Life-Changing Ideas

"If a competent CEO got to run your life for a day, what is the first thing they would eliminate?" 

This was a question posed by author James Clear in a recent email.

I didn't have to think about it too hard.

Time wasting.

If someone was looking over my shoulder for a day, they'd see how much time I waste, even though I swear I'm a hard-working, productive person.

Every day I spend far too much time checking emails. I always tell myself I won't spend more than 20 minutes, then next thing I know it's 45 minutes later and I still haven't finished.

Then there's surfing the web. I go online to look up one thing and end up clicking and going down one rabbit hole after another.

Chatting to people when I see them can often be another time-waster. Sometimes I'm only on the front veranda for a short coffee break, and neighbours will stop by to say hi, or their dogs will bark when they see me so I HAVE to go and pat them, and that starts a conversation with their owners. But if I had a competent CEO with me, he wouldn't allow me to waste so much time, even if it's a cute dog wanting my attention (because how can anyone resist a cute dog, right?).

Seriously though, not only do I know that I waste too much time, I also know what the solution is. 

I need to stick to my daily schedule and not let myself be sidetracked so easily. 

I know how long things take to do, so I need to get them done. If it's in my diary to be done, then I should do it and take my coffee breaks inside where neighbours and dogs can't see me. It's very friendly where I live.

A timer is always my best friend because I work better when I'm working against the clock and my time is limited.

I know how much I'm capable of doing when I stick to my schedule every day, and to be honest, it's not even really that hard.

It's never a good feeling to get to the end of the day and regret all the things I haven't done.

Which is why I'm now hard at work writing my next book, and I've already planned the next one too. I need to keep my imaginary CEO cracking the proverbial whip every day because it works.

Which is how I wrote this blog post in only 15 minutes.

https://cheritonhousepublishing.com/books/15.html

The Brilliantly Simple 2-Hour Schedule That Actually Works

There's a book I love by Dorothea Brande called 'Wake Up and Live.' It's an old book (and still available to buy from just 99 cents for the ebook) and was first published in 1936, but the advice it contains is still relevant today. It's a really popular book.

Wake Up and Live is all about being productive and achieving everything we want in life. One chapter (naturally) is about discipline, where she talks about her idea of using a 2-hour schedule to get more done.

At first this may seem too easy to be useful. But while it is easy, it also works like a charm.

The idea is simple. Decide what you're going to do for the next 2 hours and do it. This doesn't mean doing only one thing. It means being productive for 2 hours.

So for instance, your morning 2 hours might be-

6.00 to 6.30 am-shower, dress, bed made.

6.30 to 7.10 am Breakfast and Dishes

7.10 to 7.30 am Emails

7.30 to 8.00 am Set timer and write. 

The crucial thing isn't what you do during those 2 hours, but that you stick to each individual task for the designated time, no matter what. She advocates short, unbreakable daily appointments with yourself rather than massive time blocks.

It's the dedication to discipline that's important, and to maintain those time blocks as non-negotiable. So if you plan to check emails for 20 minutes then clean the bathroom for 20 minutes, stop checking emails after 20 minutes and go clean the bathroom. This will help you learn to stick to a schedule no matter how small it is. You'll also discover how long it takes you to complete each task while instilling discipline to get more done.

Before I tried the 2-hour schedule I had no idea how undisciplined I was and how easily I was distracted by unimportant things. 

I use the same 2-hour schedule for my writing using a timer for scheduled breaks every 25 minutes. And it's amazing how much I can write in just 2 hours when I work this way. Knowing that I only have 25 minutes to write in each block stops me from being distracted because I don't have time, and so I have to keep going whether I feel like it or not.

The 2-hour schedule is something that you have to try for yourself to see how powerful it is.

Wake Up and Live!
By Dorothea Brande
This book will help you reach your goals and achieve success
https://amzn.to/3gs6WU4

Stop Worrying and Start Writing

It's all too easy to worry about all the other things you "should" be doing instead of writing, or to worry that your freelance submission won't be good enough or that your books won't sell.

But what I learnt recently is that there's an answer to all this. Not only that, but the answer was here all along. And even more than that, you've always known the answer, whether you admit it or not.

I read a book by Dale Carnegie called "Stop Worrying and Start Living." It's a fascinating book, and he says that the easy cure for worrying less and living more fully is hard work. Being busy and productive not only helps to take your mind off your worries, but you'll feel better for achieving more.

- Hard work is the cure for worry.

- Boredom leads to worry and depression.

- Learn to love your job, or at least parts of it.

- Keep active mentally and physically.

- Do your best and ignore everyone.

- Accept what can't be changed.

- The devil finds work for idle hands.

All this is why I find writing to be the cure for all this.

