Opinion

Fits of Inspiration: Keeping Motivated

"I'd write, if only I had the time." Does this describe you? Do you start each day intending to write, but end it without having scribbled a word? As a struggling freelancer myself, and moreover one with notions of novels dancing in my head, getting up the motivation to write is a big part of my daily life.

Writing as an occupation can make for an awfully isolated existence, so that it’s hard to tell how you’re doing, or, at times, to justify it—especially if it isn’t (yet, right?) a source of income. With that in mind, I’m moved to share with you some of the things that got me started and that have kept me going, packaged into a Top Ten list for your convenience.

10. Sometimes it really does take a kick in the pants. In my case, the kick in question was a layoff. At the time I had the luxury of not having to seek work again right away. So, I said to myself, it’s time to prove that you were serious, all those times you went on about writing "if you only had the time." Suddenly I had nothing but time.

9. Distractions expand to fill the time available. Even if you’re unemployed and spend your days couch-surfing, a peculiar thing happens when you decide it’s time to write: there’s no time. There’s always something else that needs to be done: rearranging your silverware drawer, for instance, or cleaning out your clothes closet.

On a Usenet newsgroup for science fiction writers, this is called "cat vacuuming," defined as "the invention of useless but apparently necessary work to keep you from writing." A lot of budding writers of my acquaintance feel guilty for having these impulses, but the secret is not to let them overwhelm you. The best way is this: make the time.

8. It’s a date! Make an appointment with yourself each day, and give yourself a time—15 minutes, say, at first—or a word count as a goal. In the beginning it doesn’t matter what you write about; just make the time. This technique is one embraced by Dorothea Brande, whose book, Becoming a Writer, is one of the most useful I’ve found.

7. Don’t spend so much time reading that you forget about writing. I love research. I’ve been researching the Great American Epic Fantasy Novel for years. But all the knowledge, tips, tricks, and techniques in the world won’t help you if you don’t sit down and put pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard. Like anything else, good writing takes practice. We can’t all be Shakespeare, but even Shakespeare was a bumbling amateur once.

6. Don’t wait for inspiration to strike. A common complaint that I hear from people who say they want to write, but who don’t, is that they never have any ideas. First of all, this just isn’t true: open the newspaper, and you’ll find ideas burbling up, seemingly out of nowhere. When I’m running low on ideas, I think of something an author I admire once wrote: “People are always waiting for inspiration to strike. Well, with the mortgage, the taxes, and a family to support, I get inspired at 8 a.m. every single morning.”

5. Write what you are. That’s a bit different from the usual adage, write what you know, so I’d better explain. When you’re told to write what you know, what’s really meant is what you know by virtue of being human. This applies whether you’re writing fiction, or an essay, or a newspaper article. It even applies if you’re writing a set of instructions or rules: after all, your readers have to comprehend what you’ve written, or it doesn’t work.

4. Have a goal. One of the persistent oddities of life is that it’s easier to get motivated about things you do for someone else than things you do for yourself. If you’ve got a deadline, if you’re getting paid for this, it’s a lot easier to get the thing done than if it’s something you’ll get around to someday, when you have time.

Whether you intend to write a novel, or get published in a newspaper, or become a theater critic, having a goal makes the job easier: instead of this big, amorphous thing called “writing,” it now has shape and dimension. That allows you to break it down into smaller pieces, each of which helps you work toward the larger goal. There are lots of ways to do this, and no one way is the right one, though there’s plenty of advice available if you want it.

3. Be careful about taking advice. After awhile, seeking advice can be just another form of cat vacuuming (see number 9). Remember, advice is only as valuable as what it brings to how you work. If it doesn’t work for you, discard it and find something else. Just bear in mind that the finding something else part is even more important than the discarding it part; otherwise you end up where you started.

2. Take a break once in awhile. A couple of months ago, I got so stressed out about all of this that I took an enforced day off, heading up to Deception Pass for a day of hiking in the snow. The problem with giving your goals shape and dimension is that they can come to dominate your life. It can be hard to let go from time to time, especially if this is a source of income and it’s been a slow month. But time off, even if it’s just a five-minute walk, is crucial to your sanity. We all need to take our brains off the hook once in awhile.

1. Write! When it comes down to it, the best motivator to write is simply to write. Once you’ve made a habit of it, it becomes increasingly difficult to let a day go by without getting some words down. You’ll miss some days, of course, and there’ll be times when, despite your best efforts, you sit down to write and nothing comes out. It happens. (If all else fails, write about how frustrated you are at the lack of writing. This can be a surprisingly effective kick in the pants, see number 10.)

The hard part is that, when you’re just starting out, you’re writing for no reason except that you like it. That’s the most important reason, but it can be difficult to sustain without outside encouragement or benchmarks of success, especially since there’s no guarantee that you’ll ever write for anything other than your own enjoyment. But one thing’s certain: if you don’t write, you’re not even doing that.

Genevieve Williams is a freelance writer and occasional musician. She writes reviews, articles, newsletters, and short stories, has completed the draft of her first novel, and has been accepted to the summer 2002 Clarion West science fiction writers’ workshop. She can be reached via e-mail at rimrun@drizzle.com.