How Much Writing Is Too Much?

How much writing do you do every day? Have you ever thought of what your daily writing output is?

I recently received an email from a subscriber telling me that they had downloaded my 12 Month Writing Challenge but felt that the first month of sending out 30 submissions in 30 days was "beyond" them.

And that got me to wondering how much do writers write every day?

I know that horror author Stephen King only writes for one and a half hours a day. Science fiction writer Isaac Asimov averaged one huge novel a month during his writing life. And novelist Dean Wesley Smith writes over 100,000 words every single month - and blogs about it daily.

So is submitting 30 pieces of work in 30 days too much to achieve?

I don't think so.

Magazines usually only want to see an article outline to begin with although if it's fiction, they want to see the whole story.

But even if you had to write the article first, is writing one article a day too much to do?

Are you actually writing less than that?

If you're not writing enough (meaning you know you're capable of much more than you're doing) or you're not writing at all, then maybe it's time you upped your writing output.

And if you're writing every day but not earning as much money from your writing as you'd like to, then you need to start writing more too.

If you're a writer, then there really is no excuse not to be writing.

And if you're not sure what to write or where to start, then perhaps you need to do The 12 Month Writing Challenge too.

:)

5 Rituals and Routines That Changed My Writing Life

I recently read an online article called "5 Rituals and Routines That Changed My Writing Life" and it was fascinating and thought-provoking, so I thought I'd share it with you.

The reason why this article was inspiring for me is because I've spent the last couple of weeks working on a new responsive layout for my Cheriton House Publishing website. And because I'm not really up to date with webpage design (it's incredibly complicated these days) the whole process is taking me a lot longer than I thought. It's also been holding me back from getting my writing done.

I keep telling myself that this is only a temporary set back and once the website is finished, I can get back to my usual writing.

And I think that's why this article struck a cord with me, because I've been letting my writing slide quite a bit lately and that doesn't make me happy at all. But this article prompted me to start writing again every day AND gave me a way to do it.

One of the first things it said is that it's no good wanting to make money from your writing and then deciding that you can only write when you "feel inspired" (or in my case, have the time to write). That will just keep you doing nothing and being broke.

Instead it said "Finding success as a writer requires you to be intentional about your writing. To do things with purpose."

What this means is that you need to get serious about being a writer and use rituals and routines that get you writing every day and taking your writing seriously instead of treating it like a hobby.

And that entails acting "as if" which means acting as though you already have a best selling book.

What would you do every day if you were already a best selling author? Would you spend your time on social media or playing computer games all day, or would you be busy promoting your book?

See the difference in those two mindsets?

My two best takes from this article were:

Write before you do anything else every day

and

Write 5 days a week.

So even if I only sit and write for an hour and then get on with other things, no matter what else I do, my writing is done.

And if I do this every day (5 days a week) then that's a lot of writing. Although I usually only write for 4 days a week and have a long weekend. But even 4 days of writing can create a huge output.

So that is what I'm going to do from now on.

No matter what other projects I have to do (book cover design, webpage design, formatting, editing, etc) I won't do it until I've done my writing. Even if it means only spending an hour or two writing every morning.

How about you?

What are you going to do to write more every day?

--------------

Writing Rituals

Write faster and make
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How much of your "writing time"
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Focus & Self-Disipline; The Hardest Things About Being A Writer

I've been a writer for many years now.

I began writing part-time and working part-time and gradually transitioned to quitting my part-time job and writing for a living.

One of the things I love about writing is the actual writing.

What I find the most difficult is actually saying no to doing other things so that I can sit down and write.

Working alone every day isn't easy, especially at first.

It's different when you're at work and you have a boss looking over your shoulder making sure you get all your work done.

But when you're at home and it's a nice sunny day, and you live near the beach like I do, it's sometimes hard to sit down and write.

What I found that helped in the beginning was to download writing courses and work my way through them. That kept me on track without my having to think of what to do or what to write.

I began with an easy course called Quick Cash Writing that helped me earn money while also helping me to develop a daily writing habit.

I also studied ebooks, courses and audios about concentration, focus and creativity. These products were invaluable and helped me in more ways than I probably realise.

And right now, if you want to increase your writing output, have more ideas for writing than you ever had before AND improve your concentration, focus and creativity, Writer's Digest have put together a huge writing and creative package of digital and physical products that also comes at a huge discounted price. This package would normally sell for well over $200 but is currently discounted to less than $50.

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A Year of Writing Prompts
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Building Your Writing Life
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This is a HUGE collection and has everything you need to help you kickstart your writing career.

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Happy writing.

No I Won't Personally Tutor You And Here Are The Reasons Why

Okay...As you must already know by now I've been doing a run of local talks about setting up websites/blogs and making money online.

I called these talks The Laptop Lifestyle, after my best selling ebook of the same name.

Since then (as well as during my run of talks) I've had quite a few emails from people asking if I do private group lessons on how to do it all.

Now, while I can understand everyone wanting to know more about this, I'll give my reasons for not doing private group lessons:

1. It takes up too much of my time.
2. I'd rather be doing the work myself than teaching others how to do it. 
3. Most people don't want to know how to do it, they want me to do it for them.

All three of these reasons are valid on their own.

I'm far too busy doing my own work to take time out to teach others.

And the reason I work online is because I enjoy working alone. As nice as it was to get out and meet lots of new people, at heart I'm a working alone kind of person.

I love to sit here every day, learn more about working online, write ebooks and courses and earn money from what I do.

And there are many people who also want to do the same. I know this because many of them were at my talks.

But the difference, is that I found that many of them don't really want to work like I do. They want someone else to do the work while they reap the benefit.

I kept pointing everyone to my Laptop Lifestyle ebook that provides everything they need to get started. I told them that working online involves getting going and learning as you go along.

Yet still I keep hearing from people saying they couldn't set up a free blog because they'd learned all about how to do it but were confused (without even starting), weren't sure how blogging software works, weren't sure how many blog posts to write to get started, wanted to know what to do if they didn't make money...and on and on the list went.

I've been repeating myself over and over about this to so many different people lately, and I'll say it again.

You don' have to get it right. You just have to get it going.

It's impossible to know everything there is to know about something before you start.

Look at learning to drive. Did you know how to do it before you started or did you get in the car and learn as you went along?

At school, did you learn your math lessons by the teacher explaining everything about math without you having to lift a finger, or did you learn by actually doing the math yourself?

And as for knowing how something works to be able to use it (like blogging software), I use electricity every day but I have no clue how it works or how to fix it when it breaks. I also don't know how computers work either, but that doesn't stop me from earning all my income from one.

So if you want to make money online from writing, blogging, affiliate marketing, advertising or any other of the hundreds of ways to do it, stop making excuses and just get it going. (This advice also applies to everything you want to do that you've never done before).

And if you don't know where to start, you can start by clicking the image below for more information.

But please don't ask me to tutor you personally.

I'm far too busy writing and living my own Laptop Lifestyle.