When I'm writing, my mind is completely locked into the present moment. When I'm concentrating on my writing it's impossible for me to think about anything else.

Writing, especially when I'm working on a big project, is an escape from reality.

I find it to be a form of therapy.

Writing really is the way to stop worrying and start living, plus it's productive and profitable.

MISSION CRITICAL FOR LIFE

Start Living Life On Your Terms By Pursuing Your True Life Mission

https://cheritonhousepublishing.com/books/MCFL.html 

How to Handle Writing Saboteurs

Have you noticed that whenever you commit to a big writing project, an unending stream of disruptions starts to happen?

It seems like everything and everyone in your life wants to sabotage you.

And it can be anything - a spouse who needs your attention, kids getting ill, friends dropping round, an old habit tempting you, or your own desire to quit and go and do something easier.

Whatever it is, the more you commit to a goal, the more resistance you'll get.

Why?

No one knows. 

It's one of the mysteries of life.

So what can you do about it?

There's nothing you can do except get comfortable with it and keep working towards your goal.

Deal with the saboteurs as quickly and efficiently as you can. 

Don't ignore things. 

Deal with them. 

If a friend knocks at the door, answer it and tell them you're busy and you'll catch up when you've finished. Don't ignore the door, or they'll come back and keep knocking. 

And don't ignore your writing. Keep going and work on it every day as much as you can. Even two minutes a day is better than missing a day.

If you let these things drag you away from your goal, then you need to ask yourself if you really were committed to it.

How about committing to the challenge of writing 12 books in a year?

Even if you don't make it, you'll have achieved so much.

The 12 Month Writing Challenge
Write and Publish 12 Books in a Year

https://cheritonhousepublishing.com/books/12MTH.html

Winners and Losers

I'm currently re-reading the book 'Atomic Habits' by James Clear, and I'm finding so much wisdom in it that I wanted to share some of it with you. I'm only on the second chapter, but even in those few pages, there is a lot to learn. 

As an aside, considering this is the second time I've read the book, I'm wondering why I didn't notice all this before. But this is why I always read books more than once. It's like watching a movie for the second time; I always notice things I missed the first time around.

But back to the book...

In the title, he uses the word 'atomic' to mean small. He says that success doesn't come from having grand plans, but from making small changes (the size of an atom) one step at a time. This produces lasting change.

Big goals (like the ones we always make every New Year) fail because it's too overwhelming to make big changes all at once, and we quickly get tired of trying too hard. But small goals that only mean minimal changes are easy.

In the book, he nailed it when he said that the goal itself isn't what differentiates winners from losers, or success from failure.

In the gym, they all want to get in shape. Olympians all want to win the gold medal. Every applicant wants the job. Every writer wants their book to be a bestseller.

What sets apart winners isn't their end goal because they all want the same thing. They all want the same goal, the same outcome.

What sets them apart is the daily systems they follow.

One does the work, the other doesn't. To be a winner you need systems that improve your results for good. You need to work in a way that changes your habits one atom at a time so that you'll stick to your new habits and not find them overwhelming. 

He says that if you're a writer, write daily, even if it means visiting your work for just two minutes a day. Don't skip a day. Build a daily habit, no matter how small.

I think building a daily writing habit, even a small two-minute habit, is extremely important, even though it doesn't sound like it is. It's just that sitting down to write every day is the hardest thing about writing. We can all think of other things that need doing when we know we should be writing. 

But when you know you only have to sit down for as little as two minutes, it's doable, because no one can say they don't have two minutes to spare. And that is the start of a daily writing habit. I've been doing it for the last two weeks, and it's working really well. Once I sit down and look at my diary to see what I should be working on, the next thing I know, half an hour or more has passed, and I didn't notice because I was so busy writing.

And it's while I'm writing that I can find systems that work for me. I can't possibly know what will work unless I'm actually working, and then it's easy to know what works and what doesn't.

James Clear says to find systems that create results and keep on refining them for endless improvement.

You'll love the process.

Get off-line and Get a life

If there's one thing that annoys me every time I walk along a street, it's people walking towards me while staring at their phones. They're not even looking where they're going, and they have no idea I'm even there. So I wait until they're within a few steps of walking straight into me, and I yell," Look out!"

It's funny to see how much they jump, but it's also annoying that they are so inconsiderate (and stupid). 

A few days ago, I was in the food court at a local shopping mall, and there was a young woman at the next table, staring constantly at her phone. She wouldn't take her eyes off it for even a second. Sadly, she had her young daughter with her, who was desperately trying to get her mother's attention, even standing by her side, hugging her arm, and talking to her. But the woman ignored the child completely. It was as though she'd forgotten she even had a child. It was sad to watch.

