productivity

My mason bees are all hatching and it’s quite entertaining to sit out on the porch and watch the tiny perfect new bees encountering the world for the first time. When they reach the sunlight they stop and preen themselves like cats. Grocery deliveries have become a source of great excitement, and I am currently on Fall of year 2 in Stardew Valley. The move to Portland is on hold for at least a couple of weeks while we figure out where the world is going.

While existence has become more circumscribed for many, my life has, weirdly enough, become a bit more social as a result of recent events. I’ve been doing daily co-working sessions, at least one, sometimes two, each day, for a group that includes a bunch of friends and family, current and former students, mentees, and Patreon supporters as well as trying out some different things like videocalls where we all log on and clean our workspaces at the same time while chatting or Netflix Party.

I wrote a piece for Medium on how to run a successful and productive co-working session, and I cannot recommend them highly enough, although I know that mileage will wildly vary, according to people’s process. If you miss coffeeshop writing or working in an office, though, this may be a reasonable substitute. Remember there are scholarships for the Discord server.

I’ve also been doing some consulting for people turning their material into online versions. If you’re undergoing this process, here’s Things to Consider When Converting Your Live Class Into an Online Version. I also turned in book three of the Tabat series, hurray hurray!

Coming up this weekend:

• Get Weird! How to Make Your Fiction Original, Compelling, and Deeply Weird with Evan J. Peterson Saturday, April 11, 2020, 9:30-11:30 am Pacific Time. Taking cues from classic stories as well as contemporary literature, film, and pop culture, workshop leader Evan J. Peterson teaches you the ways to make your writing original, compelling, and deeply Weird. From witchcraft to spirits to unnameable entities, you’ll learn what makes a story unsettle audiences and stick with them for years.
• Writing Interactive Fiction with Kate Heartfield, Saturday, April 11, 2020, 1:00-3:00 PM Pacific time. If you’ve ever found yourself choosing between possible endings or plot twists, why not try a storytelling format that lets you explore them all? Games and interactive fiction invite the reader to join in the storytelling process, and invite the writer to consider multiple facets of agency, characterization, pacing and plot. Learn some fundamental principles and techniques for interactive formats, or just gain a new perspective on ways to develop your non-interactive prose.



• The Writer’s Guide to Handselling Books (Social Isolation Edition) with Michael R. Underwood, Sunday, April 12, 2020, 9:30-11:30 AM Pacific time. Author and publishing professional Michael R. Underwood shares lessons from a decade of hand-selling books to readers, booksellers, and sales reps. Learn how to put your work into a market context, showcase what makes it special, and connect with readers when selling at conventions. There’s no one way to sell any book, so this class will help you learn to find several different ways to pitch each project for greater success. In this edition, we’ll talk about how to sell books while practicing social isolation via virtual events and social media.
• Fearless Writing: Learning Not to Hold Back with Evan J. Peterson, Sunday, April 12, 2020, 1:00-3:00 pm Pacific Time. What are you afraid to write about? In this class, we create the supportive space to write the things we haven’t yet. We will discover what fears hold us back from writing about the topics and experiences we want to, in the forms and styles we want to. We will move past these fears and write fresh, honest, compelling work. We will practice sharing our writing with one another to dispel the fears of judgment and replace them with encouragement and strength. This class welcomes those writing in all genres and levels of experience and confidence.

Remember that there are Plunkett scholarships for classes; even if you’re strapped for cash, these classes are available. If you’ve enjoyed Rambo Academy classes in the past, please spread word of the school!

Cat reports on how the first co-cleaning session went, talks about upcoming Rambo Academy for Wayward Writers events and classes, and then discusses goal-setting and achievement-celebrating for writers, showing three examples.

This weekend’s events include Catherine Lundoff’s So You Want to Write an Anthology class (http://www.kittywumpus.net/blog/so-yo…) and Fran Wilde’s Journaling for Creativity workshop (http://www.kittywumpus.net/blog/journ…) as well as a co-writing session and our first Netflix movie night. Limited enrollment; 3 free scholarships available in each class. For more info on how to join the fun, you can go to http://patreon.com/catrambo for info on supporting Cat or http://www.kittywumpus.net/blog/join-… for chat server scholarships.

