Maintaining a writing routine is difficult! Especially with our fast-paced lifestyles.

Plus, it’s December!

Also known by teachers as report cards, assessments, unit wrap-ups, fun days, and kids who’d rather be out in the snow playing month. 

Is my head spinning? Yes.

Have I placed writing on hold until summer? Nope.

I’m committed to my writing. I have a routine and I’m sticking to it! Mostly…

It wasn’t always so easy though! I used to do writing sprints and then stop writing for months or even, yikes, years! 

Especially after starting my full-time job. I couldn’t see a way to fit my passion into a busy work and home life.

I didn’t think I had any time. I’d get back to it eventually, in the future when everything was smoother. 

And, I’m a single lady! I don’t even have to throw kids into the mix or family too much.

Hats off to all of you juggling the work-family-passion combo. You’ve got a lot of grit!

I’ve tried various writing routines over the years and nothing stuck.

Getting up early to write before work? Hard no.

Writing after work? Nope.

Writing only on weekends? What, and live in a cluttered, dirty house? Not gonna happen. 

Part of my problem was that I was holding onto the idealistic, nostalgic view of my summer and evenings of endless writing as a kid… hours and days without interruption. Glorious!

But unrealistic for this time in my life.

So, first came the mindset shift, and then came experimenting over many months to find out what writing routine worked for me.

Many people talk about perseverance and prioritization. “Just do it!” they say.

I don’t like that trigger statement. You can’t just do something and expect it all to fall into place.

If perseverance means to continually persist at something difficult then I hope that it is very clear to us all that persistence is not doing the same action over and over and hoping for successful results. 

I hope that we can persevere while rerouting, trying anew, and looking at the problem differently.

If it worked then, it might not work now and that’s not failure.

While we all have numerous priorities in our lives, I don’t believe that just placing our writing on the priorities list will automatically keep it at the forefront of our minds and actionable at all times. 

I think our mindset and our actions need to work together here if we are to successfully create a writing routine that works for us.

So, I can only share with you what I find helpful.

It’s not the best way or the only way.

It is one way to start you off as you explore creating your own writing schedule.

Here are five ways to create a writing routine with a full-time job!

Apparently, New Year’s resolutions are a thing of the past. Setting significant goals to complete by the end of next year is unrealistic. 

You start with so much commitment. You push yourself out of the gate at full speed and then you over-extend yourself.

Missing a day, or two days, you feel defeated and your steam runs out. Soon enough you’re thinking that your deadline is still months away. You can take a break and get back to it later. 

Later never comes. 

We get bored easily. We like incentives. We like wins.

When we can’t see progress, we often feel defeated which can lead to avoidance or procrastination.

We fear failure after all, so not trying can seem easier than giving it a go.

Enter quarterly planning.

I first came across quarterly planning in one of muchelleb’s Youtube videos. Ever since I’ve taken this and run with it!

 Quarterly goal planning allows you to choose shorter-term goals that usually last for about three months.

That gives you four goals per year. 

When you have a shorter time frame you are more realistic about what goals you can achieve in three months.

The writing routine that you build to accomplish your goals is tailored to the ups and downs of your lifestyle.

It also allows you to celebrate your accomplishments or small wins more often. 

There are many different ways to work with that notion.

You could have a year-long goal like writing a novel, which you then break down into four quarterly goals.

Or, you could have one big goal each quarter followed by one or two mini goals that you only work on when you have time. 

I used quarterly goal-setting to start up my blog.

It looked something like this:

First quarter: research and write a master to-do list

Second quarter: write ten blog posts in advance 

Third quarter: design and start up my website

Fourth quarter: launch website!

Maybe this is too slow for some people, but it worked for me.

I easily felt that I was moving toward accomplishing my big goal (starting a blog) without the stress of getting derailed by the busier times of the year at work.

Maintaining a writing routine with flexibility allowed me to persevere and still feel accomplished even when missing a day.

Some people use the Pomodoro technique, a time-management method, where you work for stretches of twenty-five minutes followed by five minutes breaks.

The intention is to allow you to set focused work times.

When you’re struggling to start writing or procrastination keeps getting in the way even twenty-five minutes can seem like a lot.

When I was getting back into writing, it took me a while to figure out how to stay motivated with a full-time job and not be disappointed whenever I missed a day.

Twenty-five minutes wasn’t working for me.

Instead, I started with just five minutes each night. I literally set my timer every afternoon for a month for just five minutes.

I wrote and when the timer went off, I put my writing away, feeling accomplished.

After a couple of weeks of five-minute writing sprints, I completed one chapter of my novel. 

Over many weeks the amount that I wrote grew. Somedays when I was feeling great I wrote longer.

On other days, when I missed it entirely, I didn’t punish myself. I didn’t force myself to write for ten minutes the next day.