But it's not just phones that people are addicted to. It's tablets and computers as well. This technology, originally designed to save us time, now seems to take up all our time. If we let it.

The truth is that phones, tablets and computers are mostly used as a distraction, because while we're "busy" online, we ignore everything else. And I'm not much different from most people. Once I start searching online, I can easily get lost down a rabbit hole and end up looking at things not even remotely connected to what I was originally searching for.

To stop myself from doing this (because it can happen often), I began doing what I call a Digital Detox. When I want to look at social media, I do a timed session for 25 minutes maximum. I've set 25-minute screen allowances on my phone and computer settings. I also take breaks from social media and news for a week or two at a time, because these sites can end up being depressing.

Entrepreneur Derek Sivers says he is now offline 23 hours a day, which he says improves his productivity as well as his mental clarity. https://sive.rs/off23 

I've also recently read about the benefits of being offline for most of the day, and I agree with them all, including Reclaiming Time, Mindfulness, Enhanced Physical Health, Increased Productivity and Focus, and Stronger Relationships.

I now spend most of my time disconnected from the internet, and it feels good. I sleep better, I can think more clearly, I'm (a little) less anxious, and I have more time every day.

I'm also much more creative when my mind is free to think. There may be a lot of ideas that can be found online, but they're not good ones, so I don't need to look up everything.

At the moment, I'm experimenting with only being online 2 hours a day max. A one-hour block of time in the morning and a one-hour block in the afternoon. And no internet whatsoever in the evening.

Being so limited with my online time not only keeps me focused while I'm online, but also keeps me focused when I'm offline because I can't look for answers, so it makes me think for myself more.

And I find I make better decisions.

An Extra Benefit From a Daily Writing Schedule

 No doubt you're aware that I've been talking a lot lately about having a daily writing schedule and sticking to it.

Schedules are great because you don't have to wonder when you'll sit down to write, since it's already there in your schedule.

But there's also another reason why having a schedule is important.

A schedule lets you know when you can shut down for the day.

It's one thing to know when to start writing. It's another thing to know when to stop.

I know that I can get a lot of writing done in just two hours a day. But sometimes when I'm in the flow, I can write for hours.

Some days, I sit down and write thousands of words in my two allotted hours. On other days, I'm restless, so I don't write as much. But that's OK as long as I sit at my writing desk for the full two hours without distractions, because being forced to sit there gives me time to think, and that's when ideas come. 

Thinking creatively is also working, even if I look like I'm staring into space doing nothing.

Being creative is a lot more than getting words down on paper (although that IS the goal), it's about giving ourselves time to think.

And to also know when to stop working.

And scheduling just two hours a day means I know when to start, how long to keep going, and when I can stop if I want to.

But I don't always want to.

Stop Procrastinating 
And Take Back Control Of Your Life

https://cheritonhousepublishing.com/books/sp.html

Achieving More Without Goals

"Writers don't need more goals, they need better habits."

~ Patty Robinson

I'm always looking for ways to get more done, but I also don't want to work longer or harder. In my search for answers, one thing I did learn was not to plan any goals.

Don’t get me wrong, goals are great, and I always have plenty of them. Currently, my goals are to lose 6 kilos (approx 14lb or 1 stone) in 12 weeks (which I began 6 weeks ago and I’m 3.1kg down, so I’m on track), to finish my latest novel in the next 6 weeks, and to finish making curtains and roman blinds for our new house in the next 6 weeks.

All these things are doable because I'm not pushing myself too hard to reach these goals. And the reason I'm not pushing too hard is that I planned a process to follow to reach my goals. This means that once I know the process, I no longer need to remember the goal.

Goals are great because they provide direction for where I want to be. But I don't plan the goals. I plan a short-term process to get there because a short-term process leads to long-term results.

I don't think about my goal to write a book, I plan to write every day.

I don't think about my goal to lose 6kg, I'm following a 1,000-calorie, high-fibre diet every day, with a weekly weight loss of 0.5 kilos.

 I don’t think about my goal to have the curtains and blinds finished in 6 weeks. I worked out the steps involved in working on them each week, and now I’m following the steps.

Once I have my processes mapped out, all I need to know is what I'm doing each day or week, so it's easy to follow, and it’s way less stressful than trying to aim straight at the goals. I forget about the goals and just concentrate on what I have to do each day.

I find that keeping things simple by focusing on a daily process means I can enjoy the present moment. I don’t have to think about my goal. I just have to follow my daily processes and hit my weekly targets. 

One of the important things about working this way is that my goals are short-term, so I don’t have to dedicate the rest of my life to them. I just think of what I want to do, give myself a doable deadline, plan out the steps to get there, then live in the moment and work my way through the steps, week by week, day by day, for the time allotted.