I came back from PNWA this year inspired by talking to Chris Fox, author of 5,000 Words an Hour, and adopted a new writing process, which has several parts. I want to emphasize that I’m pretty sure this is not a process that’s going to work for everyone. I have, for example, major luxuries such as a) no children, b) the financial resources for a gym membership, c) the time to make use of that membership as well as devoting a significant chunk of my time to writing, and d) good health and reasonably good energy levels. If this process sounds like one that might work for you though, I highly suggest you check out both the book as well as others by Chris Fox.

So here’s what I do.

• I get up at 5:30 AM and drive over to the gym to work out, doing a mix of elliptical and rowing machine, mainly about 45 minutes to an hour’s worth. In recent days, when the fog has been thick, I’ve chosen to do an hour’s brisk walk instead. Yes, it is dark, and cold, and miserable. No, I am not looking forward to colder weather and having to de-ice things.
• I come back here, eat my yogurt, start a pot of coffee, and begin writing with absolutely no Internet allowed, whether on phone or computer.
• I write in Scrivener, (writing software I’ve been using for over a decade now, available for both Mac and Windows OS) and I set myself a goal of 5,000 words, keeping the word count tracking window open so I can see the progress.
• I do a lot of 30 minute writing sprints, where I spend a few minutes beforehand figuring out what I want to accomplish in the scene I’ll be writing. Some of that will be typed, but if the flow is going well, I may switch over to dictation, using the Mac’s dictation feature, which I’ve come to favor over Dragon Dictate.
• Usually by 9 or 9:30 AM I hit the 3k word mark, and at that point, let myself walk over to a local coffee shop to pick up a latte and a pastry. It’s a 10 minute walk (and that’s another luxury I have, pleasant and safe surroundings for such a walk.) I can text my spouse at this point, but no Internet access still, even when waiting in line at the coffee shop.
• Sometimes I’m not sure I’ll hit my 5k mark by 11 AM but most of the time I do. (If I don’t, I keep writing till I do.)
• I reward myself for hitting my goals, usually with something on a weekly basis, but I’ve also been known to promise myself a treat for the day if it’s hard going. The rewards of late are Breyer horses, which is something that I would normally never allow myself to splurge on. Apparently my inner twelve-year-old is a powerful motivator.

Doing this has pretty consistently yielded 5,000 words each weekday along with another 5,000 spread out over the weekend, with the experience of the past few days, when I was at a writing conference but still managed two early morning workouts and 2,000 words. Currently I’m at over 93,000 words for the month of October. I’ve finished two books since PNWA: an adult novel as well as a middle grade one, and am currently 22,000 words into the sequel to the former.

I’m more productive overall and less likely to put stuff off (I think). Chris quotes Mark Twain as saying “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.” And it’s true. Get it and soldier through something not particularly palatable, and other stuff becomes easier. It does seem that, for me, working on strengthening my willpower is paying off. Staying off the internet is better overall for my sanity I think; I know I’ve pretty much stopped paying any attention to the trollios because there’s just not enough time in the day and wrangling with them is pointless anyhow.

And what I’m writing is pretty good! Writing that fast means it’s fresher in my head and I’m less likely to lose my way or forget bits I’ve added, The “making it all fit together pass” is easier than with manuscripts written over more time.

So why say all this? Am I taunting you with my productivity? Absolutely not. But I am saying – I started pushing myself a little harder and I was surprised how much farther I could go by doing something that put me in my body and then avoiding distractions and focusing on writing in an undiluted way, free of email distraction. There was no mail so important it could not wait until 11 AM.

I did learn to get better about getting set up ahead of time, making sure my gym clothes were laid out, my headphones ready, and that I knew where Wayne had parked the car each night. One morning I ended up going to the gym in damp clothes and feeling quite virtuous; I’ve also been feeling a lot healthier, stronger, and more energetic as a result of this regime.

I also don’t beat myself up if I miss track. I didn’t write as much as I wanted to at Surrey, but I also spent some time napping and reading in order to maintain my energy level and stay at my best during the conference. Today it was so foggy that I didn’t drive over to the gym — but I still managed to get my 5k in, so hooray for me. Tomorrow will be another day.

