It's been well over a year since I quit my job and decided to stay at home as a [cough, cough] housewife. Also I had grand plans to really focus on my writing, as well as start a family. As it turns out I don't seem to be very good at any of those things, I am a self certified terrible cleaner and my order for a family seems to have got lost in the post! As for my writing...
Just to give you a little bit of a mini history into my writing, as long as I can remember I have always been interested in writing, in one form or another. But up until recently most of my writing has been in the academic field and therefore my writing 'skills' lean more towards the formal and on many times can be very, very dry. I have worked hard over the last year to really try and make my writing more relaxed and believe me it's actually not an easy task. Starting my blog, joining twitter and reading a lot more has helped to 'casual-up' (or should that be casual-down...) my writing.
The only problem now is, well as any person who writes full time will probably know, I seem to have misplaced my drive and motivation. The way my life has gone is pretty much education to more education to full time job including part time education, so I have come to the conclusion that a life spent following 'rules' has left me institutionalised and now that I actually have the time to do something I want, I don't really know where to start.
After hearing me talk about a book idea for the past god-knows-how-many months my husband finally snapped, telling me it's great to have ideas and plans but I need to actually write the damn thing. Strangely enough he actually made sense.
However, there was still a problem, I still can't find that pesky motivation...
My husband's solution was that he took it upon himself to set me tasks for each workday last week and he would check when he got home to see if I had actually done it. And you'll never guess but it actually worked, who'd have thunk it!
Last week I managed to fully develop all my characters including their history, issues, current situation, appearance and inspiration etc. As well as decide on all locations and do all my research for particular subject areas of my story and write a plot outline and synopsis. It's scary to think that I accomplished more on my book last week than I have in the last six months. And now I am ready to actually start writing, and I'm feeling good about it.
So to those of you out there struggling to find the motivation to write don't give up! Find the way that works for you, for me I obviously need boundaries and targets, but there isn't a one size fits all approach.
Keep searching you'll find it.
I must get back to writing now otherwise my husband will start cracking that whip (and not in a kinky way!).
Xx
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