It’s Jan 16. Total number of pages of best-selling novel written:   um…

Oh, I remember the resolutions. Waste less time. Make goals and stick to them. Write and journal every day. And then with the return to work on Jan 2nd, those positive, motivated New Year’s voices became quieter, and quieter, until they disappeared altogether. Yep.

It is entirely too easy for me to get lost in the daily shuffle. As I’m typing this, I have my work laptop open to my left and I’m monitoring my boss’ email while he’s traveling. And keeping track of a customer issue. While I’m writing. At 9:45 at night.

Work and life do not stop so I can focus on writing for 30 minutes. I’ve had to admit to myself that if I don’t get serious about making time to write, I won’t write, I won’t get published, my stories won’t be read. That idea to write at work during my lunch break sounds great, but come on – I’m lucky if I eat my lunch during lunch. Many times that too is pushed to the side.

So how do I, and spare-time writers like me, figure out a way to get anything accomplished? Few of us can walk away from a paycheck to focus on writing, especially now in this economy. And yet, I know there are others out there that want to write, but are working a full-time job, come home exhausted, come home with work, or come home to families and have a whole other life to tend to walking in the door. So how does someone with a job or two find time to write?

My answer was to set some goals and tasks:

• Started blogging and journaling to keep the creative side engaged, even if I’m just recording the day’s events
• Began sifting through half-finished stories to see how I can rework them – attempt to have a story outline by March 2013
• Signed up for a free-trial of Scrivener to test if the writing application can help me work more efficiently (still in trial mode – will let you know)
• Asked my husband for permission to disappear at night to the basement to write, instead of hanging out in front of the TV or web surfing or gaming
• Find and sign up for a local writing convention and make connections with other writers

And slowly, though my story is very much at a beginning stage, I am taking tiny steps to make some progress with my writing. Hopefully you too are coming up with a path toward writing more – feel free to comment below and share how you plan to meet your writing goals in 2013.

Originally posted on Spare Time Writer dot Com