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I am lazy. There, I said it. In fifth grade, I told a classmate that I waited till the last minute to do everything. My teacher overheard me and said I was a procrastinator. I said, “What’s that?” She told me to look it up in the dictionary. I did and nodded my head as I read the entry. Yep, that was me.

I am a procrastination pro. I can give lessons. However, as a wannabe published author, that “skill” isn’t going to get me very far. I know this, but still I struggle.

Last night, at work, I took the opportunity to work on my newest masterpiece (tee hee!). A co-worker asked what I was doing. Was I writing a book?

I told him yes, I’m working on a romance. He made the hilarious comment that I had to post on Twitter, but he also said something else. He said he’d like to write a screenplay, but he didn’t have the time. He is busy. In addition to our common place of employment, he has a full-time job, not to mention a husband and a million other things I don’t know about.

But his comment got me thinking. Where do I find the time? Yes, I’ve been procrastinating, but I’ve also been working on the masterpiece.

How? Seems I’ve hit on the right motivation. If I ever get contracted, I know my motivation will be deadlines and not wanting to look bad. But as an unpubbed author, I have no one looking over my shoulder asking when the book will be finished. It’s all on me, which isn’t good because I am the procrastination queen.

Don’t get me wrong. I love writing, but one of the hardest parts of the process, for me, is getting started. Why begin when I can do so many other things, like check Twitter or ESPN, which require so little effort on my part, and yet offer hours of entertainment? Once I get going, I’m fine. But to actually open a Word document, you’d think I was trying to complete some Herculean task like run a marathon (which I would NEVER EVER do) or do laundry before I’m out of clean towels.

So after hours of procrastination, I’ve been telling myself, “Just open the document. If you can do that, the words will come.” All I have to do is drag the mouse to the file and double click.

More importantly, I’m not putting pressure on myself to make a specific word count. Could I write more words if I spent less time wasting time? Of course, but I’m averaging about 1600 words per day, which puts me on track to have a first draft finished by the end of the month. I’m finding this works for me so much better than giving myself a specific daily word count goal. In the past, if it’s gotten late and I know I won’t get the daily goal in, I just won’t start.

This way, it’s about not the number of words, but the fact that I have words. And like I said, I know myself. Once I get going, I’m likely to continue and get more words in than I thought I would.

So far, so good.

What motivates you? Do you have a daily word count goal? Does guilt work like it does for me?

 


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