Episode 4: You Aren't Getting The Most Out Of Your Writing Time If You Miss This ONE STEP

Join Elizabeth and Stephanie in this episode as they delve into the importance of creating a balance between dedicated writing time and intentional rest. The hosts kick off by discussing the community's upcoming events and resources, including weekly prompts focusing on self-reflection as writers.

The main focus of the episode revolves around the concept of "Time to Write" within the community and the benefits it brings. They emphasize the power of writing in community, setting goals, and the accountability that comes with shared writing sessions. The hosts share personal experiences from recent writing sessions, showcasing the flexibility to work on different genres and the unexpected creative flow that can emerge during these dedicated times.

As the conversation unfolds, Elizabeth and Stephanie transition to the equally vital topic of taking time to rest. They explore the significance of allowing ideas to percolate and giving the mind a break, especially during the busy holiday season. The hosts share insights into their own struggles with taking time for rest and provide practical tips on scheduling and reframing rest as a crucial part of the writing process.

Listeners are encouraged to find their own definition of rest and to overcome the societal pressure associated with taking breaks. The episode concludes with a reminder that finding a balance between writing and resting is essential for overall well-being and sustained creativity.

Tune in to gain valuable insights into optimizing your writing routine and nurturing a healthy writing lifestyle within the Inspired Writer Collective community.

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Transcript

0:01

Welcome fellow writers to the Inspired Writer Collective podcast, your go to hub for all things writing. We're your hosts, Elizabeth and Stephanie. Whether you're a seasoned wordsmith or just dipping your quill into the ink well of creativity, we're absolutely thrilled to have you with us. Drawing from our experience in publishing diverse writing genres and the daily grind of showing up for yourself, we're here to be your writing companions. Expect insightful discussions, expert tips, and a dash of inspiration as we navigate the twists and turns of the writing journey together. So whether you're listening on your commute, during your writing session, or just relaxing at home, get ready for an immersive experience that celebrates the art and joy of writing. Hi, Hello. Hi Elizabeth. How are you doing today? Good, how are you? Good, good. All right, first we're gonna start by talking a little bit about what we have going on in the community this week. This is our Inspired Writer Collective community. As always, we have several time to write meetings scheduled. Those are Tuesdays and Thursdays. We have a morning time and an evening time, depending on, you know, what works best for your routine or your schedule. Those are consistent between those times. Whenever you show up, you'll get a very similar experience but there's lots of opportunities to connect with us in that way. We also have some writing resources available to you within the community. And then I created some weekly prompts for this week that focus on self reflections as a writer. So these are questions related to your writing practice, the resulting work, how you feel about sharing that work, and just exploring some of those aspects of writing and being a writer. And the intention behind these prompts coming at this time here at the end of December, I Was to do a little bit of looking back and reflection. In preparation for setting intentions for the next year and within our new collective and how to look forward and make those plans, tweak those plans for the coming year. And as always, we have asynchronous chat opportunities, so you can jump in and be a part of the conversations there. So listener, we hope you'll check us out. More information is In the links and also at the end, we'll, we'll share those as well. tOday our focus is on both taking time to write and balancing that with taking time to rest. So as Elizabeth talked about, inside our community, we have a time that we call time to write because we believe really strongly in the investment in making sure you're taking the time. And We're going to start by talking about just the general benefits and why we invest this time and one of the big ones is accountability because you show up when other people are showing up, you show up, it's natural, it's a natural human inclination to be part of a community and uh, that's one of the key components of Our Inspired Writer Collective is building that community, building that sense of writing together. And so with that is writing in community is a really powerful aspect of time to write. Yeah, and we, we kick off each meeting with a little bit of inspiration and then we set goals about what we each individually hope to accomplish within that writing time. At the very end, we come back together to celebrate those things that we've accomplished, and in just a few minutes, Stephanie and I are going to share about our recent experience and walk you through this process ourselves, and the wonderful realizations we've had through setting aside this time for ourselves individually as writers, but also to show up in community as writers. Well, and one thing that's really powerful about this is putting it in your schedule, and especially when you're part of our community, once you commit to a time that you're going to show up, you'll get a reminder, email, so that you won't miss it. Don't forget that it's happening in this, especially in this busy time of year as we transition into the new year. And definitely