Here in the States, we just celebrated Thanksgiving Day. It’s a busy week of grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, and visitors. My sister, her four adult children and their children came for the week. We had so much fun! But it was a challenge to write for 10 minutes every day with so much company. And, in the midst of all the activities, I got a great idea for a fictional character and a scene for a book or short story. So I had to write! I had to squeeze in 10 minutes between the cooking, shopping, playing, talking, visiting, etc. You can too:
- Add 10 minutes to your day by setting your alarm 10 minutes earlier than usual.
- Write at the kitchen counter while you’re waiting for the water to boil or the potatoes to cook or the rolls to get burned – I mean browned. (I learned that 10 minutes is too long for rolls to be in the oven!)
- Lock yourself in the bathroom for 10 minutes. (Note: this doesn’t work very well if you have children in the house because they see the closed bathroom door as their opportunity to have a conversation with you!)
- Sit in your vehicle in a well-lit parking lot at the mall or the grocery store and write for 10 minutes.
- Or, sit in your vehicle in your driveway or parking lot and write for 10 minutes.
- Invite your company to go with you to the library or a coffee shop where you can write for 10 minutes while they read or enjoy a snack.
- Write while your mother/sister/husband/niece/nephew is talking. Look up occasionally or nod your head to appear as if you’re paying attention.
- Announce that you’re going to take a 30-minute nap. Write for 10 minutes; sleep for 20.
- Ask whoever you’re with to write for 10 minutes with you. My sister Becky and write together and sometimes we read what we wrote out loud.
- Before you turn in for the night and go to sleep, turn off the television, tablet, computer, smartphone and then write for 10 minutes.
I’m re-reading “How to Write a Nonfiction Book in 21 Days That Readers LOVE!” by Steve Scott. He writes for 2-hours every day and tells how he does it in this book. Someday…
I only have 10 minutes to write today so please excuse my unedited rambling. Sometimes this happens when you write for 10 minutes every day – you just write – without editing, correcting, changing. You write quickly, off the top of your head, in the now. I’m currently reading Eckhart Tolle’s book, The Power of Now (I know, I know, everybody’s read it already). He explains why and how to live in the now. So today I’m writing in the now – not about the past or the future, just what’s going on in my head at this moment – which is dinner – whole wheat spaghetti with meat sauce and zucchini. We’re having an early dinner and then going to our writer’s group.
Today is Sunday. For me, a day of rest and retrospect. A day to re-fuel my inner strength to face the week ahead. It’s a popular thing to write a gratitude list every day as a way to center your spirit. But my gratitude list has become repetitive. Every second of every day, I’m grateful for my family, my husband, my friends, my health, home, brains, beauty, freedom. That list is carved in stone and I can refer to it every day. So now I write, “I love it when….”
Do you prefer to write by hand with pen on paper or on a keyboard? Does it affect your creativity? We had this discussion at our last Use Your Words writers group meeting. We were talking about writing every day – some like to write in a journaI while others prefer the keyboard.
Write for 10 Minutes 