I came across this post by Anna Staniszewski, who quotes another rockstar author, Jo Knowles:
"Always make writing the top priority in your life even if that means other things have to slide."
Quite honestly, I thought that quote was pretty harsh. Maybe it was just my mindset at the time, but I thought to myself, "I can't put writing first." I'm a mom. A wife. I compete in races so I stay in shape (because deadlines and accountability work for me). I volunteer for a local educational non-proft, help organize a writing conference, help teach at our church Sunday school, and last March, I created a non-profit writing community.
My days start out with me trying to figure out what is the BIGGEST fire to extinguish. And I'm pretty sure that you are all just as busy as I am. I mean, there are only so many hours in a day, right?
So my writing slides to the back of the to-do list.
But the universe started whispering to me. With Anna's post, and then with this post by another of my favorite authors/mentors, Erica Orloff--and what a beautiful post it is!
We writers lament about time management. But maybe we should take a page out of the financial management world.
When talking about finances, experts tell us to Pay Yourself First.
In order to get a future as an author, we need to start prioritizing and paying into it. Paying into our future. And if you are a writer, but you are not paying into your future--into your dream--then that dream will never happen.
So, that's my goal. I'm going to start getting my writing done first--just a little, before I do anything else. Because if I put aside a couple hundred words here and there, pretty soon, it'll grow to be a whole book.
And that's my future.
(Also, I get really crabby when I don't write.)
How do you envision your time/project management? How do you protect your writing future?
