When I tell people that I’m taking a career break to write a novel, a common question that I get asked is: “do you have a routine? Is there a set time when you write?”
How do you slice your time cake?
And, yes, I do have a routine. Here it is:
07.00 - 09.00
Get up. Sort child. Sort dog. Sort self. Empty dishwasher. Drop child off at school.
09.00 - 09.15
Write in logbook what I read/watched/listened to/things of interest from day before. Sometimes write in my diary about the awfulness of other people in order to feel like a proper tortured artist.
09.15 - 12/12.30ish
Work on novel.
12.30 - 13.30
Lunch.
13.30 - 14.30
Ideally, but not always, a bit more writing; sometimes reading related to writing.
14.30 - 17.00
Life admin tasks; reply to messages; walk dog; either workout, read fiction or non-fiction books related to the novel, or invest some time in a hobby (painting, baking, gaming).
17.00 - 20.30
Make tea, collect child, eat with family, hang out with child, do bedtime.
Evening
Read, watch, play.
23.00 - 23.30
Bed.
Repeat, Monday - Friday.
Weekends: Family stuff. See friends.
How I compare to the great and the good. (Source: Podio)
Having come from stacked days of meetings and video calls and never enough time to do everything, that feels pretty good. And it’s a routine I mostly follow. Somewhere in there I need also to write a weekly substack, which takes a few hours (I’m writing this right now in the evening), but never feels a chore (I mean, I don’t need to write this substack, no one’s making me do it - but writing it brings me great joy).
The interesting thing about this routine - which is completely unfettered by external expectation or paid employment and in which I am essentially free between the hours of 9 and 5 to do as I wish - is that there is still not enough time to do all the things that I want to do.
Partly this quart-into-a-pint-pot problem is because some activities are only possible some of the time. Most notably, I write best in the morning, and in the late evening, although in the late evening (which it is as I write this), I rarely want to write because I’m usually doing some other leisure activity, or I’m tired, or I know that if I get in the groove I’ll have trouble sleeping. Writing in the afternoon is possible, but so is climbing Everest. I prefer the foothills of the morning.
But the problem is not solely caused by my inability to write in the afternoon. The problem is the finitude of time. Perhaps you’re familiar with this hurdle from your to-do list at work? I have referenced Oliver Burkeman’s excellent Four Thousand Weeks before in this newsletter, which is a book-length discussion of the challenge. Ever since reading that book, I have been fond of telling people at work that they will never reach the end of their to-do list. And I can now exclusively reveal that the same is also true when you are entirely responsible for setting your own schedule at home, day-in, day-out.
The principle difference is that I no longer can blame my inaction or failure to finish things on the demands of work. Because, historically, I am an inveterate salami slicer of time. Through flexible working and compressed hours, I was lucky enough to have a non-working day once a week before I started my sabbatical. On that day, I would inevitably try to do a little bit of everything that I wanted or needed to do, achieving little and ultimately feeling unsatisfied. “If only I didn’t have to go back to work tomorrow!” I raged. “Then I’d get everything done!”
Why would you want to be doing anything else other than walking here with me?
So now I’m trying to do fewer things at once, and finish the things that I am doing. It is a process of rehabilitation that is ongoing. Helping me with this is Cal Newport’s Slow Productivity, which I am currently reading, and on which I will doubtless bore you in a future newsletter.
But to return to the routine. I need it. Because writing a novel is massive. As an endeavour it feels both long - as in, it will take a long time to actually write the words to get to the end; and deep - as in, along the way there are so many rabbit holes that you can fall down, of characterisation, theme, tone, voice, historical accuracy etc etc. When I try to conceive of the thing in its entirety - and all of the things that I need to do to make it, first, into a novel that hangs together and, second, a novel that I am happy with - it’s overwhelming.
So the routine is the prison with which I’m able to cage the beast. When our daughter was a baby, when sleep was rationed and figuring the inner workings of our baby’s mind - why she cried or didn’t sleep - was an exercise in reading tea leaves, all we had was the routine. We used to repeat this to each other like a mantra “all we have is the routine.” Nap at this time, feed at that time. It didn’t always work but we had to believe that it worked overall otherwise we would have lost our minds. So it is with the novel.
Without some kind of routine, I could work on the novel all the time, or at least feel like I should be working on it all of the time. And I do not want to feel guilty for not doing something on this year when I could do anything.
But the routine is not just the cage, it is the engine. Some people say to me, “I suppose you can only write when you’re inspired.” But this is not true. As Picasso said, “inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” Sometimes when I write I feel like I am skating, other times it feels like I’m squatting 100kg. But when I read it back afterwards, I can’t tell whether I wrote it when I was squatting or skating.
Do I set myself a word count goal? No. I try to avoid them - instead, taking my lead from Emily St John Mandel (author of Station Eleven - please read it if you haven’t, it’s one of my favourite books) and aiming simply to “progress the story every day.”
Do I still obsessively check my wordcount? Yes.
I am learning that it takes a lot of faith to write a novel. Faith that you will reach the end. Faith that you can write. Faith that this is something worth doing.
But a final word on routines: they’re made to be broken. To quote Burkeman again, “consistency is not the same as uniformity.” At a recent talk on writing and resilience, Cathy Renzenbrink, an author who also writes about wellbeing, discussed her writing routine. She starts early, to make room in the rest of the day for other things. And she has “let it be known to friends that I am available at short notice for crises and interesting invitations.” Which seems to me like an excellent approach. Life is for living, and without the unexpected it would be boring… and so would my writing.
So I’ll let you into a secret: very occasionally, I completely ignore the routine and go do something else. AND I’M NOT EVEN SORRY!
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INPUTS
What I’ve been reading/watching/listening to/thinking about this week…
- Movie: Inside Out 2. I cried. Twice. Being a parent ruins you. A beautiful film about growing up. A little cringe in places. Just like the experience of being a teenager.
- Poetry: Christina Rossetti’s poem Goblin Market and Alfred Lord Tennyson’s Claribel. I’m reading things related to English folklore at the moment, a topic which very much influenced both Rossetti and Tennyson. I also find that reading poetry enriches my language. My favourite adjective of the week gleaned from poetry: “ambrosial.”
- Novel: Lanny by Max Porter. This was recommended to me recently by the literary agent that I spoke to about my novel. It’s a strange but compelling book about a forest spirit and how it interacts with a nearby village in the home counties, specifically a boy and his family. Told from multiple different perspectives, it’s got a really compelling story and is a quick but engrossing read. Would recommend. Don’t let the first bit with the bendy words put you off.