Ten Things That Helped Me Finally Commit to Starting and Completing My First Novel 

How I Found My Way ...

Working as a publishing consultant, it turns out, was an important "turning point" for me. Remember that ad agency connection I told you about in my last post? Well, while I was working as a publishing consultant, through a network of people associated with that work, I got "reconnected" with that same Dallas agency. I was hired to become a screenwriting consultant, to help an already published novelist who wanted one of her unpublished books adapted into a screenplay. So, in 2004, I moved to the Los Angeles area where I worked for six months on that screenplay. I was fortunate to be able to hire to help me another consultant, a man who was a real live, Emmy-winning, Hollywood screenwriter and film editor. (Link to read my short story pictured below)

And, although confidentiality agreements prohibit me from being able to talk about the screenplay, after six months of hard work, I completed it. Those six months involved total focus on and commitment to that project, and once I completed the screenplay, I knew well the meaning of true commitment to a project. Competing that project, in fact, is what made me know I could commit to putting together an interesting and exciting story from beginning to end. I knew that if I could adapt someone’s novel into a 120-page, well-written screenplay, I could darn well commit to starting and to completing my own first novel!

Here are the ten things that helped me finally commit.

1. Stop waiting to find the time to write. Make the time you need to do it. No matter how full your life is (family, job, dog, house, responsibilities out the wazoo, etc.), if you really want to write a novel or a non-fiction book, you will find a way to do it. Do whatever you need to do to manage and/or delete those distractions, and get busy writing your novel!

2. Put your writing goals in writing! You're a writer, or you wouldn't be planning or dreaming about writing books. So, as a writer, use your skills to write down your writing goals. Why? Because committing your thoughts to paper will help to clarify them, and with clarification comes focus. You cannot commit without focus, and you cannot focus without clarity. You can easily start to feel "intimidated" and "overwhelmed" thinking about needing huge chunks of time to be set aside for writing your book. Don't think of it like that. Think of it as a project you can complete by setting and meeting daily goals, weekly goals, and monthly goals. Then, set and keep those goals. (Link to my short story pictured below)

3. Don't just say you're going to do it, do it. If you truly love writing, that means writing is something you enjoy doing. It comes easily to you. If you don't really love it, and if it doesn't come easily, chances are you'll abandon your book project soon after starting it. But if you know you love writing, and you love the idea you've come up with for your book, then once you set your goals all you really have do is to act on those goals. What are you waiting for? It's not enough just to put your goals in writing. You must learn to think of the goals you've written down as your plan, your declaration, your mandate to commit to completing your book. Once you've clarified your goals and your intentions, revisit them daily until you actually begin working to achieve them.

4. Once you've started, insert into your life what it takes to commit, to keep the momentum going. Don't worry so much about the "quality" of your writing, or even the "quantity" of what you're producing, in the beginning. Just begin, and be sure to devote time to your project every day. Some days, you might have only a few minutes to write, and other days you might find an hour or two to do what you love. And that's fine. Just write while keeping your eye (and your mind) on the prize—completing your book. Remember: Every word you write takes you a step closer to another sentence, every sentence gets you a step closer to completing another paragraph, every paragraph inches you closer to having another chapter done, and every chapter brings you closer to the "finish line" of completing your book.

Lets face it. It's very difficult finding a way to devote, regularly, eight, five, three, and sometimes even one hour a day, to writing. I understand. Best-selling authors may be free to spend countless hours a day writing, but most of the rest of us don't enjoy the luxury of having that much time that we can spend writing. That means the rest us must make the most of the time we can make. We have to write all we can when we can, and we must always have a goal of getting to the next paragraph, the next scene, the next page, or the next chapter as quickly as we can.

5. Allow yourself to become excited and energized by any progress, no matter how small. As you continue committing yourself to writing, every day, be proud of the fact that you're making progress toward accomplishing your goal. Acknowledge your progress. Read and re-read what you've written. Make notes about changes you want to make, and if it will get your writing engines going, go ahead and make those changes the next time you make the time you need for writing. Allow your writing project to become a "seamless" part of you; an important part of your life. Don't spend any time lamenting time lost. That's the past, and you live in the present. So, don't beat yourself up for not having started your project sooner. Learn to be thankful for the present day and the opportunity you've carved out in your life for writing. Be thankful that all you have to do now is to make more progress toward achieving your ultimate writing goal. (Link to read my short story pictured below)

6. Give yourself permission to take "baby steps," as needed. Writing a book takes big commitment. And, even though it is a very big project, one that can ultimately take months or even years to complete, you can look at it as a series of smaller projects. You can give yourself permission to take "baby steps" in the writing of your book, and doing that will help turn what can feel like a huge, seemingly unmanageable project, into a series of smaller, much more manageable projects.

7. Tackle your smaller projects one at a time. Don't allow yourself to become overwhelmed by thinking about all it will take to complete your book. After learning to think of your big writing project as a series of smaller projects, tackle each smaller project as a task in and of itself. That way, all the writing, revising, editing and re-writing that is required to get your book ready to publish will be organized into much smaller goals that won't seem so huge and overwhelming. The key is to keep working, and to stay committed to starting and finishing your book. Never forget that your "mindset" is more than important, it's crucial. How you think about what it takes to write a novel makes a world of difference—and that difference is between completing and not completing your book. (Link to read my short story pictured below)

8. Be creative in finding ways to get you to stick to your goals. Do your best to hang in there any way you can! One way is to give yourself deadlines. However, when you set deadlines, you have to try your best to meet them. After all, a deadline is no good if you simply ignore it. I found that, for me, a good way to practice meeting a novel-writing deadline is to join and participate in Nanowrimo, National Novel Writing Month (http://nanowrimo.org). Even though I had worked on my first novel off and on before signing up, I started writing it fanatically in 2009 after signing up for Nanowrimo. In fact, it wasn't until I participated in Nano that I completed the first draft of my first novel. The idea of writing almost nonstop for a whole month (Nano takes place in November, every year) is what worked for me. And now I'm challenging you to do your own research, to find that something that might work best for you.

9. Stop requiring/expecting "perfection" in everything you write. Remember, you are writing a first draft of your book, and you cannot perfect your first draft until you have a first draft. So chill out, and write your first draft. Keep in mind, as you are writing your first draft, that now is not the time to worry so much about grammar, sentence structure, or even dialogue that might be "challenged." That's all okay for now, and now is not the time to start editing your book. Accept that it doesn't have to be good yet, it just has to be. You have to get it written so that you will have something to edit and to revise, later. But for now, it's all about getting it written. Keep telling yourself that you'll make the time you need, later, for all the editing and revising and rewriting that you will want/need to do.

10. Stop worrying about what other people might think of your novel. The best way to keep yourself from achieving any goal in life is to allow "what others might think" to become part of your mindset. That's what I call "stinking thinking." The way I see it, if you feel strongly enough about an idea to want to commit the time and effort it takes to write a novel about it, then you should do it, no matter what. Sure, there might be some who will not like your book once it's published. Even Shakespeare, "The Bard," has critics who don't like his work. Such is life. Personally, I think it's wonderful that people (including you) have a right to their own likes and dislikes.

The truth is, you shouldn't need everyone to like your book. But, just as there will be those who won't like it, there will also be many (perhaps even more) who will love it. The point is, you cannot allow the thoughts of unnamed and unknown "others," or even those of people you know, to keep you from writing your book. Don't place what others might think about your unwritten book above your own thoughts about it. Don't relegate your thoughts to "second place" in your own mind. Take charge of your thoughts, and after doing that, spend your time and energy on writing your book, and finding the right audience for it.