Develop a Writing Routine

Being a writer myself the hardest thing I struggle with is to develop a writing routine. I admit since doing it for 3 month and a bit now I find it increasingly easier. But there are still days when I just can’t deliver. My aim is to write 3 articles/ day and this month is actually the first months I managed to do this. Thanks to Dr Mani and his “Infopreneur Challenge”. I have to admit that this challenge was the best way to get me kick started in the right direction to develop a writing routine for myself.

I think it is important for any writer to do this. After all, this is how we are making our income. So having a writing routine is essential for those writing deadlines. Let’s face it, if we have a traditional job we also have to follow the routine to go to work every day at the same time. So why should it be so different, if we work for ourselves? Well, it isn’t different, but it is harder. Nobody is clocking us in or out of work. And no one is looking over our shoulder at home. So we become masters at finding excuses on why we don’t have to stick with “our self imposed writer’s routine” today. We are only kidding ourselves doing this and hurting our own pocket.

Developing a routine for anything is always the hardest thing. Once we get going, it is easy as it becomes – routine – yes you guessed it! It takes around 21 days to change an existing habit into another one. So looking at those statistics I shouldn’t be doing too badly in the future.

But it isn’t just about developing a routine either. We need to give ourselves some credit when we manage to stick with it. How do we do this? Anything is possible; allow yourself a special treat. It should be something that makes you happy for achieving your routine tasks. I treat myself by being able to participate in my favorite forums. I have around 5 were I regularly hang out and being able to go and converse with some of my online friends allows me to treat myself. Sometimes it is also food or TV I choose.

I also make sure that I take some time off every week. Sometimes we get the best ideas for writing we are away from our computer. I believe that developing a writing routine starts with us. By staying true to our self we will build credibility within. This is important for the bad days. We all have them, but having the knowledge that we are able to stick to a self imposed routine, will make us push through those barriers and keep us on track of our writing routine.