11–16 of 16 posts
For me, a lot comes down to that complicated "work/life balance". I need to make sure I get enough sleep, I get varieties of stimulation, I get enough time with the people I really love (love is a HUGE part of my life)... that I'm balanced. If the balance goes out of whack, if I overfocus on one thing, my broader productivity drops precipitously. Life is a marathon, not a sprint. Every time you sprint, you reduce you…
- He loves to write, more than ever; now that people are admiring his work.
- He regularly writes 2500 words/day. Every day. This isn't much, but becomes huge if done regularly.
- He often does little side-projects (often unplanned) that end up as published novellas, short-stories, or sometimes video-game tie-ins.
- His ideal plan is to do one big project (large epic sf book) and follow it up with a shorter YA novel.
- He has a huge list of books he plans to write (currently around 30-40 atleast) all in various stages of planning.
My favorite point is that he writes good _and_ fast, which is a very rare combination (see GRRM, for instance).
Someone I'd really like to point out is Brandon Sanderson. He's a prolific writer with an average of 2-3 books every year. He has been asked how he manages to write so much and at such quality (all his books regularly hit NYT bestseller lists), and his answers revolve around: - He loves to write, more than ever; now that people are admiring his work. - He regularly writes 2500 words/day. Every day. This isn't much, b…
Actually 2,500 words per day, every day, strikes me as a lot of writing. I did NaNoWriMo (http://nanowrimo.org) a couple of years ago, and to hit the "50,000 words in 30 days" target for that you have to turn out around 1,700 words each day. I'm a fast writer compared to a lot of folks -- just look at the length of some of my herniated HN comments to see what I mean -- and even I found that target to be a pretty big lift. It's do-able, I got in my 50,000 words, but by the end of the month I was exhausted. I can't imagine doing it every day for the rest of time -- and that's only 68 percent of the words Sanderson says he's turning out.
Someone I'd really like to point out is Brandon Sanderson. He's a prolific writer with an average of 2-3 books every year. He has been asked how he manages to write so much and at such quality (all his books regularly hit NYT bestseller lists), and his answers revolve around: - He loves to write, more than ever; now that people are admiring his work. - He regularly writes 2500 words/day. Every day. This isn't much, b…
He regularly writes 2500 words/day. Every day. This isn't much, but becomes huge if done regularly. Actually 2,500 words per day, every day, strikes me as a lot of writing. I did NaNoWriMo ( http://nanowrimo.org ) a couple of years ago, and to hit the "50,000 words in 30 days" target for that you have to turn out around 1,700 words each day. I'm a fast writer compared to a lot of folks -- just look at the length of s…
>[..] I don't think I write all that quickly. I do about 2000 words a day, most days. That's 250 words an hour working a normal schedule, and I often work more. 250 words an hour is NOTHING. Try typing a few emails, and you'll find out how fast 250 words goes by. I think for me, there are two secrets.
- [From his AMA earlier today](https://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/2ytg2h/im_novelist_b...)
So, he writes around 8 hours per day, which is something you'd expect him to do at his level. You have to realize that he does writing for-a-living, full time. Most people doing NaNoWriMo aren't doing it full-time.
But yeah, he's definitely writing _consistently_, and that's what I find interesting.
A friend of mine is the latter: We have about the same drive, intellect, and motivation, as far as I can tell from working together, from long talks over beer, etc. But he needs about 4 hours a night, I need 8-9. That gives him several extra days a week, compared to me. Even if he only takes advantage of "one day", that still puts him 20+% ahead of me.
I also know several people in camp #1, some of whom are on second or third spouses, very few of whom are still with original partners.
There is a third camp, the rarest of them all: Focused but balanced. They get a normal amount of sleep, switch from rest to work mode and back again immediately, and when in work mode are focused and productive the whole time. They are the ones I try to emulate, at least to some extent.
"It's not smarts or talent." I wouldn't be so sure...
Thanks for your kind words and support!
To sum up your blog post more succinctly -- being productive is a skill like anything else, it takes time to develop.
Responding to inspiration quickly is one aspect of that skill, but it's not the only one.