And with my processes in place, I know that what I’m doing each day and week means that my curtains and blinds will soon be finished and hanging at the windows, I’ll be 6 kilos lighter by the end of next month, and my book will be written and ready for publishing.

And my daily writing habit is something that will continue long after the book is written.

 

My Writing Failures 2025

  

 It's November, so we're heading towards the end of the year.

    Last January I had great hopes for all that I was going to achieve with my writing, but I've had a few failures as well as a few wins.

    So let's unpack it and see what happened.

    I planned to write and publish 3 novels. I only managed two. I was also going to write and publish more blog posts and articles, and a few ebooks, but I haven't managed all that either. Why?

    Well, late last year, we had to sell our home and move into a rental house until we could find a house to buy.

    Then in December, we'd booked a one-month holiday in a house in the country, thinking it was a place to relax and get plenty of writing done. Instead, we fled from there after only 9 days because the place was a filthy tip and the garden was so overgrown it wasn't usable. Plus, there was a rooster on the property that woke us up at first light every morning with its loud crowing.

    We then spent the next few months house hunting, which was so time-consuming.

    Eventually, we found a house, but we had to spend 2 months renovating it, which meant spending 12 hours a day working on the new house, plus taking one day off a week to do  "normal" things like cooking, shopping, cleaning and laundry. As you can imagine, we were exhausted.

    But even though we moved in two months ago, the work on the new house isn't over. I've spent every weekend making curtains, and I have 2 roman blinds to make too. I’ve also been doing some cleaning on the outside of the house.

    Plus, we've had to adapt to living in a new suburb, which includes finding our way around locally, settling into a new routine in our new home and getting to know our new neighbours.

    Thankfully, our lives are becoming more normal again now, and I've even organised the cupboards so that I know where everything is. And there were all the other disruptions, like attending dozens of open homes, eating up all our chilled and frozen food to empty the fridge freezer before it was moved, all the trips to the DIY store to keep restocking the building materials we needed, choosing and organising flooring and carpets to be fitted, and organising the removalists. Then we had to go back to the rental property to do a final clean and mow the lawn.

    We also had 'fun' things to do, like dealing with lawyers and all the forms to fill out, pages and pages of legal jargon to read through, and other legalities of buying a new home.

    As you can imagine, all this was not only time-consuming but also an extreme distraction to my life and my writing routine. But I did write and publish 2 novels, and sold many books too. So despite my low achievements, I still had an income, and I have a beautiful house to live in.

    The good news is that I'm never moving again-NEVER!

    Even if the house falls down or this turns out to be the worst neighbourhood ever-

    I'm going nowhere.

    The Big Question

    The question now, though, is what am I going to change to make next year more successful?

    Right now, I don’t know, but what I do know is that it won’t be disrupted by moving or house hunting or 12-hour days doing house renovations, so I know that I’ll get so much more writing done than I did this year.

    But I am going to give it a lot of thought between now and the end of the year. I’ve already started making a few plans, but I have several more weeks to finalise exactly what I  want to be working on next year.

    I do know one thing for sure about what I’m going to be doing.

    I’m going to stay home and write most of the time.

    It's my mission, after all.

 MISSION CRITICAL FOR LIFE

https://www.cheritonhousepublishing.com/books/MCFL.html

How To Stay Motivated and Write More

Sitting alone in a room and writing for hours can sometimes feel hard, because being a writer is so different to how others earn a living.

Writers don't have to get up at a certain time and don't even have to leave the house to travel to work. We just sit and write, which is why it sometimes feels hard, and why motivation can sometimes feel like it's lacking.

So, what is motivation, and how can you have more of it?

The word 'motivate' has the word 'motive' built right into it, which is why you need a good reason to do what you're doing.

I find that sometimes I lack motivation to write because I have no set deadline to finish what I'm working on, and no one will know if I've done my writing or not. That's why I always schedule my time so that I can sit down at a designated time and start writing.

Naturally, it's not as easy as it sounds, and many different things get in my way and try and stop me.

Just the other day, I promised myself that I'd sit down and write at 9 a.m. But I got distracted reading an article, and when I looked up, it was way past 9 o’clock, and I was angry at myself for getting distracted. But clearly, having a writing schedule doesn't always work.

It can be that the lack of motivation comes from a goal not being important enough to stick to. 

I found that the best way to stay motivated is to have a clear goal of what I want to achieve, and then I map out a plan of how I'm going to achieve it. Then all I need to do is stick to my plan. But the goal has to be important, otherwise, why would I care? These are the 3 things I need to stay motivated:

- A goal that's worth reaching 

- An action plan to get me there 

- A deadline

I think that the most important of these is a deadline. And this doesn't just apply to writing. 

