THE ONE ABOUT WORKFLOW

Photo by Ian Dooley on Unsplash

This is a post I’ve been wanting to do for awhile, but I wanted to approach it sensitively, because it’s such a subjective, well…subject. I recognize that I am in a place of privilege to be able to write full-time, stay at home with my child, and focus on my creative enterprises. It wasn’t always this way. In my early thirties I was a single mom, and while I was self-employed even then—I owned a hair salon—I would get up at 5:00 AM every morning to write before taking my daughter to preschool, and then go to work and spend 9-10 hours on my feet behind the chair. I know how hard it is to juggle all the things. I see you, writers with full-time jobs.

I will say, even when you work exclusively from home, there’s always something to do. You’re still busy. Many of us learned this first-hand during the pandemic when we were home 24/7 for the first time, with our spouses and children and pets underfoot. I don’t think anyone with kids will ever say stay-at-home-parents have it easy, ever again! And don’t get me started on the dishes. They never end.

After I transitioned out of salon ownership in my early 40s and became a full-time wedding photographer, I learned a lot about time management. I tend to be chaotic by nature. Some have mentioned that I seem really organized and pulled together, but this takes a ton of willful effort and energy. I learned pretty quickly that if I did not approach my self-employment as a real job with set hours and designated tasks, I’d fall apart and end up in a loop of procrastination, anxiety, and self-imposed burnout and depression. No fun and no good for anyone.

For my nitty-gritty task management tools, I use notebooks, the Notes app on my phone, and my paper planner to keep track of tasks. I definitely write everything down, mostly to have the satisfaction of checking tasks off my list. This is A Real Thing for me and appeals to my kind of executive functioning. I’ll be doing another post at some point about the way I manage my revision and writing processes, specifically, but today I only want to cover the over-arching way I approach my daily schedule.

So here we go. This is a week in the life of Paulette the Writer:

Weekdays (except for Tuesdays—more on that later)

7:00 AM — This is usually when I get up. I’ll make the coffee, do some household chores, eat a piece of fruit to stave off the hangries, then I do 30 minutes or so of reading for inspiration. Then it’s time to work. I go into my office, shut the door, turn on some music, and get my word count for the day. If I don’t write or edit my work first thing, I feel guilty and it hangs over my head. So I get my words down before anything else. I usually strive for around 1,000 words a day when I’m drafting, but I don’t force things if they aren’t coming on, and some days I get derailed from writing anything at all. I end my writing/editing session and check my email to see if there’s anything urgent from my agent or editor.

10:00 AM — I make a light breakfast and take my shower. I do more household tasks like watering the garden and errands such as our grocery shopping or pharmacy pick-ups.

11:00 AM — This is when my daughter gets up. She’s homeschooled, so as a growing, neurodivergent teen and a night owl, I let her set her own schedule. This works really well for our family. I like to be available if she needs me, so I will usually pull up a friend’s manuscript on my iPad and do any critiquing/beta reading I have on my list at this time, so that I’m in the main part of the house and not sequestered in my office. This is also the time when I’m on social media the most.

4:00 PM — Daughter finishes schoolwork. We usually go on a walk together afterwards, and she has her free screen time. I go back into my office and write a bit more (but only if I feel like it) or prep pages for my critique partner. I check my email once more, make sure I’ve backed up my work to an exterior hard drive, then shut down my workspace.

6:00 PM — Dinner. The rest of the evening is spent with my family and reading. And who knows when I go to bed? It’s never the same, but usually I aim to turn in around 11:00 or 12:00

Tuesdays

Tuesdays are my designated author admin days, where I focus on the business side of writing. I file any business-related receipts and enter them into Quickbooks. I prepare any big social media drafts in advance (book cover announcements and deal announcements for example). If I’m planning to post book reviews on Instagram, I’ll photograph the books I’m recapping/reviewing, and edit those photos. I follow up via email on any non-urgent matters and spend a lot more time on social media — this is usually when I do my Facebook posts, check Goodreads, etc.

I also prepare and draft my blog post for the week on Tuesday. I’ve been a little busier lately, so I’ve missed a couple weeks of posting new articles this month, but I do try to put up a new post every week. Blog posts are a huge way to draw more web traffic to your site and help so much with SEO. They are a worthy channel of effort, in my opinion. So are newsletters, but I have decided to only do newsletters for big book news, so that I’m not pulled in a ton of different directions.

I think it’s really important to have a focus with your online efforts, and for me, my biggest focuses are Twitter and my blog. Focus really helps with the overwhelm.

Weekends

I try not to write on weekends unless I’m on a deadline. I am writing on weekends right now, because, guess what? Haha! But usually, it’ll take up far less time than on weekdays. I sincerely try to keep my weekends free for my family and for household tasks I enjoy, like gardening. We all need a day off, after all.

My schedule varies and doesn’t always look exactly this way, because life happens. But I do try to stick with it unless I have something urgent come up. I’m not perfect. And some days, none of the things get done, but for the most part, this is the way I keep myself disciplined.

We all have different approaches to time management when it comes to writing. If any of this resonates with you and seems helpful, that’s great. But your workflow may look very different than mine, and that’s the beauty of being a creative person. Each artist’s journey is unique.

I’d love to see any helpful tips you’ve discovered to manage your own workflow in the comments!