Posts tagged ‘time management’

September 16th, 2011

Effective vs. Efficient

by Johanna Harness


My husband is a project manager and sometimes I’ll be mulling some idea about how I’m spending my writing time and he’ll drop an idea on me that stops me in my tracks.  Here’s one of them:  being effective is not the same as being efficient.

Being effective is about results.

Being efficient is about process.

(He’s not responsible for any of this further mulling. So if you know Greg, don’t ask him to explain any of what I’m thinking. He gave up on that a long time ago.)

All the writers I know have other gigs in their lives.  Time is precious.  It’s not enough to be effective or efficient; we need to be both.

When I’m efficient with my time, I might measure that in words written or pages edited.  I might look at how many blog posts I’ve written.  Being efficient is important.  How can I be more efficent?

  • Get up early so I have time alone without disruptions.
  • Watch the clock.
  • Limit frivolous distractions.
  • Write during the time of day when I think most clearly.
  • Take care of myself, so my mind is sharp.
  • Set a timer so I persist through writing discomfort.
  • Listen to music that sustains my writing frame of mind.

All of this efficiency is great, but what if I am channeling my energy ineffectively?  What if I really need to re-envision my rough draft and I’m checking for typos instead?  I might end up with a manuscript 99% free of typos and then need to go back and rewrite every scene.  Maybe I’ve been efficient in hunting typos, but I’ve been ineffective in producing that final draft.

What about blog posts?  What if I’m blogging like crazy to build an audience for my novel–but I never have time left to write the novel?  I can be efficient at writing posts.  I can even be effective in building an audience.  Yet, when I stop to assess, I’m no closer to my goal of becoming a novelist.

What can I do to be more effective?

  • Define my goals in concrete terms.
  • Identify steps toward completing my goals.
  • Of those steps, identify the most time-efficient processes.
  • Be honest with myself about how I spend my time.
  • Be honest with myself when something isn’t working.
  • Take responsibility for the path I’m on.

So that’s it, right?  Be more efficient.  Be more effective.  End of story.

Not so.

All of these steps improve my odds at becoming a better writer, but the creative process requires something more.

I can’t always measure the effectiveness of daydreaming, but I feel it.  I can’t always explain why I need to research some weird aspect of Idaho history, but I feel it.  I can’t always explain why I need an hour to block out a relatively simple scene, but I feel it.  Whether we call it intuition or inspiration or motivation from the muse, these gut feelings are rarely wrong for me.  Often impulsive actions feel neither effective nor efficient and yet they are essential.

How do you spend your writing time? Are you effective and efficient?  Do you follow your intuition?  How are you with setting goals?  I’d love to hear your thoughts.

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This post first appeared as a guest post for Ev Maroon.

Categoryenergy, focus, inspiration, time, writing | Comment10 Comments »

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October 23rd, 2010

Writing a NaNo Anthology of Friday Flash

by Johanna Harness

In Readers are Everything, I wrote about posting short stories as gifts to readers.  Develop an audience by giving away writing of quality.

Time management becomes an issue.  If I let myself, I could spend all week preparing for one Friday flash and then the rest of the week responding to comments and reading the stories of others. While this would be fun, I would no longer be working on my novels.

My solution?  NaNoWriMo.

If I write 50K words of short stories, I’ll have a year’s worth of stories for my website.

I wasn’t sure this was a legit idea for NaNo, but I’d heard of NaNo Rebels, so I pursued it anyway.  Being a rebel sounds nice, yeah? Then I read “Am I a rebel?” and I was kind of disappointed to find out I’m probably not.

This is from the above link:

  • I’m writing a collection of short stories. Am I a rebel?
    Probably not. There’s no actual rule on this one. We define a novel as “a lengthy work of fiction.” However, we the moderators feel that since you find short story collections on the shelves alongside longer works of fiction, if they’re related, they count. They need to have some common theme, or linking thread that weaves them together that makes them a single, “lengthy work of fiction.” Which leads us to the next:
  • I’m writing a series of unrelated essays/short stories/vignettes. Am I a rebel?
    Probably. Again, there’s no official rule on this one, but if you’re just combining unrelated work to get the 50k, it’s probably not a novel.

So the only tiny, little problem I have:  the idea is quite likely a scrunchy little bit of INSANITY.

I’ve written novels quickly.  One scene leads to another, the whole book gains momentum, and words flow.  Stories are cute little monsters that devour entire days in the writing of 300 words.

So I waited to announce my intention until I tested the water.  For three weeks, I’ve been building up to writing two stories per day.  These aren’t for inclusion in the NaNo anthology. This is water-testing. This is strength-building.

I still don’t know if I can do it.

One story a day almost killed me the first week. Then I added one story plus a story built on a novel outtake (again, these results are not for NaNo). Finally, I worked up to writing two original stories a day.  This required serious stretching and anguish, but I did it.  And yet, even working at this level, I’m not sure I’ll make it to 50K.

But you know what?  My exploration and strength training resulted in 19 stories written in Claire’s world. I’ve posted four of them on Claire’s website. If I write like hell all through NaNo, I’m going to have the results I want, even if I don’t meet the 50K.

And you know what else?  That means I can start writing novels again on December 1st. Once a week I’ll edit a story and get it ready for the site, but I won’t need to write new short stories while I’m working on a novel.  (And honestly, it’s difficult for me to work on anything else when I’m absorbed in a novel.)