As an example, when we were recently refurbishing the house we have now moved into, we knew what we wanted to do, but we didn't give ourselves a deadline. After a few weeks, we were sitting discussing what we still had to do and how long we thought it would take. We wanted to get out of the house we were renting as soon as we could because it was costing us nearly $600 a week to live there.

So we set a deadline for the end of the month, ev
en though the timing was a bit tight. 

Then we gave notice on our rental property, organised a removal company, organised the flooring and carpets to be installed 2 days before that, then we told the tradies who were putting in a new bathroom and kitchen that they had to be done before the new flooring went in. Not only did this deadline make us work faster (and longer hours at 12 hours a day), but it also mustered the tradies who were mostly not even turning up every day. Without a deadline, it might have dragged on for weeks.

And it's the same with my writing. If I have a deadline to meet, I get the work done no matter what. And I also need a goal and a plan to get there.

Once I know what I have to do, I have to make sure I stick to it the best I can. Every time I have a plan of what I want to do, life has an ugly habit of throwing as many obstacles in my way as it can, which often makes me want to quit.

But then I think to myself that the time is going to pass anyway. The only question is, how am I going to use it?

With the right motivation, I know I can achieve anything.

Doing The Math of Daily Word Counts

I was reading an online discussion recently between a group of so-called writers about how difficult it is to find time to write.

I called them 'so-called' writers because they all blamed a lack of time every day for their lack of writing. Hence, the term 'so-called.'

Not having enough time to write is a common grievance for many writers who want to write more, but they say there aren't enough hours in a day.

I say that's nonsense. Twenty-four hours a day is more than enough time to write.

Back when National Novel Writing Month was a thing, most people found it difficult to write a 50,000-word novel in a month.

I tried it two years in a row (a long time ago) and it's how I wrote my first novel, Playing For Real, which is still selling today.

Being my first novel, it was a bit of a shock to write so many words in such a short time, but my novel worked out to over 70,000 words. To be able to finish the first draft in a month, I had a detailed outline ready so that all I had to do was write, write, write

I also broke down the math of how many words I needed to write every day, and the following is the math of the daily word count to write a novel in a month.

It's well-known that many writers only write for 2 hours a day. So I figured on aiming for that.

Most writers average writing 1,000 words an hour, so 2 hours of writing is 2,000 words a day. For me, that was 10 A4 pages of writing.

- 2,000 words a day for 30 days is 60,000 words

- 2,000 words a day for 20 days ( 5 days a week for 4 weeks = weekends off) is 40,000 words

So I figured that if I wrote my novel in 2 hours a day for 20 days, it wouldn't add up to 50,000 words. But I'd probably write faster as I went along, so even if I didn't write on the weekends (I had a job and family obligations back then), I could still make the 50,000-word goal.

And I managed to write 20,000 words more than the expected 50,000. 

Now I'm not saying that everyone can write 50,000 words every month, but everyone can try. And as we know from experience, whatever we do regularly and consistently becomes faster and easier. 

And it's the same with writing. Working just 2 hours a day means you could start producing between 50k and 100k words a month. You may not be able to write that much every month, but imagine how great it will feel during the months that you do.

The math says it's possible, so all you (and I) need to do is make it happen.

The 12 Month Writing Challenge
Write and Publish 12 Books in a Year
https://www.cheritonhousepublishing.com/books/12MTH.html 

New House & 15 Minutes Daily Writing

I am seriously enjoying my new Kindle Scribe and I've been using it to write all my blog posts and articles. The handwriting recognition software it has converts my scrappy writing to text effortlessly and accurately.

Sadly though, I haven't had much time to use it lately (not even for reading) because Dean and I have been busy because we bought a house. 

As you know, we had to sell our apartment late last year and have been renting a house for the last 8 months. And after months of searching we finally found a house we liked and bought it. Unfortunately, it needs a lot of work done to it, including having a new kitchen and bathroom put in, and a complete clean inside and out, and a complete paint job.

The house was owned by an elderly man who lived there for years and, it seems, let the place go to hell. We daren't even think about the junk-filled, overgrown garden yet. But what the house does have is amazing potential and a nice open layout.

We've spent the last couple of weeks cleaning and repairing the place, and it's looking (and smelling) so much better already.

The problem is that in addition to spending a lot of time working on the new house, we still have everything to do at home, too (at the rental house where we still live until the new house is habitable). So we are extremely busy and exhausted, and most days I'm too exhausted to write or read on my Kindle Scribe or do much of anything else.

One of the ebooks I was reading on my Scribe was Dorothea Brande's Becoming a Writer.

