Last month I introduced you to Ms. Carolyn Rae when she shared some thoughts with us. Today she shares something she treasures....
Tempus Fugit Latin for time flies – How to make the best use of your valuable time.
What we generally regret is that time we want to spend doing something we enjoy can be taken up by other less enjoyable things or we have not been able to complete the important things we want to get done.
However, there are ways to improve your use of time by careful management. First, you must set priorities. Mine was to send out a cookbook proposal to an agent I met at a conference who requested it. While I have managed to condense the important elements of the book into the ten-page limit she specified, I admit, I have strayed to check out a few e-mails. However, while my phone has rung twice, I let the answering machine take messages and free me from sales calls.
For good time management as a writer, it is important to schedule work on your projects at a time when you are most alert and creative, and there are less likely to be distractions. If this time for you is morning, you should schedule only the most important duties before tackling your important work. Unless your mother-in-law is coming to visit, you don’t need to clean the kitchen or straighten your house before starting your important project.
If your best time for your creative endeavors is at night, you’ll want to take care of the necessary things beforehand to free up time to work on your project.
Let’s talk about necessary things. Can you shorten the time you spend on them? Do you really need to clean the house that often? Are there some jobs you could do only once in a while? Does that closet or cupboard really need to be rearranged? Can you enlist children to do some things with perhaps a bump in their allowances? Maybe you can persuade your husband to do some chores. After all, he shares the house with you. If you can afford it, maybe you can pay for housecleaning or yard-work and free time to do what you enjoy.
Whichever time is best for your creativity, if you are writing a novel, you need to schedule time to work on it daily. That keeps your mind working on the story, so you will think of things to add when you sit down to write. When I had a full-time job, I scheduled an hour each morning to write, and managed to finish a novel each year. Now that I am published, I spend more time writing so that readers can buy more than one novel of mine each year.
Time IS something we treasure, Carolyn as well as our creative projects and these ideas are sure to be treasured by all who read them! Thanks for sharing.
Carolyn Rae is speaking on How to Write More and Faster on the Fun in the Sun Caribbean Cruise Conference on February 28, 2019, sponsored by the Florida Romance Writers.Carolyn Rae’s latest book Romancing the Doctor, is a spicy romantic suspense where CDC Doctor Daniel Whistler and his girlfriend, Heather McKinley, hunt an elusive virus spreader to keep people from getting sick and perhaps sterile. They follow the population control fanatic from Atlanta, to New Orleans, to Dallas, and finally find him on a cruise ship in the Caribbean. Find our more by visiting Carolyn's website and Facebook page.
Hope you enjoyed today's post and that you'll check back regularly for Tuesday Treasures, Thursday Thoughts and Saturday Spotlight.
Until next time, take care and God bless.
PamT