No, I need to show up every day to keep the story churning in my subconscious each night so I can write in the mornings before the world distracts me. So, for me, the showing up and writing every day, even just 100 words is more important than a deadline.
No, but I'm finding that having periodic feedback available to me is helping me a lot more than I thought it would. I have no trouble sitting down to write every day but there is so much I want to do that I can easily get distracted. Knowing I have to turn a chapter into my writing group keeps me focused on *that*.
I spent a good majority of my life wanting to be the person who was productive with a deadline. It has been very recently that I have accepted the fact that I am not that person. I'm a much better writer, artist and person when I create without any expectation of readership or audience. I try to have faith that the story will reach who it needs when it's needed. Luckily I am in a position to do that in my life.
No, or I'd never have gotten my book written. But I do love a deadline, as well as structure/length guidelines. Just wrote a one thousand word essay on my "Power Song" for @Womancake mag and it was such fun to write!
Deadline for what? Finishing the project? Ending a chapter? Finding time to write? How long before the deadline? I like a good lead time so I can stew over ideas, then just before it's due, finish it.
“I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by”-Douglas Adams.
Basically sums it up for me. I make deadlines for myself, but inevitably I go over by a month or two (even if I try to build extra time into the deadline…) If it’s a deadline outside my control, I can usually do it, but it involves cramming tons of work into the last few days before the deadline.
I would love to not be a serial procrastinator, but short of rewiring my brain I’m not sure it’ll ever happen.
Oddly, although I generally need a deadline to get projects done, I don’t seem to need one for writing. I look forward to it. But it’s not my job (I’m a musician by trade).
Having said that: I started ADHD meds a week ago (at age 56!) and this morning I got up an hour before I needed to, to get some work tasks out of the way. So maybe I’ll be less deadline-dependent in future.
At a certain point, when I'm ready to draft or when I'm revising, I like having a deadline, it makes me faster. But when I'm still figuring out what the book or whatever IS, I have to be more mellow about the deadline. I do like giving myself a time framework to achieve SOMETHING. But sometimes I change what "something" is.
I absolutely need a deadline. It’s like seeing the shore on the other side of the lake you’re rowing on. I am an Obliger per Gretchen Rubin’s framework, and I really need outer accountability to make my inner scheduler run efficiently.
It definitely helps. As a #1 Strategic (Clifton Strengths) it sometimes be the only way to get things "done." Since I'm a self-published author, I create deadlines to make this happen.
If my goal is pure productivity, then yes. If the goal also includes a degree of quality, then the answer is mixed. Sometimes I work well with a deadline (even a self-imposed one, as with committing to posting on Substack once a week), but at other times the artificial constraint results in making compromises or doing less editing than I'd like. What helps, then, for regular posting for example, is to ready some one-offs I can post if I need more time to write the next series of posts. And if I can give myself the luxury of have a few weeks' posts ready, then I can relax into a deadline that's still out far enough for me to do the kind of work I prefer.
All that said, I think productivity comes more from focus and intensity than necessarily having a deadline. Some of my most productive writing periods came when I had a clear inspiration and no deadlines whatsoever. Deadlines can, of course, inspire the necessary focus and intensity, but I don't like to work under that kind of pressure for more than a month or two at most.
Nope. I'm Tom Crepeau, and I write with David Hochhalter. All our writing is planned to be published by me, and I don't set deadlines for me. There are no deadlines, and my writing partner and I have eight books out since 2019. (first book took 12 months to write, submit for developmental review, completely rewrite, send out to our alpha review team, incorporate their line edits while addressing their narrative concerns with short rewrites, and PUBLISH (ourselves). The same secondary world now had eight books set in it (it helps our third book's main early editorial comment was "this needs to be a trilogy" which it NOW IS: Healer's Awakening, Healer's Love, Healer's Journey. (By David Hochhalter and Tom Crepeau, Healer's Awakening is our best-selling title, while our first book is Wandmaking 101, a Sunshine Mystery Magic Club Adventure). We might not sell thousands of copies every week, but we aren't selling zero copies, either. -tc
It really helps to have a deadline in most cases. In other cases, a more leisurely approach to writing is needed.
