The Grasshopper Issue #28: Deadlines
Outside or self-imposed, I need them and so do you
Last Sunday I wrote an anecdote about procrastinating on a book deal headline and having to write an entire book in a month. What I did not mention is that, because this was a non-fiction how-to book, I had written a comprehensive outline.
I want to talk about that outline before I get to the topic of deadlines. When you write a nonfiction book proposal it is quite comprehensive. Two sample chapters, a marketing plan, an author bio, and that outline. And the format for that outline that worked for me was one page for each chapter and one line for each concept or page subject within the chapter.
This format tells you whether you really have a book-length concept that doesn’t require filler. It organizes your ideas and shows you any gaps in your knowledge or ideas that don’t flow with the topic. And, once it is done and accepted, you can write the book by basically filling in the text.
So, a lot of work was already completed before I actually did much writing.
It should be noted that this is not the way my fiction or most of the fiction I admire is organized. As I mentioned in the past, I’m a ‘pantser’, a writer who does not have an outline when writing a novel. There’s lots about that in the back issues of The Grasshopper so I’ll leave you to it.
There’s also a quote from Haruki Murakami in the last Sunday issue that describes his working intuitively.
Deadlines make you money
If you don’t finish, you don’t get paid. If you’re late, you might get paid, but you might also not get a second chance.
These are two hard and fast rules all freelancers should keep front of mind if you want to succeed. And always hand in clean copy, edited, and carefully organized for a logical flow.
I no longer freelance so I’m not going to dwell on the topic, but I still have deadlines for two good reasons. First, a lot of my writing is based on current events so the subject’s shelf life is limited. I have to get my articles out while they are fresh. There is no time for obsessing or pursuing perfection, a guaranteed way to fail as a writer.
The second reason for self-imposed deadlines is discipline and forming good working habits. I write and publish articles daily with the occasional day off if there’s nothing getting me going. To do this requires discipline and developing a daily writing habit that works for you.
For me, that is scanning the news in the morning with a cappuccino nearby, identifying a story I want to tell, and writing it, generally 500-700 words. Some days a second one follows. I then set them aside till later in the day for proofing and editing. Then they get published.
If there is a second story, I generally determine which story is most relevant at that moment and publish it first, saving the second one for the next day. Sometimes, if a story has a longer shelf life, I might put it into a queue for when I have a gap or need to mix things up.
I’m not saying all writers should follow a pattern like mine. But finding your own pattern is the determining factor in whether you will move on the next level as a writer. Patterns like mine create their own deadlines and do a number on procrastination, a disease common to writers.
The Stephen King method for writing fiction, as outlined in On Writing, is the basic pattern used by most novelists: sticking to a daily word count. That word count becomes your deadline and, as the days tick by, helps you tackle the daunting task of writing a full length novel or any book length project.
It’s simply a numbers game. 500 words a day, five days a week, gets you to a 100,000 word manuscript in thirty weeks. Not a finished book by any means. There is still a lot of work to do and you’ll have to develop habits for dealing with that process of edits and rewrites.
So, deadlines are an invaluable tool in your writer toolbox, one that will teach you something every day that you write. And remember this, professional creators don’t wait for inspiration. They do the work and inspiration finds them.
Last Sunday’s issue was a long one and this one is a bit shorter than usual, so I’ll call it balanced. Which may be a future topic since finding balance as a creator is really vital to keeping yourself from burning out. See you next week. M
In the meantime, if you want, buy me a coffee and I’ll pay it forward.
802 words