Seven Tips for Creating a Personalized Writing Schedule

Finding time in your busy day to write can be difficult whether you’re a career writer or someone who writes for fun. When you’re constantly trying to squeeze in your sessions amidst your crazy life, it can be difficult to let your ideas flow freely and you may wind up spending most of your writing time sulking in stress. 

That’s why you need a writing schedule. Don’t know how to start? Never fear, we’ve got seven tips to setting up a schedule you can stick to like glue!

Know Your Own Work Rhythm

Are you a night owl? An early bird? Figure out the time of day that speaks to you and plan your writing around that time. Some people may wake up at the crack of dawn to get a jump on their next novel, but if you’re not a morning person waking up that early may make you feel sluggish and unproductive. 

Try to schedule your writing sessions at your most awake and productive time of the day. If that doesn’t work, of course, you can compromise with your current schedule, but forcing a writing time block into an unusual time for you won’t necessarily increase your productivity. 

Organize your Other Commitments

Once you’ve determined when you’d like to write, organize your other daily events chronologically to figure out when you can write. Begin by listing out your commitments for the day. This isn’t just work and meetings, but rather a comprehensive list of things you’ll be doing during a normal week. 

For example, solely listing out that you work from nine to five and leaving that as your only commitment won’t accomplish much in the long run. Write down the yoga class you go to on Thursdays, include what time you usually eat dinner and block out a chunk of time for however long your meal usually lasts. Include that Saturday nap you usually take, and don’t forget to leave time for finishing up your household chores.

Don’t forget to schedule what time you need to go to bed and what time you wake up in the morning. Setting a solid time for when you like to wake and retire can keep you focused when you’re writing and keep your schedule on track. Keeping an eye on your sleep schedule will also keep you from falling asleep at the keyboard!

Once you’ve compiled your commitments, organize them by day and block out any remaining time left during the week. Those blocks are what you’ll transform into your weekly writing sessions.

Determine the Length and Frequency of Your Sessions

After you’ve outlined your commitments and free time during the day, divide and block out those empty spaces into writing times as you see fit. They by no means all have to be the same length.

You don’t have to fill in every free space with writing. In fact, that may be too much writing depending on how big your spaces are! However, attempt to write regularly, at least once or twice a week, to keep the ideas fresh and your schedule consistent. 

How long should your sessions be? This is where knowing your own rhythm becomes important. Some people can write for hours on end without hand cramps or writer’s block, others not so much. If you know you work best in short bursts of time, schedule your sessions to be about thirty minutes long or vice versa if the opposite is true. The choice is yours.

Label Your Sessions

This holds especially true if you’re working on several different projects simultaneously. Even if you’re only working on one project, labeling your sessions can still be very beneficial. 

If you have three projects in the works, say an article for a magazine, a chapter in your personal novel, and a blog post, finishing up all in a timely manner may feel impossible, especially if you’re someone who gets distracted easily. 

This is where labeling your sessions with a clear goal can be beneficial. If you have three sessions a week and three projects, label each section with something like, “Session on Blog Post” or “Session on Chapter 5 of Novel X”. Keeping your sections organized with labels can ensure that you work evenly on all your writing projects, not just the most fun projects or the one with the closest due date. 

Along with this idea of labeling your sessions, diversify your time blocks to keeping yourself from burning out. If you’ve got a whole day of writing ahead, working eight hours on the same dang chapter of that novel could leave you exhausted and frustrated. 

Schedule a variety of projects during long writing times to keep the boredom away. Starting with your novel is a great place to begin, but after a couple of hours transitioning to writing a current events article can keep the ideas from coming dull. You can always return to your novel, but diversifying your sessions can prevent your works from becoming stale. 

Reserve Time for Inspiration and Brainstorming

As you probably know, much more goes into writing than simply putting your pen to paper. Even beyond planning, you’ll need time to generate ideas and compose potential plot lines. While some of this of course just comes out of no where, you’ll want to plan some time time in your schedule to consume some sources of inspiration. 

Reserve a single block of time in your schedule for simply reading, brainstorming, or taking any writing courses. Even if you think you’ve had enough inspiration, scheduling a little block of time dedicated to reading some outside info about writing can provide your brain with a break while keeping yourself moving towards your writing goals. 

If your writing schedule has long periods dedicated to putting ideas down on paper, you may consider scheduling fifteen to thirty minutes in that monstrous block to take a writing-related break. Use that time to consume magazines, read through one of your favorite novels, or check out a couple of writing blogs! When you return to your project at hand you may find you’ve emerged with a few more fresh ideas. 

Spend Time in a Writing Community

Whether you’re part of a writing group or just have another buddy who loves the craft, schedule time in your busy life to connect with them. Not only can it keep you inspired to continue writing, but your writing friends can help with holding you accountable to your schedule.

If you’re struggling to build your own schedule, chat with your community about it. While they may not all have consistent schedules, some of them most certainly do. Ask if you can see theirs, and trade ideas. Ask tons of questions! “Why do you write at night?” “How do you squeeze in writing on your lunch break like that?” “Wow, how do you write for three hours straight? What’s your secret?” You’ll almost certainly learn something!

Scheduling in time with your community also prevents you from encountering surprises down the line. If you have a blocked out writing socialization hour on Monday evenings, it will become a lot harder for you to forget those club meetings you’ve missed one too many times. 

Stick to It!

You’ve done it. You’ve carefully written out your beautiful, color-coded schedule and posted it everywhere. Now comes the hard part: sticking to it. 

Life happens, of course, and sometimes you have to make exceptions. Maybe you missed your Monday writing session because you had a late meeting at work. Maybe your day off gave you more writing time than you bargained for. Or maybe you didn’t have time to work on that personal project and had to blaze through a series of articles instead. Deviating from your schedule is okay as long as it doesn’t become a habit. 

This doesn’t mean your schedule is a permanent fixture that can never be changed. After the first week of committing to your schedule you may find a couple of unrealistic expectations in your outline. You might realize that a five hour time block dedicated to your novel is totally unrealistic for you. Maybe you totally forgot to leave time to pick up the kids for school. Or maybe you just plain hate your schedule. 

Thats okay! Revising your schedule is totally fine, as long as you aren’t revising every day, because at that point it isn’t a schedule. You may go through a couple of “trial” schedules before you find your dream writing agenda. Once you’ve found that dream timetable though, commit to it. 

If you do need to revise your plan, try to pinpoint why. Just thinking, “This isn’t working for me” can lead to frustration if you don’t identify what the problem is. Figure out what is making you miserable when you sit down to write. Did you forget to leave yourself time to take a break between work and writing? Try fixing a couple of specific time blocks before you throw the whole thing out and start over!

If you’ve struggled to put together your writing plan, take a look at our tips and consider what isn’t working with your own schedule. Ask yourself tons of questions about your current plan and figure out if you’re working with your own rhythm or if you’re trying to cram your life into someone else’s “writing productivity” mold. Whatever you come up with, remember that this is your schedule. It isn’t meant to fit anyone’s life but yours!