How I Get My Writing Started

From the archives – an early reflection on my writing routine.

Sometimes it can be really difficult to get into a writing frame of mind. Particularly because we have so many distractions around us.

Being creative is much easier if it is done first thing in your daily routine. Your mind will not have had much time to fill up with distractions especially if you do not connect in anyway to social media before you begin the process. You need to find a routine that suits you. One that you can actually do on a daily basis so that it does become part of your routine. Here is how my writing day starts:

1. Large cup of coffee, replace with the beverage of your choice!

2. Music – headphones go on.

3. My morning pages – morning pages are just a method of carrying out a brain dump so that your mind is totally clear. I alternate between using a journal for this and a great free website 750 words.

4. Set a timer for 30 minutes –

• Draft Article

• Edit yesterday’s article and post to its destination

• Organize research for next article

5. Break

6. Get on with your next task of the day!

The research for the next article is usually just bringing together all the material that you have collected into one source file. This makes you reread all the information discarding all the superfluous bits that you are not going to use.

The reason that I do this is that you read the information when you found it, rereading it for a second time in context with all the other material will help your mind work on the content before you actually start writing the next day. This can avoid not knowing where to start!

This is my routine. Do you have a similar routine or do you approach it totally differently?

If this resonates, you’re welcome to share your own approach.

I’ve written elsewhere about the tools I tend to write with.