Week 9 of Full-Time Writing: Diary Entry #10
A week of webinars, lack of focus, and overcoming anxiety.
This week was Fantasy Writers’ Week at ProWritingAid, so I went to a bunch of webinars about writing, editing, marketing, and publishing. I learned so much and got to hear from some successful authors like V.E. Schwab and Tomi Adeyemi, which made it even more exciting.
As one might guess, I didn’t get to write as much because of all the festivities. But I did some things that I set out to do last week, so not all is lost.
Here’s last week’s diary entry in case you missed it!
My Schedule
This week I tried all kinds of new things with my schedule. I also spent at least two hours a day in webinars, so this week is not at all representative of how the rest of this month should go.
To recap my plan from last week, for the month of March I’ll be sending freelance writing pitches on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, writing 1200 words for my current WIP novel on Tuesday and Thursday, and writing articles I want to write here when those other things are done.
How did it go this week?
What worked
I really enjoyed devoting longer time periods to a single task. On Wednesday I spent the morning and part of the afternoon working on a pitch and got it finished and sent by 2 pm. The rest of the day I worked on articles and went to a webinar. I worked on my goals without feeling rushed and overwhelmed since I had the whole day to get it done, rather than a measly two hours.
I’m still using Google Calendar for my scheduling and it keeps me on task much more than my physical planner ever did. I am known to romanticize manual tools (like planners and journals) and then ditch them because their mediocrity makes me sad. They never live up to my expectations, because I am too lazy to spend the time to make them look pretty. Google Calendar looks relatively the same for everyone, so I feel less pressure to make it look pretty and end up getting right to the point of it — functionality.
What didn’t work
The webinars drove a serious wedge between me and my words this week. Even though the event provided a lot of value, it wasn’t conducive to productivity. At all. I got very little done this week.
If Fantasy Writers’ Week were every week, I’d be in trouble.
Plan for next week
Next week I hope to see how well this new schedule actually works. I’ll be sticking to the plan, which I’ll go over in the Goal Review section of this article.
Challenges, Victories, and Lessons Learned
Challenge
Even when I wasn’t attending the webinars, I had a hard time focusing and staying in a creative mindset. My brain was in learning mode and decided it just wanted to chill, eat snacks, and take notes.
Victory
I sent two pitches this week to online publications that I would love to write for!
How I felt
I was excited about Fantasy Writers’ Week, and that was the major highlight of the week. I experienced a lot of anxiety and self-doubt about getting back to pitching, but once I got past the first pitch, I felt more confident.
Tools I used
Last week, I mentioned ProWritingAid. I’ve used it a lot since then so I wanted to amend my last assessment.
The ProWritingAid integrations are excellent. When editing an article, I can easily click into the full editor and use their suggestions to make my writing more concise and powerful. The changes magically appear on the original document without messing with the formatting (something Grammarly couldn’t do). The premium version offers so many ways to improve your writing, depending on what style you’re writing in. They have style guides for different genres of fiction, plus web and academic writing and many others. I’m impressed. Not all suggestions make sense (AI is imperfect no matter where you go), but it’s the best editor tool I’ve ever used.
Goal Review — March 2022
Priority 1: Send one pitch on Monday, one on Wednesday, and one on Friday. Writing jobs trump this for top priority.
I did it! This week, I sent two pitches to online publications (I didn’t start until Wednesday). I was nervous about getting back to pitching this month, but it went well once I stopped worrying about perfection. A pitch is just that — a pitch. It’s out of my hands once I hit send, so my job is to do the best I can, set it free, and then learn from it.
Next week, I’m going to send two pitches to online publications and one to a brand, which will be new for me.
Priority 2: Write 1200 words in my novel on Tuesday and Thursday.
I wrote a depressing total of 800 words in my novel this week. I expect to do much better next week.
Priority 3: Write and engage on social media.
I joined a writing community on Facebook and a Discord chat that I’ll be using for networking and outreach. I also published one article here.
Bonus: Work on a short story.
Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to work on any short stories this week.
Final Thoughts
Overall, this week was good. The webinars became the primary focus of the week, and I think that’s okay. It was a pleasant break from the daily grind, and I gained some necessary new perspectives.
Next week I’ll officially try the new schedule and let you know how it goes.
Until then, have a great week!
Follow my publication, Diary of a Freelance Writer, and check back next Sunday for another rundown of a week in the life of a full-time freelance writer.
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