Welcome once again, writers! It’s Monday, and you know what that means. It’s time for more Being a Better Writer.

Now, I do have a small tidbit of news to drop here. Due to the new writing schedule BaBW has switched over to, this weekend when I would normally write it will be instead a holiday. Specifically, Thanksgiving. Which means that instead of writing next week’s BaBW, I’ll be spending time with family, friends, and probably whatever leisure project I’m currently engaged in (probably reading or gaming).

So yeah, next week there will not be a BaBW installment. The week after we’ll get something. And it also doesn’t mean that there won’t be content next week. After all, Axtara – Magic and Mayhem is nearly ready (and may be, by the time this posts next week) for a second Alpha, which means that I can start dropping full previews without feeling like I’m delivering something that’s too substandard.

So no new Being a Better Writer next Monday, the 27th of November, but instead new Axtara stuff as book two wings closer to coming out! And BaBW will resume the week after, at least for the few weeks leading into Chistmas.

All right, so with that warning out of the way, let’s talk about today’s topic. And yes, I know that some of you are probably looking at it and thinking “Ugh, this again? Haven’t you talked about finding time to write before?”

It’s true. I have. I’ve covered a lot of topics on writing multiple times over the last ten years. But like all of those, this one comes back around because it’s a vital part of being able to write, and one of the aspects of writing that people struggle with most often.

Case in point: Last week’s BaBW on five things you need to write a story presented some data on the number of people who say they want to write a book versus the number of people who actually do. Later that week and with that same data fresh in mind, I made a social media post in response to someone talking about that exact idea, providing the harder numbers that I’d mentioned in the same post.

Someone else replied stating that the post had been hard to read, as they’d realized they were firmly in that portion that always talked about it, but had never set aside the time to actually do it, and noting that maybe they needed to finally start looking at putting some time behind their aims (and yes, I definitely replied back in support of that).

Point being that this is something that still comes around as a shock for many. Or a hard truth. So today, we’re talking about it. We are going to hit the concept head-on and talk directly about why you need to make time to write.

So hit that jump, and let’s go.

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I’m going to start by relating a story that may seem odd, but is, I assure you, about the topic at hand. Years ago, when I had just seen the release of my second book (Dead Silver, if you’re curious) and was hard at work on what would become Colony, I bumped into an old roommate from college who inquired about what I was up to.

Proudly, I filled them in on my current day to day, which was at that point due to my full commitment to writing, rising, writing, and ending. In other words, writing all day. I quite happily noted that I was working on my third book and pumping out around three-thousand words a day on it.

Now look, those of you who write? You know that three thousand words in a day is no joke (Sanderson is quite famous for his two-thousand a day pace being pretty near the peak of output). But this old acquaintance? They immediately laughed and told me that it sounded like I wasn’t working at all, just wasting most of my time each day because they as a data transcriber were copying over six thousand words each day. Obviously, they said while laughing, I was spending most of my time goofing off, because by comparison to their output I was only meeting half of it.

The fact that they were just copying and regurgitating data, where as I was building content from scratch, clearly never occurred to them.

I share this story because it was one of my early exposures to a realization that a lot of people don’t respect writers because they have no idea what work actually goes into writing. The flaw in my old acquaintance’s thinking is obvious to anyone who’s ever sat down at a keyboard and tried to write something that wasn’t simply transcription work (which is what they were doing in contrast). Unfortunately, a large majority of the population never has actually tried their hand at writing for any period of time, and therefore has a brutal misconception about it that was reflected in my acquaintance’s lack of understanding about the difference between our two roles.

This misconception is in the requirement of time. Time to develop a setting, and characters, that fit together like a finely-tuned set of gears, yes, but also the time to write out each and every interaction that is important to the story in a way that is clear, well-written, and most of all conveys the story in the manner that it needs to be told.

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This lack of understanding is often, I’ve found, one of the root causes of the “Want to write a book crowd” we touched on last week almost never becoming the “I’ve written a book crowd.” Most people have a poor understanding of the amount of effort that goes into producing a book—some even aggressively so, believing that writing a book is as easy as firing off an email or a text message, and that anyone who speaks of the “work” involved must just be lazy. After all, how hard can it be to string some words together?

