Jeri Smith-Ready: Meet the new boss

Friday, July 07, 2006

Meet the new boss

Anyone who works at home, or who has had to complete a long-term project like a thesis or a book or a quilt, knows that we have to employ constantly shifting strategies to trick ourselves into working.

My new strategy: a 9-5 workday, during which I concentrate on nothing but Voice of Crow. All my other priorities--e-mail, blogging, writing new proposals, tasks for my part-time jobs, promo for Eyes of Crow, housework, and maybe even leisure--get stuffed into the off-hours before or after 9 to 5.

It's very freeing, in a way. My brain can focus, knowing that there's another time set aside to do all those other minutiae that knock at my mental doors. I need this level of single-minded concentration to sort out some perplexing issues in this book.

But I'm not a person who does well with too much structure, so we'll see how this goes. Tricking myself into work is like playing Whack-a-Mole--the little critters named Laziness and Distractability* keep popping their heads back up in a different place.

BAM! Time for work.

*and their tag-along little brother, Freddie

Labels: writing life

posted by Jeri @ 8:58 AM
3 comments

3 Comments:

Well, if you are planning a 9-5 workday then you will need two 15 minute breaks, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Also, a half hour lunch break sometime between noon and 2 p.m. in order to have a structured workday as they have in an office.:-) Good luck Jeri.

Posted by: Kathy at 7/07/2006 1:09 PM

Good luck. I can't write that way. Forget about the laundry calling me because the kids and summer make it impossible to have that sort of concentration.

I do better writing in spurts than doing one long day of writing. I try to do most in the AM then leave the other life jobs for the afternoon. Night I go over what I wrote earlier. Or not.

Some days it works. Some days it doesn't.

Good luck.

terri

Posted by: moonhart at 7/07/2006 1:48 PM

Well, Kathy, I do have the lunch built in, and the breaks just sort of happen due to my dog's demands and/or my back/neck/butt hurting.

Terri, I'm not writing for 8 hours/day--I wish I were that productive at this point. Some hours are spent researching or plotting or revising. And just a bit ago I figured out a plot point while mopping the floor. It was one of those moments where I just couldn't think while sitting still.

I'm having some encouraging breakthroughs, but they mean going back and rewriting much of what I've already written. This one's a toughie, and I'm still working out the kinks.

Some days it works. Some days it doesn't.

Exactly! And it's tough not to beat ourselves up for not measuring up to the plan every day.

Thanks for the Good Lucks, ladies!

Posted by: Jeri at 7/07/2006 5:46 PM