I used the self-talk that I teach my students “We’ll try again tomorrow.”

After a month of making that a habit, I added five more minutes to the timer.

I continued this writing routine until I made it to 25 minutes. 

Now, I don’t follow the Pomodoro technique to a T. But, short focused writing sessions or short focused consistent sessions to work on your goal can help.

If it feels like there’s never an end to the tasks and chores that you need to get done, then give this a try.

Find a few spare minutes in your day or carve them out intentionally.

Try to be consistent but don’t worry when you miss a day.

Over time, you do see progress!

I love making lists and crossing off what I’ve completed. Planning ahead keeps me on track, but the way we plan is different for everyone.

Lavendaire has an Ideal Week Planner for those who like to keep a weekly schedule of times to work on various projects.

This didn’t work for me, but with my quarterly planner I do like to look at the week ahead come Sunday night. 

Every week’s a little bit different depending on if there are after-school events that I need to attend so for me, it makes sense to shift around when I complete my writing routine from week to week.

Other people might not want to look so far ahead. They may be interested in a daily planner. I do both.

I like taking my weekly master plan, reviewing it each night, and then making my daily plan for the day ahead. That way if I didn’t complete all the tasks that I hoped to, I readjust tomorrow’s plan.

Going with the flow and only working once inspiration hits seems like the way you’d want to do it as a creative, but you can’t rely on inspiration. 

Creativity can be a consistent plan.

Scheduled Creative Writing Sprints can keep me inspired and on track.

I believe that the more I plan in time for my goals and creative pursuits, the more inspired I feel because I see them coming to fruition. 

Try out different ways to plan and find what works for you. Don’t worry if it takes a while. Be flexible with your writing routine. 

Let go of what doesn’t work even if it’s what you’ve always done. Maybe, there’s another writing routine that works for you right now.

This can be a hard one.

I am a people pleaser. I don’t like to say ‘no’ and I’d love to pack in all of my dreams at once.

For better or for worse, I want to write stories, publish novels, maintain a blog, be an excellent teacher, travel, get my scuba diving license, learn to use a pottery wheel…you get the idea.

I also simply want to spend time with family and friends.

If I did all of this right now, aside from working myself to exhaustion, I’m not sure that I’d accomplish any of my goals with excellence.

A novel would certainly not be published. 

It’s time to take a long hard look at everything on your plate and determine what you can let go, at least for a little while.

What is something you can come back to later when you have extra time? 

It’s okay to say ‘no’ to some invites, to some opportunities at work. 

Make space for your creative goal.

Make space for you to breathe.

I know that there are writers out there who don’t do this. I too love the feeling of letting the words just flow out of me. 

However, if I don’t outline my work before I write, then a lot of time becomes wasted by pondering what should happen next or researching important information that I need to know to move the story forward. 

If I plot out the story in advance and have all my notes in front of me then I can deeply focus when I sit down to write.

I can write more in my twenty-five-minute sprint and half of it isn’t me just looking out the window waiting for a word to pop out of my pen.

Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People talks about the benefits of beginning with the end in mind. A clear vision of our goal, of what we want to express through each writing piece, allows us to align our actions with these hopes.

It keeps us from veering too far off course and focusing our time on busy work.

The first draft is allowed to be messy and horrible. I don’t need to only put pen to paper when I’ve found the perfect words and ideal sentences.

It can all be fixed later. 

But that stage will be farther off if I waste time fumbling through my story without the clarity of a plan.

I absolutely veer off course when inspired to, but the road is always there to return to when needed. It’s the safety belt that keeps me in check when I’m close to derailing the entire project.

Give outlining a try.

It doesn’t need to be overly detailed. A few bullet points to get you started could be enough. 

Help yourself nip time-wasting in the bud by building a writing routine that sets you up for organized success!

There are a lot of tips, tools, and tricks out there to help you make time for your goals.

There isn’t one secret way to do it. If there was we’d all be successfully living our best creative lives right now. 

These are just a few items that have helped me along the way. A place for you to start as you play with and discover what works for you.

I’d like to leave you with two more considerations as you navigate the road to successful time management:

1. Weekends: weekends may seem like the ideal time to work on creative pursuits; however, your body, mind, and soul need a break too.

Carefully consider how much of your weekend you’d like to commit to working on your writing project.

Make sure there’s time for your social life and self-care.

2. Find What Works For You Right Now: Our lives ebb and flow, constantly changing, hitting us with both big and small mountains.

What worked for you in the past may not work for you in the present. Take a close look at your habits and structures, and consider their functionality right now.

Be open to changing your writing routine and changing it again with each season of your life. Be flexible and willing to change when you change.

It’s time to reflect on your writing routines!

What’s working for you? What changes are you ready to make to consistently keep writing despite your busy schedule? 

Do you have any tools that keep you on track?

Share them in the comments below!

Talk soon!

Julia