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A Writing Daily Routine

15th July 2017
(Blog Posting)

A guest post from Larry G Maguire

I’m about to move into writing full-time and for structure, I need a writing daily routine.

I need a simple routine, something that’s realistic and doesn’t kill my enthusiasm for writing anytime soon – not that I believe it will.

The reason for moving now?

A big fat NO.

That feeling of “this just doesn’t feel right”, you know the one. You’ve likely felt it before yourself.

But you ignored it. Most of us ignore it.

We choose to look the other way and shelve those ambitions for a better existence citing all kinds of reasonable excuses.
This time, **** the excuses.

In any case, I’ve become very good at getting out of things when they’re not working for me anymore.

I don’t wait around for it to become intolerable. Been there, have the t-shirt.

Fulfilling A Self Commitment

My writing has suffered this week due to work commitments and I’m not very happy about it.

My commitment to writing every day was a real one and on average I’ve probably done about 800 words per day which isn’t too bad.

However, the job I took has been very demanding and I’ve missed a few days here and there.

I’ve had enough of all that now.

You know, all this following other people’s lead, other people’s rules isn’t for me.

My employee’s brain was killed off years ago if indeed I ever had one. It was 17 years ago I last was employed by others and I can’t adjust myself back to that.

So I’m out.

I gave it a go and the money was good. But it’s not my bag so time’s up.

The Necessity Of A Daily Routine

Most of us think that routines are necessary so that we can put some structure, some order on our unruly selves.

We believe we need to be disciplined, to get in line, to straighten ourselves out.

But this idea that we need some kind of governor watching over us is flawed.

Whether we are running the rule over ourselves or some other dude is measuring our performance, it’s the cart before the horse in my view and not a very powerful position we place ourselves in.

The entire structure of our society is based on the idea that someone needs to watch us, to make sure we’re doing what we should.

Although routines and structures can alter our behavior, kind of like precepts to a better version of ourselves, that’s not a proper use of them.

That’s not how I want to adopt a writing daily routine.

It’s much simpler and more beneficial than that.

Getting Feeling Of Routine

There is a rhythm to the world, a cyclical pattern that all things follow and when we get into that instead of trying to force it with rules, good **** happens.

I believe other people’s rules and regulations are why creative people suffer and struggle so much. We think we’ve got to shape up!
But we can’t do it like that.

I’ve found that a workable routine comes out of what we do rather than some predefined rule that must come first.

It’s only in retrospect that we see the pattern and mistakenly declare “Ah so that’s how they did it”.

Yeah sure, you can get hints from other people’s patterns, those who’ve been down the road. But you can’t follow them to the letter and expect to get the same results.

That’s naive.

It takes time to find the right routine. It’s like a pair of shoes you borrowed belong to a friend, even though they fit, they don’t.

Know what I mean?

Sure we can take hints and clues and read the theory of it, but we’ve got to do it so that we can learn to feel it.

Once we practice for 10 years then we get to understand it fully, and before that, if we force it then we fail.

But even in the failing, we win, we get closer to the place of mastery we’re after.

Daily Writing Routine Clues From Others

I’ve been doing a bit of digging and found some good articles (amongst the rubbish) that actually have something decent to say about establishing a daily writing routine.

These articles are based on the advice of masterful writers, ones that produced really great work.

They’re not just for writers either mind you, this advice can help any creative better approach their work.

Check it out;

James Clear – The Daily Routines of 12 Famous Writers

Brain Pickings – The Daily Routines of Great Writers

The Write Practice – Daily Routines of Writers