other times when it's busy you know, having those reminders. One of the best parts about this time to write is that it's really no stress. Because you don't have to share, you show up as you are, you can have your camera on or off it's really up to you how, how you want to show up. And we want to keep it as, you know, low stress as possible, but we really want to encourage you to take the time for yourself, take the time to write. And so with that, we're going to share about what we learned from for ourselves, showing up for this time to write. And you get to show up for this meeting with whatever goals or intentions that feel most applicable to you. So, at a recent one that I had with Stephanie, I wanted to use the weekly prompts that she had created for memoir. And I didn't have any particular writing project with my book or manuscript that I was planning to work on, on that particular day. But Stephanie showed up with a goal about working specifically on, you know, with her outline and her upcoming contemporary romance fiction. And so that's, that's part of the beauty of it is, is you can show up and work on whatever it is that you feel led to work on. Yeah, and that's the best part of it, is being able to show up, as I said, with whatever it is you're working on. And, as you can see, we were working with different genres. Memoir and contemporary romance are very different genres to write with, so we're open to whatever genre you want to explore and certainly we're, you know, here to be your guides in this process. And one of the great things about the time is connecting with each other as writers and just saying, Hey, I'm here. You know, we started with a little inspiration, kind of goal setting, you know, what's your goal, what are you going to do? And then, you know, we set a, we set a timer and it was a great visual on the screen to just kind of check in. So you're like, okay, that's how much time I have. I have left and I found, for me, I had a scene that I was working on in my contemporary romance, and I just started writing, and I had no idea that it was going to flow during that time. I had a general sketch of the, the scene written out, and I said, okay, I'm taking this time to write. And I just started writing. And by the time the timer was up, I had five or six pages of, and I had wrote by hand during this time. That was what I felt I wanted to do. And certainly writing by hand, writing on the computer, whatever works for you is, is how you want to show up. And it just was that shared energy of knowing that. Not only was I doing the writing for myself, but just being in connection with another writer and just knowing that we were both engaged in something that we really wanted to be doing. Yeah, I found it to be a really cool experience. I was going to hop on and do some writing during that time, whether anyone else showed up or not, but when Stephanie, when I saw that you were going to be able to come to the meeting, it was definitely motivating to really come up with a plan of like, okay, how am I going to use this time? And what do I, what do I want to work on? Plus it was like that added accountability of using the whole time versus if it had just been me and I had gotten to, you know, accomplish what I had originally set out to do, I might have stopped early. And for me, this writing time in particular just took on a life of its own. I sat down with the initial intention of working through the weekly memoir prompts, and I think I probably did maybe three of them, um, and I, you know, I looked at the timer. I was, you know, able to kind of see like, okay, I did about five minutes on that prompt. Okay. I did about another five on that. And I got through the ones that were really speaking to me and really felt this wave of inspiration of, well, I know Stephanie's working on her book. Yeah. And I'm, I'm, you know, these are great, these, these prompts get the juices flowing, but now suddenly I find myself motivated to get on my manuscript to see the things that I flagged in Scrivener as like a to do as far as a previously outlined story that I needed to add, you know, needed to actually write out. So I, you know, as I took a look at the timer and I still had 18 minutes left to write, I felt really inspired to just open it up and see if there was like a smaller piece that I felt motivated to write. And I did. And funny enough, it happened to be The story about my writing community, my local writing community, and what that's meant to me, and what that was like initially showing up, how I ran, you know, cross paths with Stephanie, both in a yoga and writing class that we had mutually taken, and then when I walked into the writers group that week, I saw her again, and it was that, like, recurring crossing of paths that inspired us to set up a coffee date to like chat and hear more about the non fiction she was getting ready to publish. And that's how all this really started. So I was writing that story but I was very surprised I did not go into that time to write time thinking that I was going to do Anything with the book, but that's the beauty of the setup of it is, is you're free to, to take that inspiration and just run with it. And there is that added push admittedly with knowing that other people are doing it too. Oh, absolutely, because I, while I had the outline of my scene, and I actually had three scenes I could have worked on, but I started with the first one, I was kind of feeling stuck, thinking, I don't know how to start this, I'm not sure what to do, and then sharing with you the overview of it and talking it through It made me get ideas. And then all of a sudden I just started and I decided that I really needed to focus on just writing because one of my biggest weaknesses, when I sit down to write