Pages Before Play

It’s said that most writers like to have written more than they like to actually write. I wouldn’t say this is totally true for me, because I love writing — you know, the actual process of putting words on the page and molding them into something that resembles a story — but I can relate to the challenges of actually getting the butt in the chair. I don’t know why this is. You’d think that when you love something, you’d look for every opportunity to do it, but I suspect it has something to do with writing being hard. It may be fun, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.

For years, I tried everything in the book to get myself to write more. Nothing worked well until I realized that any rule had to be tied not to time or place, but to a specific number of words or pages. In other words, I couldn’t say to myself, “I will write for an hour each night from 6:30 to 7:30,” but instead, “I will write 1000 words every day.” Or 500. Or 100. It didn’t matter how small, so long as it was specific and achievable. Because if you tell yourself you will write for an hour, well, you may write, but you may write only a few sentences. If your goals are time-based, rather than production-based, then you’re creating the wrong mindset. You want to condition yourself that when you sit, you write, and not that sitting for any set amount of time satisfies your goal.

If I know I’m not letting myself up out of that chair until I’ve written my five pages, you better believe I’ll get cranking fairly quickly. I don’t want to be sitting there until one in the morning when I know my kids will have me up shortly after the crack of dawn.

Ah, but that brings me to the other critical adjustment I made that helped me go from being a dilettante to a doer: withholding rewards until the work is done.

Or, when it comes to writing specifically, what I call pages before play.

There has to be either punishment or reward tied directly to your goal. Since I’m not really into the whips and chains and the fifty pushups with the face in the mud, I prefer to go with the rewards. What type of rewards are best? Well, that’s for each person to decide, but usually they’re what you’re doing when you know you should be writing. For me, that’s a couple things: 1) reading, of course, which is the big one, 2) movies and television, and 3) Internet and email.

So what I did is lump all of those into the “play category,” and I don’t let myself do any of them until the daily quota is met. No checking email to see if I heard back from so-and-so editor at such-and-such magazine. No reading that John D. MacDonald I find so addictive. No watching that documentary that was getting all the buzz lately. All of that waits until the pages are done.

And this works. It works very, very well, in fact. You have to have the self-discipline not to cheat, but usually the guilt will prevent you from doing that. Because not only do you create incentives to get your butt in the chair (gosh, you really would like to see that romantic comedy you brought home from Blockbuster the other night), you also eliminate most of the easiest distractions.

Pages before play. The trick, of course, is really doing it. But then that’s what separates the wannabes from the achievers — not just in writing, but any pursuit in life that takes discipline and dedication.

May Update

It seemed time to do a quick update on the writing. My wife’s broken leg back in early March threw us all for a loop, and with two young children in the house on top of things, it certainly made for a hectic and exhausting time. The writing took a backseat for a while, but I seem to be back up to nearly full speed now. I’m still not quite at the all-cylinders-firing level of productivity I’d like to be at, but that’s something I’m continuing to work on, and I’m getting there. There’s just no doubt in my mind any more that my own productivity will determine the speed at which I achieve the goals I’ve laid out for myself (goals that are so ambitious and lofty that I refrain in mentioning them, for fear of sounding arrogant to the extreme). This may seem pretty obvious (write more = do better), but it takes a while to develop confidence in your abilities and your potential so that you can fully embrace the idea that there’s really nothing holding you back but your own dedication and discipline. This isn’t to sound egotistical. I’ve got bucket loads still to learn, and always will; it’s just that I’ve come far enough, and achieved enough modest success, to know that any real obstacles to success are within me. It’s refreshing, and sometimes frustrating, when you realize this. It’s refreshing because you’re not shadowboxing with invisible villains any more. It can be frustrating when you’re not doing what you know you need to do.

Simply put, it means this: I know what I have to do to get where I want to go. Now it’s just a matter of doing it. As far as actual writing goes, I’m making good progress on the novel, but it’s a long road. If a short story is a sprint, a novel is a marathon, and I’m still getting used to the difference.

Publishing News:

  • “Father Hagerman’s Dog” appeared in the June 2007 issue of Analog. A college student’s attempt to sell a robotic dog to a defrocked priest. A bit light-hearted, this one, and fun to write. (If you can’t locate an actual copy of the magazine, you can buy it electronically through Fictionwise at http://www.fictionwise.com/eBooks/eBook45191.htm?cached)
  • “Road Game,” a suspense story involving road rage and the power of addiction, appeared in the June 2007 issue of Ellery Queen. (If you can’t locate an actual copy of the magazine, you can buy it electronically through Fictionwise at http://www.fictionwise.com/eBooks/eBook45192.htm?cached)
  • “The Dinosaur Diaries,” a coming-of-age novelette that begins when a young man finds Tyrannosaurus rex tracks on his family farm in modern Iowa, will soon appear in Realms of Fantasy. It’s one of the longest and most ambitious stories I’ve sold so far. I was told the August 2007 issue, but who knows if this is true. More news when I have it.

Weird Tales Subscription Drive

I just received word from Weird Tales that my story, “Directions to Mourning’s Deep,” certainly one of the strangest and shortest stories I’ve written (only a couple of pages, and written in second person), is scheduled to appear in the April/May issue. They’ve done a major revamp of the magazine, and in honor of this, they’re doing a subscription drive in which you can get six issues (a full year) for a mere $12. A fantastic deal. If you like weird fiction, take advantage of it. Here’s a shot of the new cover:

Also, you may have noticed a few changes to the website. I decided that the old site needed a little revamp, and since my day job is working in instructional technology for a university, it was a good excuse to learn a little more about PHP, CSS, and other geekery, things I needed to learn anyway to help faculty and students. I wanted to better embed my blog on my site as well as take advantage of tools which allow me to have the same content appear on multiple pages without actually having to update that content on every page. I’m still by no means a professional web designer, and it’s still not exactly what I want, but I’m happy with the progress. Probably more small tweaks, as time allows.