me is done during this reading period and the period where I stare at a blank wall imagining things. The actual focusing just on the gettin it down is rather small. I do a lot of previsualisation before I even try to put something together. I find if I do it this way I'm less likely to have language pushing me around. On a really good day I will read for 10 hours and write for 4.
I don't have many obligations and can blow most of them off if I've really hit my stride, so it tends to hover around a solid three hours a day. I strive to write at least for an hour even if I'm not inspired; if I can't think of anything new, I go back and work on revising past drafts of established material. If I can't even do that, I go and review stories or edit essays for fun until my brain kicks into writing mode.
I think we should do research, but I wouldn't say half and half. For slipstream or bizarro, you can't really research unless you're looking at previous examples of your concept, which I think is a strange way to get inspired. I think for me, research is more focusing on the art of writing -- reviewing, editing -- so that I can become stronger in technique and the concept will come out better for it. So, I guess, if you wanted to, you could call the reviewing/editing process a type of research for me.
So, it's a solid three, maybe half an hour to an hour of which is spent reviewing/editing. Does that make sense?
(Oh, and just reading for fun? I keep a book in my car so whenever I'm waiting somewhere, I can read; I keep a book in my purse so if I'm not in my car but waiting in, say, an office, I can read; I work as a hotel concierge so it's easy to read on the job; and I read in bed during my free time if I'm not writing or out with people. So I'd say I read at least a solid five hours a day.)