so often is that I want to fix it as I'm going along. And I really tried really hard during that time to not fix it. Admittedly, I had some crossed out things that I had went back and fixed and such, but I definitely used that time and built out the scene now to where it's flowing. And I actually, that night since we had connected in the morning that night, I hosted a time and it ended up just being me, but I actually did use the time again. Because I thought, well, I used the time this morning, I'm going to use it again, and so now I have 10 to 11 pages that I didn't have before, and that I might have, on another day, if I didn't have the scheduled time in my schedule, said, Oh, you know, it's the evening time, I think I'll have tea and just chill out and, you know, do something different or go to bed or something. But I use that time and the same thing in the morning. There are so many things I could find to do in the morning that could have steered me away from taking the time, but it was having that scheduled time in the calendar that was so helpful. And just the connected energy and knowing like there are other people that I'm connected with that are working on their writing and Just the productivity and It just creates that snowball effect where you start a little bit and you get the momentum going and it just builds. Yeah, I don't recall specifically what I ended up working on after that morning session ended, but I remember feeling really productive and really. Still very motivated, and maybe it was more business y kind of stuff that I was working on, but I remember still being in sort of like work mode, writer mode, and taking on some other tasks that I would have normally, you know. Just been like, Oh, I'm good. I've done this, you know, right. So I think it was a very productive day because I was able to sit down and like do that writing in the morning. Absolutely. And it helps too much to to get just get everything out on paper, because sometimes we hold on to things as writers, and we doubt ourselves in so many ways that we But taking the time to just let it spill out is so powerful. And, and with that the time to write is important and just as equally is finding time to rest. And we were talking about this because of course, at this time of year, it, we can feel. Guilty about taking time away from our writing because of holidays and family and other commitments and While it might not sound like rest It's the idea of you know, putting your writing aside letting it rest, but also letting yourself rest What are some why are we taking this time to rest? For me a lot of times, especially with memoir, but I'm sure this could be true for fiction writing as well, I'm dealing with a lot of, like, heavy ideas, so sometimes I just need things to percolate, right? It's like, maybe I encountered, like, a little bit of, like a wall or an area of resistance within my writing, and if I can take some time away from, like, the actual screen and the actual process of writing, Sometimes that's what I make some of my best. Breakthroughs, I mean whether it's like i'm washing dishes or i'm out for a walk, whatever it is It's like our brain has that ability It's just like when you're trying to like remember a name in the moment and you can't you know You can't find it and then you are doing some random task later and all of a sudden that name pops back into your mind And you can remember it's it's that sort of thing. Our brain is processing all the time in the background and sometimes I just need that time away from like the More active like forcing of it just to like give it a break and then those ideas Come a little bit more naturally sometimes that's because i'm seeking some external like motivation, whether that's from reading something else or from listening to a podcast or something like that, and an idea strikes me through those mediums, or other times it's just because I've just let the idea percolate for a little while. Oh, absolutely. I think we underestimate the value sometimes of taking that time away and letting ideas sit and It's always interesting to me, especially having been a former language arts teacher, and just, you know, having kids in the school system, and I just think about how, you know, growing up, we're in these intensive settings in schools where there's this perception that you have to Get the writing right the first time and there's not a, you know, there isn't always the teacher who emphasizes go back and let it sit and rewrite and let your ideas, you know, there's this pressure to well, I have to get it done. And I see that with my own kids, this idea that, well, I already wrote it. It's done. And I think about that so often with how I've sometimes approached writing where I think, okay, I've written it. It's done. But then over time, I've developed the system of making sure I let it sit and making sure that I put it aside and allow myself space to do other things and be intentional about taking time to rest. And because it does generate ideas, all of a sudden you go back and you're thinking about it. And especially with fiction writing, it's really interesting. There's This whole way that the characters begin to take on a life of their own in my head that is a new experience for me because I've written so much. More into in academia and nonfiction and of course I read plenty of fiction, but now taking on The role of a writer of fiction. I never realized how much the characters can take on a life So in a way, there's also that need like you're balancing with memoir your own story. That's taking on its whole part and Occupying space in your mind and then I have to tell the characters that it's time to be quiet because I need a break Right, right. And there's something else I was gonna say with