If this works, I can take a break from traditional novel writing to write another anthology next November.

What do you think?  Anyone want to write their own anthology while I’m writing mine?

And hey–no matter what you’re writing, rebel or not, If you’re crazy enough to attempt 50K in a month, I’d love to be your NaNo buddy.  My identity there is same as twitter: johannaharness.  Tweet me and I’ll be sure to add you back.

Let the games begin (you know, soonish).

Categoryamwriting, blog, Claire Morgane, energy, NaNoWriMo, newsletter, short stories, time, writing | Comment16 Comments »

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October 2nd, 2010

Happy Trumps Smart

by Johanna Harness

A few days ago I re-posted an essay I wrote almost a year ago:  Energy. The basic premise set forth there has been guiding my life since I started writing seriously almost two years ago.

As I trimmed and prepared that entry for inclusion on my new web site, I had to ask myself:

How am I doing?

And you know what?  Not bad. I’m doing okay. But, honestly? I’ve been letting a lot of things on my hate-to-do list crowd forward and stress me out.

I need more days like the one in the picture here–exploring the Wonderful Weird that makes up my world.  This carving is a lion marking the original Fort Boise.  I think he looks like a giant beaver-lion who might affectionately and accidentally hurt you.  He makes me happy.

So why am I not spending more time simply being happy? After some soul-searching, I have to admit I know.  And I’ve known for some time.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I’ve been keeping the list of things that make me a good author, a good writer, a marketable writer–and I’ve been measuring myself against that list, always focusing on my inadequacies.

When I started writing, I broke a big rule.  I did this mostly because I did not know there was a Big Rule.  My mistake?  I fell in love with a series character. I wrote my first book and, high on the experience, I wrote the second.  I was halfway through my third when I started reading the many posts advising writers that this was a waste of time and energy.  The reasoning was solid and logical:  if the first book doesn’t sell, you’ve put all your time and energy into a whole string of books that won’t sell.

So I stopped.

The story was still written on my heart, but it wasn’t smart to write it.

I spent three months working up other ideas and grieving.  I even wrote a contemporary middle grade novel with characters I love.  But yeah, not as much as I love my series character.

When I went to my first conference this past summer, I went there prepared to pitch my middle grade novel.  That’s me, doing the smart thing with my career. I had a couple luke-warm requests, but more suggestions for improvements than anything else.  That’s fine.  Farther from my heart, it’s easy to make changes.

And yet, somewhere along the way, I started talking to agents about Claire Morgane again.  As soon as I did, everyone asked for pages.  That’s me, being happy, not smart. How many more rejections did I need to get for this novel?

In the couple weeks between conferences, I revised my middle grade work, preparing to pitch it.  That’s me, being smart. My MG is a stand-alone.  It has a tight focus.  It’s a really good, little book.  It’s the responsible child of my novel creation.  I know it will get into print eventually because it’s just good.

But it’s also done. I can sell it now or I can sell it five years from now or ten years from now–and it doesn’t really matter. There’s simply no hurry.

So you know what I did, right? Yeah, I prepared for two weeks to pitch that MG novel and then I went back to my next conference and I talked about Claire.  More requests.

My rejections for Claire are funny.

The rejections for my middle grade submission are all about the market and whether there’s room on the shelf.  My rejections for Claire are always about Claire.  She’s not what people expect to see.  I get long rejections that are emotional reader responses to the story and then one line at the end that says, “oh I don’t think I can market this.”  And I also get rejections from people who I picture tipping their heads as they write, “huh?” or, you know, the professional equivalent.

I did meet an agent at one conference who connected with the creative spark in me. I sent my Claire manuscript and received a different kind of rejection, one that said, “I can’t represent this yet.”  We talked on the phone about revisions and all the things she suggested made sense to me.  She wasn’t looking for a different book; she wanted me to improve the book I’d written.

I spent a month revising and I’ve resubmitted, but I have no idea what kind of response I’ll get.  It’s such a big revision and it feels distinctly possible that the story is too much changed from the manuscript I originally submitted.  Of course, I also worried my beta readers would hate this new version too–and all responses have been overwhelmingly positive.  So who knows?

I let manuscript requests sit while I worked on the revision and they’re all sent now too.  I’ve received a couple rejections that made me giggle.  Or they made Claire giggle anyway and her laughter filled my head.

Because here’s the thing: after spending a month with Claire, she’s back in my head.

And on my list of things that give me energy, writing Claire’s story is right up there at the top.  So you know what?

 

Happy trumps smart.

I’m following my heart.  I can’t turn away again.  And I’m so incredibly happy.

 

So where does happy lead me?

 

  • I updated Claire’s website:  http://www.clairemorgane.com
  • I’m directing my enthusiasm for Claire to readers rather than agents.
  • I posted my first Claire short story on her website.  I will add more.  These are not excerpts.  They’re stand-alone stories from her world.

 

Why?

 

  • Because it makes me happy.
  • Because being happy makes my life better and it makes the lives of those around me better.
  • Because I love this character and I really believe others will love her too.
  • Because I don’t need an agent to have an audience. Agents want writers with an audience. It’s not their job to create one for me. It’s not the publisher’s job.

I create my own world and see who shows up for the party.

 

You’re all invited.

I can’t promise there won’t be heartache, but I promise there will be happy along the way.

CategoryClaire Morgane, energy, happy, revision, writing | Comment15 Comments »

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