Writing Your Book – How To Make The Five Biggest Obstacles Irrelevant
The hardest part of writing a book is starting, continuing, and crossing the finish line. What makes these foundational phases so difficult is the appearance, over and over again, of five seemingly insurmountable obstacles:
1. Inertia
2. Fear
3. Timeless
4. Hesitant motivation
5. Unclear commitment
Of course, none of these are really insurmountable. Here are some simple strategies to make each one instantly irrelevant.
Obstacle one: inertia
Inertia tends to arise in the gulf between an idea and its execution. Ideas seem to spring into consciousness almost effortlessly, whereas finished book manuscripts do not. To bridge the gaping chasm between a book idea and its full exploration in words, you need what amounts to a map, or a list of simple, specific steps that will get you where you want to go. Your list could look something like this:
1. Buy a bound journal for all notes related to books, first drafts, doodles
2. Make notes in a new journal about the point or message of my book.
3. Write down all the headline ideas
4. List and elaborate content areas
5. Jot down ideas for research topics and sources.
6. Write chapter topics as well as ideas for titles.
7. Organize content within chapters
8. Research existing books in my book’s specific subject area
9. Set up a dedicated work area
10. Gather books similar to the one I’d like to write (both for inspiration and as models for organization, tone, and more)
Once the project is underway, it’s a good idea to continue listing the steps, although these will be much more specific and detailed (i.e. find the correct citation for the poet’s quote, MO; locate the text block in the ambiguities weather; find last year’s summer archives).
The point is that it is absolutely impossible to “write a book”. Only one specific step can be taken at a time to complete a book manuscript. This may seem ridiculously obvious, but almost everyone forgets it. And then he is unnecessarily overwhelmed by the prospect of tackling that impossible task: “writing a book.”
Whatever phase of your project you are currently working on, there is a next step. The most effective and motivating way to proceed is to write each step in lists of five or ten steps. This is because you need to know exactly and precisely what each step is in order to prepare yourself mentally to complete it. Think of your rolling list as a sort of “anti-overwhelming” tool.
Obstacle Two: Fear
It’s almost axiomatic that if a project isn’t scary enough (can I really do it?), it probably isn’t challenging or interesting enough to sustain the level of engagement you need to feel to see it through to the end. But how do you deal with the need to avoid your book project, because the very idea of getting to work on it stimulates overwhelming feelings of fear, self-doubt and…? . . sudden exhaustion?
The answer is all too obvious, though most of us have a hard time seeing it. Let’s do it. Get involved in real work. The fear immediately disappears when your attention is focused on the work at hand. It’s similar to what happens with a baby’s attention: there she is, crying her head off with all her little self, when her neighbor’s miniature dachshund shows up. The tears turn off like a faucet, because the dog captures her attention so completely that she forgets to cry.
Engage your attention in completing the next step on your list, and fear, doubt, and terminal exhaustion will dissolve (at least in the short term; when they return, simply refocus your attention on the next step).
As additional reinforcement, consider your general reason for wanting to write a book. Is it to convey a message, participate in a search, nurture your talent, or express the inspiration you feel reading another author’s work? If you add inspiration (your reason for writing) to the commitment, fear won’t stand a chance.
Obstacle three: no time
Almost everyone has a lot to do and no time to do it. But that’s no reason not to write his book. It is a reason, instead, to mock your particular version of not having time. (Keep in mind, though, that we all somehow find the time to do the things we really want to do.)
Most of the time, the problem is not so much not having time. It is the feeling that the job is too big for too small amounts of time that are intermittently available.
Make the following strategy a game you play daily: Build up an hour of five- or ten-minute periods spent doing something for your book (refer to your list of steps for small, specific tasks, and if they’re too time-consuming, cut them down). half or even in quarters).
Spend, say, ten free minutes between appointments making notes on what to include in chapter ten, instead of just wasting that time. (It’s a good idea to have a bound journal dedicated to your book project. Keep all your notes in there for reference and inspiration to see the material you’ve collected accumulate and become something substantial. A journal is also portable in more circumstances than a computer.)