In it, she says that to be able to write more, you should write for at least an hour first thing every morning and for 15 minutes later every day. I wanted to get up and write every day, but at the moment, mornings are only for getting up, having breakfast, and heading straight over to the new house to work. But I thought I could write for 15 minutes at the end of every day, because I'm the author of 'How To Write an Article in 15 minutes or Less,' so how hard could it be? I managed the 15 minutes of writing every day for about 5 days, but it was tough because I'm always so damn tired at the end of every day now. One day I was so exhausted that my hands were shaking. Eventually, I decided to just give it up for now and try it again once my life is back to normal, and I'm not physically exhausted every day. I don't think I've ever been this tired in my whole life. Maybe I'm just getting too old for all this.

But while I was doing the 15 minutes of writing every day, I enjoyed it, and it was good to have a set daily writing habit. It was good until the last day, when I was so tired I felt brain dead and could hardly think at all. So I went to bed instead, even though it was only 7.30 pm. And I slept for ten and a half hours, so I must have been more tired than I realised.

If you want to grab a copy of Dorothea's ebook, it's only 99 cents on Kindle, and it's fascinating and insightful about how to write more. https://amzn.to/471PX6E 

And now it's late (well, not really, but I'm exhausted all the same), so I need my rest. Boy do I need it.

I'll try and still post on my blog when I can, but if I do go MIA you'll know why.

We're aiming to finish the house and move in six weeks.

Fingers crossed. 

Ignore Everyone. Just Write

I read an article recently that said to be a successful writer, you must have confidence and self-esteem to put your work out in the public.

I thought about whether or not that was true. Maybe it is, but it wasn’t my experience when I first began writing.

I just wanted to write, and so I did. The first thing I ever submitted was a short story I sent to a woman’s magazine. It was accepted straight away and I was paid $600. That boosted my confidence. But then again, it wasn’t luck. It was a good story, and I had to write it and submit it.

I later branched out to the max and wrote and published a novel. For that, I was criticized deeply by other writers all saying that publishing my own book was wrong and that I wasn’t a real writer.

Others wanted to know how I did it because back then self-publishing was almost unheard of, and it was scorned and frowned upon by those who had never done it.

So I wrote and published another book called ‘Self Publish Worldwide’ where I explained how I did it. That book was a hit. I was overwhelmed by how many people bought a copy. But I still had those haters all hating on me.

I ignored them all and carried on writing and publishing books and set up several money-making websites that I also wrote content for.

I was busy writing and happier than I’d ever been. I also went on to co-author two books as well.

So was it confidence and high self-esteem that kept me going?

Maybe.

What I do know is that I was on a writing and publishing mission and I had no intention of letting anyone or anything stop me.

Mission Critical For Life

The Danger of an Over-Loaded Schedule

We all have a finite number of hours in a day, but if you’re anything like me, you try and cram too many things into one day.

I use a diary to keep track of my time. It’s an A5 notebook where I write down everything I need to do every day. And not just writing projects. I include everything I want to do. But nearly every day I discover that things take longer than I thought. Even things I’ve done before many times can often take longer than expected.

And do you know what? It drives me crazy.

The worst thing about it is that if I don’t get everything done, I feel like a failure. I sit there in the evening, diary open, rolling things over to the next day while wondering where all the time went. I begin every day with good intentions, but by midday I’m struggling to keep up.

So now I’ve figured it out. Plan how long it’s going to take to do each thing, then double it. Other things always come up that need doing, like an email that needs a quick response, or a phone call I wasn’t expecting or there’s an issue with a piece of software that needs updating.

Just a couple of days ago, I needed to quickly print a couple of pages, but my computer kept saying that it couldn’t communicate with the printer. I kept retrying it and trying different things, but it wouldn’t print. It took me almost 30 minutes to figure out that the printer software needed updating because of a recent computer update.

So, a job that should have taken 5 seconds ended up taking almost half an hour. This is why a time buffer is needed for everything.

And it starts with knowing how long things actually take, and then you can buffer in extra time.

It’s the only way I know to be able to get everything done, and sometimes even have enough time left for fun.

 

Mission Critical For Life

 

 

 

 

People Forms Habits, Habits Form Futures

    That title is not my own. I ‘borrowed’ it from motivational guru, Mike Litman who said it years ago. And it’s still true.

The reason that we create habits is to make our lives easier. When something we do becomes habitual, we no longer have to think about it. Take walking for example. When you were a baby, learning to walk took a lot of mental and physical effort. But as soon as it became a habit, you could do it without thinking, and you still do.

It’s the same when we learn to drive. At first it seems hard to have to cope with thinking about so many different things at once while trying to be safe on the roads. But once you get your license and start driving more, it becomes a habit and you can get behind the wheel and drive without even thinking about it.