that, but I might have lost it. Oh, I was gonna like highlight the fact that, you know, we've heard a lot of writers talk about, especially when you're first starting a book of any genre. How you think you know what the beginning is, when at the onset, like, oh, okay, here's where the story starts, but many times it's not until you get all the way to the editing phase that you really see, you know, once you can have that, like, broader picture of where you're going with the, with the story, that you can really see what the first chapter needs to be, whether that's, you know, a quick exposure to the middle of the story, sort of a heightened moment of tension that you then, you know Yeah. Draw back on and in the second chapter it, you know, goes back in the timeline to an earlier stage or you know However that looks or if you found that as a writer your early chapters were really more about your character development and you understanding as the writer who this character is that you're writing for and all of that ends up just being sort of background research for yourself that ultimately never makes it into the book. I've had both of those experiences with the writing and it's, it's really because of that time that I've taken away from the actual writing process that I've been able to have. That level of perspective over it. Oh, absolutely. And that, that too is you shared in an earlier podcast about how you had taken basically the whole summer off. And, you know, from your book, which gave you a whole new lens. And it's that and it's that same idea of taking the time to rest. And I think most importantly, as we. move into talking about how to do this is not to feel guilty about it. It can be very counterintuitive because we live in a culture where there's this idea that you have to be, you know, nose to the grindstone. You just have to be grinding, grinding, grinding, grinding, grinding and working, working, working, working, working. And we all have different ways we approach our writing. But at the end of the day, you can't be writing all the time. You have to give yourself The break. Right. Productivity can't just be measured through like action, right? I mean, I think that's kind of what you're speaking to Stephanie where it's like, you don't have to necessarily have anything physical to show for it in order to know that you have, you know, been productive, quote unquote, with your time. Oh, absolutely. And that's, I mean, that's one of the benefits of scheduling in the time to write. in your day or your week because you can get so much done as we learned and putting it in your schedule is definitely one way to make sure that you give yourself that idea of taking time to rest. You're taking time to write, but then also schedule in that time to rest. I know it might sound kind of silly, but if you schedule it in, you're guaranteed to say, Oh, you know what? I really need to take a break now. Especially if you're someone who doesn't easily take breaks. And I know that I'm not one who has always been okay with taking time to literally rest during the day, but I have found that it actually makes me so much more productive in shorter chunks of time. So, in fact, I'm saving time by allowing myself to rest. That's something I struggled with for a long, long time. especially in my career as a forensic scientist, but even, you know, in the earlier years of being a full time stay at home mom is like not taking that time to rest. And what I kept finding over and over again is if I left it all up to chance as opposed to scheduling it out, then more than likely it was not going to happen and I was going to experience more of the crashes consistent with burnout where like suddenly I find myself really tired or I'm starting to get sick because I haven't taken that time out preemptively to take care of myself. So. Nowadays, and it's required a lot of like intentionality on my part in changing those habits, because that's not my default mode at all. But in basically setting aside, or at least knowing at the beginning of the day, okay, today, I want to make time for a hike. I've got this meeting. I've got this work. I know I need to get done, but I also want to do this other relaxing activity and looking at that at the very beginning of the day to figure out where I'm going to fit it in preemptively and not just leaving it for, oh, well, if there's time between this and that, I would like to do this. But making sure that I carve that out. So when said activity is over, I know, okay, this is my time to relax. This is my time to rest in whatever form that looks like, whether that's, you know some salt bath or if that's a walk or grabbing a coffee with a friend, whatever it is that looks like for the day. Absolutely, and the whole idea of rest is how, how you define it for yourself, because rest can mean a nap, it can mean a bath, it can, it can be a hike, it can be, you know, getting outside, it can be putting your screens aside and reading a book instead of writing a book it can be spending time with family or people you care about. There's so many different ways to balance out. The intensive work times. And I absolutely agree with you, Elizabeth, that it's definitely not my default to take rest. Because of course, when I was a teacher and a mom, you know, like at the same time as being a mom and all that thing, I mean, my days just. We're never felt never ending. I never felt like I took time for myself and now I've really made it a priority to take the time because not only is it good for me, but it's. Good for everybody around me. It allows me to do. what I need to do with better focus because I'm able to just give the time to not be thinking about what I feel like I should be doing. And at times I find myself trying to like, sort of