Filling in the Minutes

Finding the time to write seems hard to do – especially if you have a day job, a family, and other responsibilities. I have learned that it is not that hard to do, you just have to find the odd moments when you don’t have any commitments and use it. I do it by identifying the places that I have free in my life. I use Excel, but you can use a calendar or planner if you wish. Any kind of spreadsheet will do – even a pencil and paper. First you create a grid. I will detail what I did in Excel to give you an idea of how I did it. I put the date across the columns. I put the time down the side, for the rows. I started with the time I usually get up in the mornings on the days that I work. Then I block off the times that I work – my work schedule. I then pencil in my workout, any appointments I have what’s left over is the time available to write.

In my case, I wake up and do yoga. Then I write in my journal. Then I go for a walk – if the weather is agreeable, otherwise I go down to my basement and ‘walk’ on my elliptical. Then I have breakfast and start work. I block all that into my grid. I work from home so all that is easier than it sounds. If you commute, you should include the commute time in your work block. This is the method I used to determine that I had the time to do a half hour of yoga and a half hour of walking as my physical workout. It also shows me that I have the evenings pretty much free. I also have the weekends pretty much free.

Every Saturday morning, I do the laundry and go to a weight watchers meeting. So I block that time off. I have this ‘schedule’ extended until the end of the year. Every morning I open my schedule and delete the column for the previous day. That helps me to keep track. What I basically have is a daily agenda. There are some things on it that I can’t alter, like the work schedule and the weight watchers meeting. I try to do a yoga class every Saturday, I put that in as I sign up for the class.

I try to update the agenda for the upcoming week every Sunday. This process is working for me. Everyone is different. It might work for you or it might not. In any case, to find the time to write, you will need to find the times of the day when you are free of commitments. It’s as simple as that.

About pebblepup

I am not one who is comfortable talking about myself but here goes. I enjoy writing, family history, and reading. I decided to do this blog because I wanted to try something new. I decided to make it a weekly blog because I wasn't sure that I could keep up with a daily one, and monthly seemed like I was writing a magazine. I think I did ok with my choices. You'll notice that there are not a lot of graphics on my site. That's because there are graphics plastered everywhere on the Internet and those sites sometimes take forever to load. This blog is a place where you can kick back, relax and be ready to be amused. At least I hope I willbamuse you. This blog is on a variety of subjects from my ficitional cat agency, the FFL, which is monthly, to instructional blogs to editorials, which are my opinions only. I admit that I don't know everything and could be wrong -- I frequently am. Now, stop reading about me and read what I have to say!