Next month I’ll be doing a presentation for the Florida Romance Writers Association on motivation for authors. As often happens, I’ll speak on what I need to revisit myself. (Isn’t it funny how the Universe works that way?) This year has been challenging for me for a variety of personal reasons. Accepting the challenge of this talk was one way to get myself back in the groove.
Here’s my list of tips for motivating yourself. I suggest that you create a vision board to help you wrestle these ideas to the ground. A vision board is a piece of paper or a poster board or a bulletin board where you attach photos that illustrate your goal. Creating a vision board engages both your left side (your logic/reasoning) and your right side (your emotion/creativity) of the brain.
- Have a reason. – You can’t motivate other people, only yourself. Each and every one of us is different. What I want and what you want are probably not the same. Oh, sure, we might have a general agreement that we want to be “successful,” but for each of us, success looks different. Often our real reason is incredibly personal. Perhaps it’s something you wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing out loud. That’s okay. You can hide it on your vision board under a flap of paper.
- Track your progress. – Imagine taking a road trip on a highway without signage. Impossible! The same applies to the journey toward your goals. You need to find a way to measure your progress. That can be words written, projects completed, or even consecutive days of sitting down to write. NaNoWriMo is one of the clearest examples of the value of tracking your progress, but you don’t have to wait until November. You can do the same any month by finding a way to track your progress. Alternatively, find an accountability partner who’ll help you stay committed to your goals.
- Prepare for bumps along the road. – Family life can definitely interfere with your writing time. That’s why it’s important to find a way to carve out the time you need or to get agreement from your family that they’ll help you find the time. It’s also wise to block off times when you know you won’t get much done, like around holidays and special events. Preparation is the key here. In fact, scientists have learned that the old rule of “visualizing success” is much less valuable than visualizing “failure” or the problems that are roadblocks to our success. By thinking about hiccups before they occur, you’ll be able to swing into Plan B without much effort. https://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddisalvo/2011/06/08/visualize-success-if-you-want-to-fail/#362c57cf3604
- Clear the decks as much as possible. – Personally, I think it’s hard to write in a messy space. There’s actually research that shows that visual clutter can make it hard to concentrate. All that stuff around you provides competition for your attention. https://unclutterer.com/2011/03/29/scientists-find-physical-clutter-negatively-affects-your-ability-to-focus-process-information/ Even if you shove everything into a box while you write, it’s a good idea to have a nook where you are isolated from the silent call of other tasks that need to be done.
- Leverage failure. – Once in a while, it’s good to put the power of negativity into play. Fear of failure can produce a lot of useful energy and actually exert a positive force if you use it right. Here are just a few ways you could put the pressure of failure to work for you: sign a contract, commit to a group project, set a presale date, announce a date to your readers, or schedule an editor’s time.
- Aim for closure. — Motivational experts have long used visualization as a way to direct the unconscious mind toward a desired goal. However, this can backfire. If you visualize success, it can rob you of the energy you need to actually succeed. (See #5 and the uses of failure. http://www.sportpsychologytoday.com/sport-psychology-for-coaches/the-power-of-visualization/) We’ve all seen this bleeding off of energy in the author who talks about his/her book but never gets down to the hard task of writing. So instead of visualizing success, I like to focus on closure or the joy of getting a task done. I love having the cover for my work-in-progress sitting in front of me as I write. Something about having the cover makes me itch to finish the book. It’s kind of like crossing an item off my “to do” list. It generates the satisfaction of closure. It might not work for you, but there it is.
- Take baby steps. (Bonus tip: Change the medium you usually work in.) – There will be days when nothing goes right and when you don’t feel like you are making any progress at all. Ditto days when you feel like giving up. The key to moving ahead isn’t necessarily in taking giant strides. Instead, concentrate on baby steps. If you can’t sit down and write for hours, pick up an index card and jot down a few scene ideas. If you can’t edit an entire manuscript, grab a piece of paper and create a cast of characters. If you can come up with a great character, go through a magazine and tear out photos of people who might illustrate that person. These small activities will keep you moving toward your goal and might even give you new insights. By changing up the medium you typically use (say going from a computer screen to a notepad), you’ll activate different brain paths, which might help you in unexpected ways.
- Create a habit. – No matter how tired I am, I always brush my teeth before I go to bed. If I fall in bed early, I’ll even get up and brush them sometime during the night. That’s the power of habit. Here’s a sad truth: Our lives are ruled by habit. You perform certain tasks over and over until your brain automatically defaults to those rituals. Want proof? Have you ever been in a power outage and tried to turn on the lights? Uh-huh. Silly, right? But habit is that strong. If you can develop a habit of sitting down to write, you won’t need motivation. It takes 21 days to create a new habit. Here are 35 apps that will help you create a new habit. https://tomaslau.com/habit-forming-apps/
What motivates you to keep writing? I’d like to know.
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