So I really didn’t know what I was going to do for my early-week post until last night. I didn’t have a particular song to show you guys, I...

Writing Update #1: My Ten-Minute Rule

Alexa Mintah

17 Comments

So I really didn’t know what I was going to do for my early-week post until last night. I didn’t have a particular song to show you guys, I didn’t have much for this week’s Top Ten Tuesday, I did have a tag (which I will do eventually), but it was kinda long and would probably require pics, and I was too lazy to complete it in time for it to go live this morning.

Then I remembered how I wanted to start doing writing updates since I am, in fact, a writer, but I haven’t posted too much recently about my writing projects. And then I realized why:

I’m really not working on any.

I mean, sure I have my blog as well as some stories I post online, but as far as original manuscripts, I’m not doing much. My co-writer and I have sent Becoming Braveout to beta readers and some days, if we have time, we look into agents and organize our query letter, but we’re not really doing much work on the project itself. I had tried to work on Low Expectations everyday, but in all honesty, my commitment to that project fluctuates, and as of late, it has fallen.

I make excuses, of course. Mostly, that I just don’t have time. Which is kind of crazy because you wouldn’t think I’d be that busy—I’m not in college but I’m only like, half in high school, lol, some sort of in-between, college-searching, scholarship-essay-writing preparatory stage—but somewhere in between school, my, well, quarter-time job, family, blogging, online stories, reading, and general procrastination, I let my actual writing fall through the cracks.

But that’s not something I’m allowing anymore.

Like Heather said in her Just 100 Words post, sometimes you can’t manage as much writing as you’d like to (there actually is some truth to me not having enough time to work on all my projects), and I’m not going to magically have less responsibilities or more time. To be perfectly honest, I’m probably not going to magically stop procrastinating or wasting time on less important things either, at least not immediately. But what I am going to do is commit to working on one of my original projects for at least 10 minutes everyday before I go to bed.

It’s not the number I wish I could go for, but in a week, that 10 minutes will build into 70 (which will be 70 more than I did last week). And who knows? Maybe working on the projects everyday will rekindle the fire, and I’ll find the motivation to carve out even more time to work on them.

Regardless, the something I will be doing is better than the nothing I have been doing. And I kind of can’t wait to get started. :D

So how’s your writing been going lately? Life eating up the minutes or do you write like you’re running out of time? ;) Tell me about your latest projects in the comments! I can’t wait to hear from you. :)

You may also like