Naturally, when the time comes for these individuals to put their money where their mouth is, even on their own terms, things rapidly begin to fall apart. And one of the primary causes of that (setting aside the egocentric belief that it must be easy) is a complete lack of understanding of the time commitment involved.

Let me offer an example here. I have spoken with people who have resolved to write a book. They have explained to me in great detail how wonderful a book it will be, how complicated and impressive the characters are, and so on. When asked “When?” I’ve gotten answers akin to “Oh, well, I don’t have a lot of time, but I’ve slotted in ten minutes a day after I do X thing in the evening before bed. In a few weeks it should be done!”

Now yes, I note that usually their explanation of how amazing this book will be takes longer to deliver than the ten minutes they’re slotting to work on it each night. Also, I will point out that I have had this conversation with multiple different people, all of them making the exact same assumption that ultimately proves fatal to their aims: Writing a book will be easy. A few minutes a day, hardly an inconvenience, and I’ll be done in no time.

More than once, I’ve followed up on one or two of these people, months later, to check on their process. Inevitably, I’m given an answer along the lines of “Oh well, you know, it’s a process,” with a complete reluctance to talk about what, if anything, they’ve achieved at all.

A few other times, I’ve suggested that they make more time for the writing process, only to be blown off (and in one case, loudly told off for not understanding their “process”).

In other words, this is not uncommon. I’ve encountered this issue multiple times across my writing career, and I expect I will many times to come. Each of these individuals fall victim to the conceit that writing is easy, simple, and their creativity able to be turned on and off like a faucet. They’ll just set aside ten minutes, sit down, the words will flow like a river as they pound away that the keyboard, and at the end of ten minutes they will stop, set it aside, and then immediately resume the next day. Months later, they assume, they will have a book.

But it doesn’t happen like that. To the surprise of no one who’s actually worked at writing, it’s not a constant flow.

This isn’t the writer’s fault. It’s just part of the process. Writing isn’t like laying brick, where each brick needs to go in the exact spot equal to its siblings to produce a uniform wall. It’s more like building a freestanding stone barrier, where each stone has its own unique shape and must be carefully slotted with the stones around it so that not only does it fit, but it supports and is in turn supported by the stones around it. Sometimes words will come fast and thick as the story writes itself, our hands flying over the keys. Other times however, we’ll face oddly shaped stones, situations in the story that call for repeated attempts to make things fit together.

Neither of those is a swift process. Even when words are flowing from a fire hose, the story racing along, it can still take several hours to get those thousands of words out. And if that source is cut off due to a time limit? It can take some time to get it back.

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Sands, there’s one aspect we haven’t talked about that’s slated to get its own post in the future here: Summoning the muse. Simply sitting down at a keyboard and saying “Okay, write” often isn’t enough to spawn a story from our fingertips, even if we know the characters, setting, etc. It takes time to organize our thoughts, reconnect with our mental state from the last time we were writing, bring the threads together, and start up once more. Authors have various tricks to assist things on this end, from leaving a sentence half-written for some to retreading or even rewriting the last few paragraphs of the day before.

But the point is, writing isn’t like sitting down and turning a faucet on and off. The water flow isn’t from indoor plumbing: It’s something that each writer has built themselves, and comes in fits and starts. Sometimes we have to prime it, other times its dry until we unclog something.

I’m speaking with a lot of analogy here, but it’s all to a single purpose: Time. Each of these things takes time. Writing takes time. Even recalling what was written the days, weeks, and months before takes time.

Set aside time to write.

That’s really all there is to it. Writing takes time. Unavoidable time. You cannot shortcut it (no matter how many wish they could). Developing characters, placing them in a plot, orchestrating everything so it glides along smoothly … This is not a fast process. Even for the most talented writers out there, it still takes a time commitment.

