I do my best to write everyday. Normally, I eke out about 500 to 1,000 words. Sometimes, I'll even squeeze out 2,000 words, which makes me very happy.

I find I write at odd hours. Mostly, it depends upon what's happening that day, how much privacy I have, etc. I find I do better when everyone else is asleep or I have music blasting in my ears to drown out the outside world.

I recently finished a very stressful chapter in Destiny's Bond. There's a lot of action in it, and Destiny's reactions were emotional for me--I felt for her, really I did. Which, in retrospect, is a good thing. If I hadn't felt what I wanted the scene to invoke, it most likely wouldn't invoke any feeling in readers.

I'll be going through and re-reading that chapter today to see if it still sounds all right. I might tweak it a bit, but last night I was satisfied with my read through. We'll see.

Amber

I agree.  Many times my mind journeys to a project, stimulating new ideas and character growth. Or just my everyday life will spark an idea. I was in an ice cream shop once with my husband - who is my sounding board - and a woman was acting up really bad. We just looked at each other in unison and said: "That's so Elva!"  It became part of her character and made her more realistic - and honestly more disliked by my readers, which worked out great.

Might not write everyday for my book, but my mind is constantly working on it. I have notes and ideas everywhere.

--edited by Ivella "Ivy" Jacobs on 6/14/2015, 1:43 PM--

I try to make it a goal to write every day-- whether it is writing a blog post, article, or writing a fiction novel, but sometimes life gets in the way. I don't mind that life does because these things are what fuels my writing to begin with, but I find that I get very upset with myself when I'm not writing everyday. Guilt sets in. 

Recently I had to put down my writing to focus on my Grandmother. She became severely ill and was in and out of the hospital for 3 and a half months. She then passed away and I'm currently in the middle of dealing with probate court, paper work filing, and going through her personal effects. It can be an exhausting task and I find I have little energy or creative juice for anything else these days. I now often find that just getting through a paragraph of writing is a triumph for me.

My itch to write is there-- as I'm sure it always will be-- I just tend to find myself starring at a blank screen more often because of focus issues. 

What I'm trying to learn from all of this is that I should not get discouraged, nor should I feel bad or guilty that I'm only writing a little here and there. I write from the heart and I KNOW I'll be able to write daily like I used to because my life is my muse for writing.

Hi Amanda--I am so sorry about your grandmother. You must be so busy with all the details, not to mention grief. It might be trite to say it, but this too shall pass--not necessarily the grief, but the administrative part of a loved one's passing.

Have you connected with Charles Barone on Book Country? He recently shared that his writing had been interrupted by a death in the family.

It's not trite to say that all! I know it will pass and I know I'll get back to writing shortly once my head doesn't have to compete with so many details.

I have connected with Charles, but I will! 

Thanks so much for the kind words and support Lucy!

Every wake period.  Morning, afternoon, evening doesn't matter. I like to write ASAP after waking. If I'm stumped on a paragraph or passage, I let my sub-conscious work on it.  It's amazing what a few hours of sleep will do. Warning this technique does NOT if you get blasted on drugs or alcohol.

--edited by John Speikers on 7/2/2015, 4:36 PM--

I write every day. It doesn't matter when, or where, or how. I used to write via a MUSH I played on.  It’s such a good way to 'force' yourself to write. I did that for years and years (and years) about 5-10 hours a day, once I did a 24 hour online roleplay session (ok, who am I kidding, there were quite a few of those).  My character was voted into Government office—yes, it was a thing.  I wish I could use that on my writing stats: ‘I was a Duchess—no, seriously, I was!’

Then I realized that I could (maybe) write for myself, with my own characters, in my own world. (And being a Duchess on a MUSH was bad ass, but wasn’t getting me any respect outside the game.) So I just logged off the MUSH, came up with some characters, threw them in a blender and hit frape!

I try to write about 2k – 5k words a day, though it’s often times something like: ‘just do it, just write, what you are doing? Just put something down, just go …go…go….gooooo’ and eventually, like starting a really old motorcycle, the gears grind forward and the engine sputters to a start and real work begins. 

Once I gave myself permission to write drivel when it spits out of my brain onto the page, it became a whole lot easier.  Most of what I write, I can’t keep but it’s much more fun than MUSHing and the bullsh!t I had to deal with there—and this is MINE.  ALL MINE!

I hope that other people can learn from that—that it doesn’t have to be good when it first comes out.  I thought if it didn’t come out ready for print, I was a no-good hack.  But, the ‘good’ part is hidden in there, you have to curry out all the burrs and brush it out and then curry more burs and hair and brush it—over and over, every day, and then it’ll look like a shinny show pony.

Perfect.

DianaRoseWilson,

I used to MUSH, too.  What kind of a game did you play on?  I never could compose on a keyboard.  I always wrote my stories in longhand and then typed them out.  But after a few years of MUSHing back at the turn of the millennium, I started being able to compose on the keyboard.

A MUSH is a text based game. <Multi User Shared Hallucination >  For real.

I started on Pern games and went on to Shangrila (Adult theme, lots of political/sexual overtones, though mostly sexual).  I tried some World of Darkness ones too but never could quite get into those.

I don't mean to be flippant, but I write everyday only when using the word as an adjective.

Otherwise, I write every day, two words, and I do try to write every day, usually in the early morning.

--edited by Dalton on 2/11/2016, 3:52 PM--

Yes I write nearly every day some 50 hours a week.

I even scribble while visiting some friends. Scribble and chat a bit of multi-tasking. Good friends don't mind and I still chat.

As I hand write in pencil 0.7mm. After collecting dust for some months I type it all in.

Always something going on, except for a day or two after the finish of a book or draft.

Do many people hand write?

Regards, Dravid

Storing many a lever arch file is a problem.

The spare room has a wall of book cases. The lounge has another book case. Add a pile in my office come bedroom.

I have a laptop with a 1 Terabite external hard drive. I also back up my book files onto a 64 Gbite SD Card.

Due a full backup.

Hand writen does come at a cost. Pencil pen 0.7mm works and is cheap.

Judge          "Define the Original?"

          You drop a lever arch fold full of the initial 1st draft, hand written. 

                    "Case dismissed."

You             "Stuff that. I'm suing for damages. Haven't written a word in a year."

Regards,

Dravid.

No.

I always assumed that to be a writer, I had to write daily or at least as often as I can. But over time I have come to amend this belief. And the reason is, writing is an art. Yes, artists are working on their craft all the time, but they are not doing the same thing all the time. For example, a painter will not paint everyday, there might be days when they sketch in notebooks, days when they dabble with different paint mixes, days when they study other artists paintings, when they buy/make their canvases, look for inspiration, etc...The same is true of writers. A writer does not have to write EVERYDAY. But a writer should work in the universe of their writing world everyday. This could include, reading other writer's works, taking the time to research topics they are writing on, find inspiration, etc

So, no. I don't write everyday. I have "binge writing periods" that last 2-3 days. During this time, I only write. There are times when I just edit previously written works, and times when I read other writer's works. And a lot of time when I look for inspiration.