Once you’ve completed an hour in small increments, find a small but rewarding way to reward yourself. This step is very important. You want to feel good about consistently doing small, incremental amounts of work on your book. Those increments add up and can take you through the entire process.
It’s also important to give yourself rewards because the ultimate reward for writing a book doesn’t happen for that long, an inevitable aspect of any long-term project. Small rewards are one way to get around that long delay in gratification.
Postscript: When you can set aside more than brief amounts of time, be sure to create a time frame for your work. Look at the clock and count down an hour or two, saying to yourself, “Okay, I’ll work on my book from 7:00 to 9:00.” The reason not to say “I’ll spend the day reading my book” is that it’s too amorphous and overwhelming. These two conditions lead to avoidance and burnout. You must have a set start time and a set end time.
Once you’ve done an hour, or whatever period of time you’ve decided to use, take a break and reward yourself. Then give yourself another limited-time work period, followed by a break. Psychologically, this prepares you for work, but doesn’t overwhelm you with the thought of spending an endless day doing nothing more than that. Chances are you’ll spend the day doing everything but working on your book (I’ll clean out the garage, attic, and foundation first, then I’ll start on my book).
One last thing: be sure to list what you intend to accomplish during that scheduled hour or two hour period. It’s another way to prepare your mind to finish your book work. After you complete each task, check it off. This is strangely satisfying. It also produces a “snapshot” or visual record of all the things you’ve accomplished during that particular work period (a picture really is worth a thousand words).
Obstacle Four: Wavering Motivation
Sometimes you feel like working on your book is the most exciting thing you can imagine doing. And sometimes you feel like working on just about anything else would be cause for celebration. To do?
Recognize hesitant motivation for what it is: it’s either a lesser form of fear (self-doubt) or a sneaky form of burnout (spending too much time doing the same well-known writing tasks, without enough variation to keep you interested). ).
Examine your feelings to find out what is creating the hesitation. If it’s a feeling of fear, use commitment to work, along with external inspiration, to overcome it. If it’s a feeling of boredom or exhaustion, find out what new aspect of your work with the book would cheer you up. What does it feel like it’s fun to do?
Another technique for keeping motivation strong is to practice the mantra of tripartite work: Same time, same place, every day. In other words, schedule your days so that you can spend a half hour or more each day (and the sooner the better), working on your book in the same physical location.
There is an accumulation of productive energy, not only in the place where you work, but also in the quality of work that creates habits. If you show up at the same time every day, there’s a natural tendency to slip into work easily, because there’s already a memory groove for it. You can use this phenomenon to keep your project going, with much less effort.
Obstacle Five: Unclear Commitment
Your commitment to your book is what makes it “stick” to you. It is your primary purpose, what you ultimately hope to accomplish by seeing your book through to completion.
Sometimes people start work on a book with too vague an idea of why they are working on it. They then suffer from particularly acute amnesia about those vague reasons during the inevitable periods of low energy and thus low engagement and interest in their bookwork.
To protect your project and your commitment to it, create a carefully constructed statement about why you want to write this book. What points do you hope to make and why do you want to make them? Be as specific and detailed as possible. Then post your reasons conspicuously on your workspace as well as on the front of your book journal.
If you finally find that you have outgrown your original reasons for writing your book, because your topic has evolved as you worked through the first few chapters, then rewrite your purpose statement. But he continues to remain clear about his reasons for writing. In its simplest form, this is often a question of what sparks a feeling of energy and enthusiasm in you (what you love), and what your book shapes or embodies.
Writing a book may not be “easy,” but it can be rewarding in ways that almost nothing else is. To make sure you start, keep going, and cross the finish line, remember that there are a few simple ways to make inertia, fear, lack of time, wavering motivation, and unclear commitment instantly irrelevant.