We acquire many habits during our lifetime like daily showering, brushing our teeth, and even walking the dog. These are things that we do without even thinking about them.

I find it’s the same with household chores. I do them several times a week and always at the same time, and I do them without even thinking. People often ask me how I can be bothered, but I tell them that, first, I don't have a lot of furniture (I’m quite the minimalist) and second, I’ve been doing chores for so long that it never bothers me. I’m so used to doing them without thinking that I call it ‘busy hands empty mind’ time so I usually listen to audios while I work because I don’t have to think about what I’m doing.

But you’re probably wondering what this has to do with writing.

Well, you can use habitual routines to get your writing done every day.

If you don’t usually sit and write every day, then doing so takes a lot of thought because you have to remember to do it and you probably have to stop doing other things.

But once you make yourself sit in your writing chair at the same time every day, it quickly becomes a habit, and before you know it, you’re sitting down without even thinking about it.

Most mornings, I do my usual morning routine and do whatever chores I usually do each day and then I go straight to my writing chair. 

When I first started writing professionally, sitting down to write every day was a chore in itself at first, but once it became a habit, it was easy, and now I look forward to it. I like to get other things done first every day so that I can sit down and write, knowing that other things have already been taken care of.

It’s a writing habit that I’ll take with me long into the future because people form habits and habits form futures.

Stop Procrastinating

And Take Back Control Of Your Life

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The One Habit That Transforms Writers’ Block Into a Book

  

 I’ve recently been working daily on my latest horror novel, trying to get it ready for publication later this year. I’d slacked off on it for quite a while, so now it has been a race to get it ready for publishing.

But it wasn’t easy. I had to coerce myself to sit in my writing chair consistently every day and work on my manuscript, no matter what mood I was in or how much I wanted to go and do something else.

And that was the ‘secret’ to getting my book finished. Consistency. It’s not big bursts of energy and motivation that get writing done, it’s the consistency of showing up and doing the writing every day. Consistent progress over time compounds into something greater.

It’s too easy to fall into the trap of thinking that those who have success in life are the ones with lucky breaks or who work 80 hours or more a week. But the truth is that those who keep showing up every day are the ones who have success. It’s the same compounding effect that got my book manuscript written, edited and proofread. I took action on it daily, no matter what.

And this compounding effort works for anything you want to do in life, no matter how big or small, like finally getting around to cleaning your car or to starting your own business. Consistent effort will get you everywhere. 

To be more successful than others all you need is consistent, compounding effort. While I was working away on my manuscript, I also kept reading about other writers who were complaining that they just didn’t have time to write and so weren’t currently working on anything.

I also found some bad habits I knew nothing about that I had to eradicate. It seems I am an incredibly distracted person and would stop and look up things or I’d want to go and watch TV or think that I’d rather be doing my sewing or going for a walk. But I didn’t I used strenuous amounts of discipline to stay in my writing chair. And once I did, I found it easier than I thought to let these distractions go.

I also learnt that I was a lot more disciplined than I ever thought I was once I was motivated enough to get my book written. And the word ‘motivation’ has the word motive written right in there, which is the real meaning. To be motivated you need a big enough reason to do something. My motive wasn’t to finish my book but to prove to myself that I could be disciplined if I tried. And I did try and I was right (because I didn’t want to be wrong).

One big takeaway from my recent efforts is that I realised that people who we think of as super achievers, when you look at their efforts, the one thing that stands out is that they are consistent with what they do.

There’s a book I recently came across on this subject that I recommend to any of you who want to do more and achieve more. It’s called, “The Compound Effect: Jumpstart Your Income, Your Life, Your Success” by Darren Hardy. 

Don’t let your big writing dreams escape any more. If what you want to do is be a super-achieving author, the time to start is now. All it takes is daily consistency to create a compounding effect.

https://amzn.to/4lqrtce 

 

How to Triple Your Productivity

A few weeks ago, I was thinking how great it would be if I could pick up a notebook and pen anytime, start writing, and enjoy it so much that I do it all the time.

It came to my mind one night when I picked up a notebook to jot down an idea I had for a short story. I’d had a shower after dinner, and a great idea came to me while I was in the bathroom. So as soon as I’d finished, I went straight to the couch, took out the notebook that I keep in a drawer next to it, and wrote out the idea so that I wouldn’t forget it.

I liked the idea so much that I wanted to start writing the story straight away, but I already had other things to do that evening.

But that got me thinking: What if, after my shower every night, I could get out a fresh notebook, start writing (I love writing by hand), with no clue as to what I was going to write before I started, and keep going for hours? And what if I enjoyed it so much that I eagerly looked forward to it every day?