No, I need to show up every day to keep the story churning in my subconscious each night so I can write in the mornings before the world distracts me. So, for me, the showing up and writing every day, even just 100 words is more important than a deadline.
No, but I'm finding that having periodic feedback available to me is helping me a lot more than I thought it would. I have no trouble sitting down to write every day but there is so much I want to do that I can easily get distracted. Knowing I have to turn a chapter into my writing group keeps me focused on *that*.
I didn't think so. But lately it seems like I might be.
Depends
Depends on my mood!
I spent a good majority of my life wanting to be the person who was productive with a deadline. It has been very recently that I have accepted the fact that I am not that person. I'm a much better writer, artist and person when I create without any expectation of readership or audience. I try to have faith that the story will reach who it needs when it's needed. Luckily I am in a position to do that in my life.
No, or I'd never have gotten my book written. But I do love a deadline, as well as structure/length guidelines. Just wrote a one thousand word essay on my "Power Song" for @Womancake mag and it was such fun to write!
Deadline for what? Finishing the project? Ending a chapter? Finding time to write? How long before the deadline? I like a good lead time so I can stew over ideas, then just before it's due, finish it.
“I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by”-Douglas Adams.
Basically sums it up for me. I make deadlines for myself, but inevitably I go over by a month or two (even if I try to build extra time into the deadline…) If it’s a deadline outside my control, I can usually do it, but it involves cramming tons of work into the last few days before the deadline.
I would love to not be a serial procrastinator, but short of rewiring my brain I’m not sure it’ll ever happen.
Oddly, although I generally need a deadline to get projects done, I don’t seem to need one for writing. I look forward to it. But it’s not my job (I’m a musician by trade).
Having said that: I started ADHD meds a week ago (at age 56!) and this morning I got up an hour before I needed to, to get some work tasks out of the way. So maybe I’ll be less deadline-dependent in future.
At a certain point, when I'm ready to draft or when I'm revising, I like having a deadline, it makes me faster. But when I'm still figuring out what the book or whatever IS, I have to be more mellow about the deadline. I do like giving myself a time framework to achieve SOMETHING. But sometimes I change what "something" is.
I absolutely need a deadline. It’s like seeing the shore on the other side of the lake you’re rowing on. I am an Obliger per Gretchen Rubin’s framework, and I really need outer accountability to make my inner scheduler run efficiently.
It definitely helps. As a #1 Strategic (Clifton Strengths) it sometimes be the only way to get things "done." Since I'm a self-published author, I create deadlines to make this happen.
If my goal is pure productivity, then yes. If the goal also includes a degree of quality, then the answer is mixed. Sometimes I work well with a deadline (even a self-imposed one, as with committing to posting on Substack once a week), but at other times the artificial constraint results in making compromises or doing less editing than I'd like. What helps, then, for regular posting for example, is to ready some one-offs I can post if I need more time to write the next series of posts. And if I can give myself the luxury of have a few weeks' posts ready, then I can relax into a deadline that's still out far enough for me to do the kind of work I prefer.
All that said, I think productivity comes more from focus and intensity than necessarily having a deadline. Some of my most productive writing periods came when I had a clear inspiration and no deadlines whatsoever. Deadlines can, of course, inspire the necessary focus and intensity, but I don't like to work under that kind of pressure for more than a month or two at most.
Nope. I'm Tom Crepeau, and I write with David Hochhalter. All our writing is planned to be published by me, and I don't set deadlines for me. There are no deadlines, and my writing partner and I have eight books out since 2019. (first book took 12 months to write, submit for developmental review, completely rewrite, send out to our alpha review team, incorporate their line edits while addressing their narrative concerns with short rewrites, and PUBLISH (ourselves). The same secondary world now had eight books set in it (it helps our third book's main early editorial comment was "this needs to be a trilogy" which it NOW IS: Healer's Awakening, Healer's Love, Healer's Journey. (By David Hochhalter and Tom Crepeau, Healer's Awakening is our best-selling title, while our first book is Wandmaking 101, a Sunshine Mystery Magic Club Adventure). We might not sell thousands of copies every week, but we aren't selling zero copies, either. -tc