By davidrawlings Posted on

What is your “new normal” as a writer?

[This blog post appeared on the LearnHowToWriteANovel.com web site in May 2020]

I’m constantly hearing the phrase “new normal” being bandied around the media. Once we go back to normal, what will the “new normal” even look like? It almost certainly won’t look like the normal we left when we all headed inside and locked the doors.

The “new normal” is sometimes spoken about with some kind of trepidation – almost as if it’s a negative. That what we’ve left behind is going to be missed.

But what if it’s not? I’d like to suggest that we could use the “new normal” as a positive. I intend to use it as a reset for my own writing, and what I’m leaving behind will be replaced by something better.

And that will become in my “new normal”.

So what will I be leaving behind, and what will it be replaced with?

  • I’ll be leaving behind a complete focus on a deadline as a specific date in time, and replacing it with smaller deadlines to help me reach it. I’ve found more regular (and smaller) deadlines during this lockdown has actually helped me write MORE.
  • I’ll be leaving behind a 100% time commitment to writing and replacing it with a 90% commitment to writing and 10% commitment to reading. I’ve found that in picking up the books I never got around to, my writing has improved.
  • I’ll be leaving behind a commitment to social media quantity and replacing it with a commitment to quantity. Let’s be honest – as authors we feel under pressure to post incessantly, but I’ve found better responses to quality posts rather than a deluge of them.

 

I’ve decided to make these things a part of my “new normal” because I’ve had a chance to take breath—a break—and re-evaluate.

So what about you? What could you make a part of your “new normal” as a writer?

One Reply to “What is your “new normal” as a writer?”

  1. scribelady says: Reply

    Right now, most of my writing is to my personal blog or to a devotional magazine which doesn’t have firm deadlines. When I want to submit a story or an article to a publisher with a specific deadline, I’ve decided to set my own deadline of two weeks in advance of the publisher’s. I know this is a small change, but my time-management skills can use improvement; I hope this strategy does it. For myself, I walk a fine line between disciplining myself too much (I get easily discouraged) or not enough (which results in no results!)

    David, forgive me, but did you mean to put “quality” instead of “quantity” in the second line of the last bulleted paragraph?

    BTW–Thanks for your blog articles. You always have something worthwhile to say, and read.

    Like

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