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Why You Need To Learn To Write Anywhere

By on June 27, 2018
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Here are some of the favourite excuses of writers when trying to avoid getting to work:

The house is too messy
I’m too tired
I don’t have enough time
I’m too stressed out
I don’t know where to start
My desk is too cluttered
There is laundry to do

Any of them sound familiar? Thought so.

All writers go through periods of procrastination and will find just about any excuse they can to avoid sitting down and getting on with their work.

The most common excuses find a way to blame not having the perfect writing conditions, for without them, how could one possibly write, right?

At the end of the day, unless you have the luxury of being a full-time writer, it might be that you only get a few minutes here and there. It might be that you’ve got to do it in a bit of a rush, or that you use your commute or that 30 minutes when the kids have gone to bed before you also need to crash out, or early in the morning when no one else has got up yet.

It would be wonderful to sit down in our perfectly set up writing room, where we have surrounded ourselves with objects that inspire us, a freshly made pot of coffee by our side and the knowledge that there will be no interruptions for the rest of the day, but we’ve got to be realistic.

In short, we’ve got to learn to write anywhere.

Training yourself to focus and be productive for short, irregular periods of time can help you make so much more progress with your writing, and the sooner you can adapt to working in less than perfect environments, regardless of whether they are noisy, cluttered or full of interruptions, the better.

As with anything, practice makes perfect, and to learn to write anywhere; you have to be willing to make an effort to consistently write in these inconvenient locations at these inconvenient times and even when you really don’t feel like it.

If you keep waiting to be in the perfect mood, at the ideal time in the ideal place, chances are you won’t get very far with your writing at all.

No one said it was easy - we know it's a challenge trying to concentrate while you’ve got kids screaming in the background or you’re hot and squashed on you commute to work. No one said it wouldn’t be frustrating to be interrupted when you’ve just got into the writing zone. But if you don’t try, you might find that progress is so slow you become even more demotivated.

So next time you are finding excuses not to write, recognize them as just that, excuses. Treat writing like a job, stop waiting for the perfect mood and moment and fit writing into your life, however messy or complicated it may be.

Bethany Cadman -author of 'Doctor Vanilla's Sunflowers'

Bethany Cadman -author of 'Doctor Vanilla's Sunflowers'

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