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So, with all that said, we reach the apex of today’s post. Writing requires time. Lots of it.

How can we make that time?

Well, we sacrifice.

This is one of the hardest things I’ve found for some new writers to accept. They’ll get the idea that maybe writing will require more than a few minutes a day. They’ll understand that they’ll need to put in some effort, but …

They won’t want to cut anything else to make room for that effort.

Okay, some people cut sleep, but still. Writing takes effort. Time. And if we want to write, we’re going to need to give it that time.

But how? Well, here are some of the best methods many writers (and part-time writers) make use of.

First, scheduling. Set aside time to write. Find a time in your week or day where you can give yourself at least twenty-thirty minutes of writing work time. Or even a day.

Yes, this may mean cutting something. There are times when my day has gotten crunched enough that in order to meet my quota I’ve had to miss a social event or cut my gym time short. And … because this is my personal most frequent cut, lost sleep by staying up late to get something just right.

Sorry, that wasn’t meant as a brag, though it kind of came out like it. The point is, we’ve all only got a fixed amount of time in our day, each of us. To slot writing time in on a dedicated schedule, you might have to cut something you enjoy. Leisure activity, such as watching TV or playing games, is often a casualty.

Not entirely. I’m not advocating cutting all your time to write. But set aside a regular time, once a week, or even once a day, more than just a few minutes, to sit and really write, and you’ll see something take shape.

But … that’s not all there is to it. Scheduling is well and good (and can even allow you to adopt a wavelike rhythm where you find yourself thinking of what to write during periods where you aren’t writing, readying yourself) but making sure that the time we do set aside to write isn’t easily given away is another thing.

Some writers, for example, will physically turn off their Wi-Fi during their writing period, or install a timer program that will disconnect them from the web for their writing time. Others will use offices or spaces or even music that they associate with writing, Pavloving themselves into being ready to work once they sit down in the proper place or start up the proper song.

This latter can extend into social issues and cues as well. Setting aside time is well and good, but having others around us understand the point of such time is vital as well. Authors that are parents have spoken about establishing a clear boundary with their children of “writing time” that they aren’t to be disturbed in unless its an emergency. We may have to educate family and friends that just because we’re sitting there deep in thought does not mean we wish to be distracted.

Boundaries, in other words. Barriers around our writing time that make that time meaningful. That declare it as important. Sometimes, just as much for us as for others.

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I understand that for just about everyone, at the end of the day this comes back to sacrifice. To setting aside time that would otherwise be spent on other things to write.

But look, if the prior 2000+ words haven’t convinced you of anything, at least take this singular fact away: Writing takes time. No book pores forth from its creator’s head and onto paper without a tremendous amount of effort and dedication. If you are one of the 80% of people that says, when asked “Oh yeah, I’d like to write a book someday,” then realize that this will never happen if you don’t dedicate the time to it.

You can make that time. The choice is yours. That might come with sacrifice, yes, but if you truly want to write a book, then “I’ll do it someday” will stop being someday and start being “today.”

But do not convince yourself that someday you will sit down, spend ten minutes to an hour, and produce a bestseller. It’s just not going to happen.

No, books happen because someone spent hour after hour working at it. A quick check for the file of Axtara – Magic and Mayhem says that it has had over 440 hours put into it so far. There’s probably an hour or two of that where it was open while I had been called away from my desk, but that would be the outlier, not the normal. And that’s for a book that’s only 190,000 words long.

Writing. Takes. Time. Time you have to make for it. And if you aren’t willing to make that time, you’re not going to write anything. It’s a brutal but vital truth to the process.

Schedule. Sacrifice. Maybe twenty to thirty minutes a week is all you can afford, but if you set that aside, dedicate it to writing, and do that week in, week out? The time will add up. It may feel like it’s taking forever, but trust me when I say it’d feel that way if you worked on it every day too. Just keep at it.

Dedicate the time. Set it aside. Spend it writing.

And one day? You do that, with conviction, and you’ll write that book you’ve always had in mind. Maybe just the first of many.

Good luck. Now get writing.

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