hack the productivity by Yeah, sometimes I do put on a podcast that features writers or I do try to read certain things in order to increase my knowledge or exposure to different concepts, because I know that it will serve my own writing practice. And so there are times when I delude myself into thinking I'm resting when really I'm just finding a different way to be productive. And at times that's fine too. But I think some of the hardest stuff is to do the things that feel restful, but that you can't. easily find the value in other than its rest. Absolutely. I think that it's, again, it can feel hard to start, but Once you allow yourself the space to get, you know, to put it into your schedule in some way, it's so worth it. And I think one of the hardest things is, and I know this happens for me, is how I feel others perceive when I'm resting. Or, you know, members of my family, where they look at me if I don't look like I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, when in fact I'm I am doing what I'm supposed to be doing by resting because it allows me to be a better writer, a better mom, a better partner, all those things in, in life. And so I think that that's the space where looking at it as taking care of yourself as a, as a writer is so important, especially at the, This time of year, but really all year, but especially when it gets busy and crazy. Yeah, this has been a conversation I've brought up even in therapy before as far as like not wanting to be perceived as lazy as you know, that being a Aspect that Through my life, I've gotten messaging as being, you know, a very negative quality and, and, and what gets categorized as lazy where, you know, it really is just rest and. One of the ways I found that's helpful for me as far as like reframing it is that I can it's much easier for me to accept that I'm taking a break when I do know I have something else scheduled. So having these time to write sessions scheduled on my calendar for, you know, morning and evening, two days a week, then. I don't, I'm not putting as much pressure on myself and like the in between day, say on Wednesday to, you know, crank out something, which I'm using that, that terminology intentionally, because that's what it feels like. It feels like it's not coming from an authentic inspired place. It's coming from this push to like, have something to show for my time. And I don't. I find that I don't put myself into those difficult positions as often when I see that I've already carved out the time it's coming in my schedule and I've already set the intention to show up, you know, say the next day at the next time to write session. Absolutely. And that brings up a great point just in terms of not feeling the pressure to have to write every day. We definitely encourage it in. one of our resources on setting up a daily writing habit. But even so, sometimes daily doesn't work for everybody. And it comes down to needing to set what, set up a schedule that works, that works for you. I've had seasons of life where that's worked for me and I've shown up that way and that's what I needed to get a particular task done. Personally I find that to be easier at the like early stages of writing where you're just trying to get the ideas out and get something onto paper to start from versus later on when you're I'm trying to fine tune something where I'm more in like an editing phase or I'm trying to write like transitions between stories and that sort of thing when I need to have like a broader picture of what's going on versus just getting words out on a page. That's just what I've found for me, that it's easier to show up daily when, when there's that objective versus when it's, you know, a hyper, more of a hyper focused intentionality and making sure I'm hitting particular objectives from like an editing standpoint. Absolutely, and certainly I'm sure there are some of you listening who use Morning Pages, Julia Cameron's famous strategy for getting up and just writing what's on your mind. It doesn't have to have any connection to your actual book in any way. It's another approach to clearing out your brain so that you can approach your day better. So there are definitely a lot of, ways to approach the process. And so, listener, hopefully today You've gained some insight into our experience with the time to write and balancing that with rest time. We hope you'll join us in the community. You can find links in the show notes. But For those of you who don't have access to that right at this moment you can join us at inspired writer collective. mn. co. Find us at Inspired Writer Collective on Instagram and Facebook and at Inspired Writer LLC on TikTok. We'd love to hear about your writing journey and encourage you. Happy writing. Bye guys. Bye. Thank you so much for tuning in to another episode of the Inspired Writer Collective podcast. We hope you found inspiration, insights, and connection to yourself as a writer. If you enjoyed this episode, please share, subscribe, and leave us a 5 star review. Remember, the power of storytelling lies within each of us, and by supporting one another, we can make a difference. We can amplify our voices and craft narratives that resonate with the world. We're not just about words on a page. We're passionate about the craft, the process, and building a supportive community. Become a part of our community by connecting with us on social media. You can find us on Instagram and YouTube at inspired writer collective on Tik TOK at inspired writer LLC by joining our writing community online at inspired dash writer. Dash collective.mn.co and let's continue this writing journey Together, you can find links in the show notes. Until next time, fellow writers may your pens be mighty and your stories captivating. Happy writing.