In my imagination, I could simply whip out my notebook anytime I felt like it and start writing without having any idea what I was going to write about. I’d just eagerly begin, and miraculously, I’d write an inspirational article, a riveting short story, or the first few chapters of a best-selling novel. And all without a clue what I was going to write. I’d just start writing, and the words would appear out of nowhere as I wrote.

Not only would I be writing great stuff, but I’d be loving every minute of it, so that every night, I couldn’t wait to sit down and write.

It was a great daydream. 

But then I had to ask myself, why does it have to be a dream? Why can’t it be reality?

I know that many writers work this way. They sit down and just start writing. It was Dean Wesley Smith who said that all he needs to write a story/novel is a character and a setting. From there, he writes ‘short’ stories and whole novels. I use quotation marks around the word short because his stories are all thousands of words long.

It was Stephen King who said you should write stories you enjoy writing and find somewhere to sell them later. He has always placed the love of writing above everything else, even getting published. 

And this is the ‘secret’ to being a writer. You can’t write well if you don’t enjoy what you’re writing. So, you must first enjoy writing. I mean, yes, it’s work, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be fun once you start.

It helps to have a daily writing goal of how many hours you work or a minimum number of words you write every day, and stick to it. The real secret is to stick to it, no matter how you feel.

I find that I can get lost in my writing once I start and forget the whole world. It’s an escape from everything.

Having set hours or words to write every day doesn’t mean you have to do it all day long. I know at least one writer who is known as being prolific, yet she only writes for two hours a day. And Stephen King only writes two thousand words a day. They say it’s not about how much you write, but that you do it consistently.

Most so-called writers are not consistent at all with their writing. Most days, they don’t write at all. They’re always looking for ways to get the writing done without actually writing, which always makes me laugh when they ask me about it. They ask things like, “How can I write five thousand words a day?” I respond, “Write five thousand words a day.” They never like that answer.

If you want to write, write. But not just once or now and again when you feel like it.

It needs to be every day, and it needs to be consistent every day. Not every day for a week or two, and then back to not writing.

As the great Mike Littman used to say, “In life and in business, you’re either consistent, or you’re non-existent.”

Above all else, you must love to write. 

Don’t wait till you're ready to start writing.

Just start.

You don’t have to be a great writer. That comes with practice. You just have to keep on writing.

As Elbert Hubbard said, “The only way to learn to write is to write and write and write and write, and write and write and write.”

And you’ll triple your productivity in no time.

Guaranteed.

Writing By Numbers and How to Make It Pay

There’s something that I’ve said many times about earning money from writing. And it’s so important I’m going to say it again.

If you want to make a living as a writer, you must write.

A favourite writer of mine, Dean Wesley Smith, put it more simply when he said that more products mean more money.

For years now, I’ve seen wanna-be writers asking, “How much money can I make from writing a book?” How much? Not much. Not with that attitude.

Writers, like artists and musicians, do what they do because they love what they do, not because they think they can become rich from doing one thing, like writing one book.

Where would J K Rowling be today if she only wrote one book? Or Stephen King? Or Arthur Conan Doyle if he only wrote one Sherlock Holmes novel?

None of these writers could have imagined how rich and famous they would become, nor did they care. They just wanted to write and, if they were lucky, their books would earn them enough money so that they could write for a living.

And why wouldn’t they want that?

If you’re a writer, writing isn’t hard. I mean, sure there are days when you don’t feel like writing, but that happens with any job. But the reason you don’t want to work isn’t because it’s hard; it’s just that you don’t feel like starting, which can happen with anything.

I’ll use this morning as an example to show you what I mean. This morning I knew I had to clean through the whole house. It’s something I do once a week, and today was the day to do it. But I didn’t feel like doing it. I woke up not knowing what day it was, and as I became fully conscious, I realised it was my designated cleaning day, so I had the whole house to clean.

I mentally protested through breakfast, but then I began the cleaning anyway. I plugged in my earbuds and listened to an audio book as I worked. It didn’t take long to become absorbed in what I was listening to, and a couple of hours later, I was finished.

After a short coffee break, I then mentally protested about planting my butt in my writing chair, but I went to my writing room anyway. After a quick look in my diary to see what I had to work on and rereading a bit of what I’d written the day before, I soon found myself deep into my writing.

You see, cleaning and writing aren’t difficult. Anyone can clean a house. It’s not rocket science, and writing is something I do all the time. It was just my motivation that was lacking. I was missing the motivation to get started.

The secret (if that’s what you want to call it) to earning money as a writer is to keep writing and producing. Because the more products you have, the more you can sell.

So, keep writing and producing.

And every day, make sure you get started, no matter what your mood.

7 Day Ebook Writing and Publishing System

How to Write and Publish an eBook and Start Getting Sales in Just One Week

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