If I were truly organized, this would have appeared on New Year’s Day, but I had a very nice weekend instead. Now it’s Monday, and I’ve had my coffee and homemade yogurt and done some stuff. I’m feeling good about the year and have made the usual sorts of resolutions. Things that I’m trying in 2016:

More productive. Daily writing, no matter what the circumstances, shooting for 3k, but taking 1k as the absolute minimum. Getting the novel done, done, done, and a slew of other stories and projects, all stuff I’m looking forward to, but which must be banged out and then (ugh) revised. Daily free-writes to get warmed up and help me listen to my unconscious. Doing some of the daily little practices that end up accumulating, like practicing my Spanish on Duolingo.

More organized. Sitting down in the morning to take ten minutes to sort out my day and write the three most important things to get accomplished. Tracking things better. Having a household system where things have their designated place and get put there, and eliminating the clutter clusters, the places where stuff gets dumped and remains. The new house helps with not just the act of having to purge and sort that moving involved, but in having more spaces to put things.

More mindful. That same morning moment helps me figure out my day and live it more purposefully, less prey to random disorientation and derailing. Keeping a daybook/journal where I jot down ten things about the day, as well as a short list of what I got done, and the more important occurrences like visitors, trips, etc. Giving my poet-side time to sit and think at times.

More healthy. With the move, I’m walking more, and with the Fitbit, I could be tracking that and making sure I hit at least 5 miles a day, but hoping to be closer to an average of ten by the end of the year. Fewer eat-ALL-the-sweets moments and more fruits/veggies. Focusing on positivity and trimming negative crap out of my life where I can. Celebrating things that should be celebrated and practicing gratitude for being alive in such a nifty world, under what are pretty darn good circumstances.

I thought about trying to map everything out in Habitica but in the end I’ve just got a journal page with it all listed, plus I’m trying to build in habits that let me audit how I’m doing.

Part of mindfulness is the occasional moment where I remind myself that I have managed to do okay so far, and that despite feeling like a hapless mess half the time internally, I put on a reasonable facsimile of a responsible adult with an actual career and stuff. That’s kinda key too. While my inner teenager does give me a lot of pleasure, she’s also pretty insecure. To me, taking care of all those internal personae seems crucial, and it’s that part of me that’s actually achieved a semblance of adulthood.

Currently working on a couple of collaborations and a story whose title makes me laugh every time, but actually seems to have some social commentary at its heart.

Happy 2016, everyone! Here’s to health and happiness, to an overall increase in human empathy and a decrease in insecurity and meanness. Here’s to living life in a way that’s meaningful, rather than treading water and waiting for things to occur. Here’s to wonderful words and songs sung together, full voiced and beautiful, even with the occasional disharmony to make the rest sound all the better.

Tried the balcony out for writing last night. Here’s a blog post that emerged.

For a long time I listen to the ocean, a background of some chirping insect, shrill arcs of sound going out against that massive, constant grumble. That is what life is like, singing out against that gray and empty grind, not caring what it sounds like, because singing is the only thing you can do.

I can feel my shoulders relaxing as I type, the guilt of several weeks (over a month, really) of getting little done, not just because of the traveling or the distractions but because I let myself get lazy and forget that what a writer does is write. If you want to call yourself one, that’s what is necessary and while that’s a hard standard to maintain consistently sometimes in the face of a multitude of crises of the mind or body or world or family, it’s one I hold myself to, first and foremost.

A confession: I am not one of those writers who “have to” write, the ones seized with such a fervid muse that they cannot exist without words spilling out of them. I envy them, and sometimes in my heart, get irritated by a smugness that is really an interpretation imposed by my own insecurities.

But I have always defined myself as a writer, even in the days when I wasn’t writing so much and was pouring all that energy into writing for an online game or technical documentation or some combination of the two. So when I don’t do it, it’s not so much that it’s the writing building up. In fact, some days I’m digging the words out, and they’re obdurately clinging to the inside of my skull so I have to wrestle them onto the keyboard. Even now, I want them to flow and they’re halting, the flow coming in fits and spurts while all the time the ocean softly roars, as though it can’t help itself at times, perhaps getting just a little too excited, a little too enthusiastic in its mutterings.

