Just as a head’s up, squiders, June is going to be a rough month for me, so there may be a few weeks where you only get one post a week. Those posts will go up on Wednesdays. And then once we’re free from my least favorite month of the year, the schedule will once again be normal and so forth.
Today we’re moving on to writing around work. Work is, of course, important, as it gives us money, and money is unfortunately necessary for things such as food, housing, clothes, coffee, books (excepting library books), and things along those lines. But there are ways to work and still have time for more enjoyable things, such as writing.
As with most things, if you want to get writing done, you must make it a priority. Take a look at your day. If you get home and collapse from exhaustion, then that’s not the time to try and add in an additional task. If you can barely get out of bed in the morning, then don’t think you’ll suddenly be able to get up an hour early and do it then. Be reasonable, be logical, and there are solutions to be had.
Let’s look at some times that could be converted for writing, depending on your personal circumstances.
WARNING: Please avoid using company resources to write unless you have previously checked out the regulations around such things. Some companies may not care if you write on your work computer, say, but in the worse case scenarios, you might be fired or even have your work considered company property.
Lunch breaks
Lunch breaks can be a good time to squeeze in some writing. Most states in the United States require some amount of time be set off for lunch, though if you are salaried, you might need to make the time up elsewhere, depending on company policy on time worked. As we discussed in the school section, small time periods can actually be beneficial for working, since a time limit can provide some added incentive for buckling down and getting to it.
It’s worth it to note that you don’t have to designate every lunch break for writing; if you’d like to go out with coworkers every now and then, or if you know you have a lunch meeting every Friday, you can designate a single lunch period each week to use. Remember that you will need to be reasonable about the amount of time that you can write. Even writing slowly will eventually result in a finished story.
Commute time
Commuting can be useful writing time, especially if you take public transportation such as a train or a bus. Depending on your work situation (such as whether or not you have a safe place to store valuables), you can take a notebook or laptop or other writing implement of choice along. Remember that not all of writing is actively writing–you can always outline, plot, worldbuild, freewrite, etc. and it’s all helpful toward reaching your goals.
Business travel
Not everyone travels for work, and depending on your situation, you may be run ragged when you do–building presentations on the plane, stuck with coworker obligations for dinner–but business travel can be a good time to get some writing done. This will vary, of course. I know people who have taken business trips to other countries, so of course one doesn’t want to be in a hotel room pounding away on a keyboard in that situation. But if you travel a lot, and often to the same place, those evenings in the hotel room can be quite boring. If you do go to the same place quite often, you can scout out places to write–cafes or coffee shops, for example–so that not only are you being productive, you’re not in the hotel all the time either.
Slow times at work
Please, PLEASE, do not do this without first checking if it’s okay. But if you have some slow parts of your day–if you’re a receptionist, but the majority of the patients only come in the afternoon, or if you test software and have time while your code is compiling–this could be good writing time as well instead of sitting around and twiddling your thumbs.
As a warning, though, please make sure you’ve made sure all your work is done and have made a reasonable effort to make sure nothing else is required of you before you do this.
Before/After Work
As discussed above, it might be easiest to just write outside of work, depending on whatever works best for you. If you’re constantly busy at work, this may be your best option instead of trying to squeeze it into your workday around everything else. Pick a time that works best for you, commit to at least one day a week, and give it a try.
Weekends
If you have kids or other obligations, it can be difficult to write during the week, no matter the best of your intentions. But the good news is that weekends exist, and even if you’re busy, they’re also usually long enough that you can get an hour or two of writing in there somewhere. Weekends tend to move in definite patterns with breaks in between activities. For example, you might have something Saturday morning, and another something Saturday afternoon or evening, but nothing scheduled in between. If you can’t plan a definite time every week, you can at least sit down Friday evening and identify a time that will work for this particular weekend.
Another trick is if you get up early on weekdays but tend to sleep in on the weekends, you can pick either Saturday or Sunday to get up at your normal weekday time and get a little writing done before getting on with the rest of your day.
Any other ideas for writing around your workday, squiders?