Here’s the thing. When I’m not writing consistently, when I’m not hitting solid word count on at least most of the days of the week, I feel unmoored, adrift, unsure of my center. What good is a writer who isn’t writing?

There’s also an awareness of time creeping up on me. Often I wish I’d done more with those early years “” though who would have known in all that young adult thrashing about? While I don’t want to let guilt consume me, it’s not a bad goad. I believe it was John McPhee that said any motive for writing is valid, even spite and malice.

And it’s a goal that I know is doable, to hit two thousand words “” and more when I’m being motivated, which often coincides with felicities of mind or body. I don’t worry about whether they’re bad or good, all that matters is that they’re words that actually make it from my mind to the page. Right now I’m adding these words into the count, even though I don’t usually count nonfiction, because right now the focus is warming up, priming the pump, getting myself back into that productive groove.

It’s the days when I get no word count, not even a page written in a notebook, that really bug me, so when the words are flowing, there’s a point where all is well, when I can feel myself assembling words to express what I want to say and they’re falling into place quickly, one at a time but in a constant patter, like raindrops falling on the keyboard.

So tonight is swell and good. We’re here for a month, then probably onward to another country to try a few weeks there. I can get into a routine that feels productive and which includes some of the things that help ensure my mood is good and I’m undistracted by feeling unwell, such as good solid walking bouts and not eating junk food and getting enough sleep.

So what will I work on this month?

First and foremost is finishing up the YA novel I’ve been working on, along with several stories, two for anthologies and a couple for the Patreon campaign. While the stories will be fun and I do want to get them finished, the novel is what I want to be spending most of my time doing. I’ll be posting snippets and word counts as I go, keeping myself accountable. Because that’s another thing for a writer — you have to hold yourself accountable, because there’s nothing out there, really, to do it for you.

Good writing to you all. I hope you’ll get some words today as well.

Here is the only thing I know to be true about writing advice: none of it is 100% true. There are always exceptions, always idiosyncrasies of individual process.

Here is the smartest piece of writing advice I ever got: said by Syne Mitchell while I was at Clarion West in 2005, “Try different things, find what works for you, and do that. Lots.”

Writers should pay attention to our own process. Sometimes we’re reluctant to do so. We worry that like the centipede in the story who stops being able to walk after thinking about exactly how she does it, looking at our own process will damage or kill it. A Schrödinger’s cat: we know we’re doing something, but if we look to prove that, it’ll vanish.

This is not actually true. Looking will, most probably, not kill it. If you are the rare exception that cannot look at their process without damaging it, a brief examination will let you know this without damaging anything too much. Maybe. There are no guarantees in writing advice.

But if you are part of the vast majority that WILL learn from it, what will you gain?

I’ve been scarce of late for two reasons:

1) My hard drive failed and so did the drive I’d been backing it up to, so the last three weeks I’ve been working on assorted laptops, an ipad, and actual, retro PEN AND PAPER. Which I actually use a lot, so that wasn’t too bad. But thanks entirely to Wayne, I’m back up on the main machine and now backing up to three locations, including off-site. Whee. Yet again I learn a life lesson in my forties that I should have absorbed two decades or more earlier.
2) Clarion West. I’ve been helping out in the classroom and coordinating some of the volunteers, which has occupied a chunk of time. A number of old friends have swung through town, including the ever wonderful Blounts and a rare Rachel Swirsky manifestation, which is always welcome. It’s also six weeks with two events each week, the reading and the subsequent party. Not that I’m complaining – last night’s was swell, and it was great to see so many people, including the passle of students, still valiantly producing stories and critting each other’s work. Next week Kelly Link and Gavin Grant will be reading, which should be FABULOUS, so I hope to see a lot of you locals there.

I am plugging away at the Clarion West Write-a-thon and got at least 2k per day done this week, which feels great! I have been very bad about mailing my sponsors so I am going to send two stories to everyone who donates in my name before the write-a-thon ends. There’s still time, and a sum as small as a dollar will net you close to 10,000 words of new Rambo wordage. 😉 Stretch goal, a la Kickstarter: If I get 20 sponsors, I will make that 15k.

Plus! ArmadilloCon at the end of this month. Yahoo!