Writing Wednesday: The Power of Deadlines

Greetings and Happy Writing to all!

I'm in a much better mood having recently met my writing deadline on my latest book project, going down to the wire but crossing the finish line with time to spare. Not much time, mind you, but days instead of hours so I'm counting that as a huge win.

And it got me thinking how deadlines are like a double-edged sword - they motivate you to get the job done while simultaneously inducing stress that can at times be so paralyzing as to prevent you from reaching your goal.

In January, my editor friend and I joined a local gym as a New Years Resolution to be healthier. We spent several hours on treadmills and recumbent bicycles discussing our projects and deadlines - mine for the upcoming book and hers for a manuscript she's editing for another writer. Our initial conversation motivated us each to count the number of days we had left to finish.

The countdown motivated me to buckle down and write... I put aside extra time, wrote out a game plan, put dates on the calendar for the remaining steps left to accomplish, and made it happen.

Counting down the remaining days had the opposite effect on her. She focused too hard on the number and how impossible the looming deadline would be to reach. She stressed out, mentally and physically, and caught the flu and got bogged down in unrelated (and unnecessary) time-sucks.

And she missed her deadline.

In her case, she seemed to be humming along at a fine pace - until she realized how close the finish line was. If she'd just kept going, head down and working, she would've made it in plenty of time to present to the client. As it is, she had to make excuses and rearrange, and yes, things worked out for her, but with a whole boatload of stress loaded on top.

It's important to understand what kind of motivation works for you and your work style. If you're the type who's motivated by a red date circled on the calendar, use it. Count it out, plan, and figure out the steps in between to make it happen.

If you're the type who sees a drop-dead date and panics... you may need to rethink how you deal with deadlines. And as much as I've tried to counsel my friend over the years (this isn't the first time I've seen it happen to her) I don't know what the answer is. I'm totally open to suggestions - if anyone has experienced that sort of "fear of success" before and figured out a way to overcome it, please share!

Now that I understand this about myself, I need to rethink my own writing habits. Setting calendar dates for milestones is positive thing for my writing style and would probably help stave off a lot of future stress. And again, if anyone has methods to help follow through with this goal, please share! I've already signed up for my next release date (in November for a holiday-themed story) and plan to go about this next endeavor more logically (LOL - as if my writer brain can work in a logical manner!)

So tell me - how do you deal with deadlines? What motivates you to finish a project?

And in the meantime, Happy Writing to ALL!

Writing Wednesday: When you Realize you Missed your own Deadline

So I'm participating in an author panel at a local writing conference on Friday and got out a few of my books to take with me. And realized that at the back of DEFIANCE: Son of a Mermaid Book 2... with the sample chapter, I added a page that promised Book 3 in July 2016.

July 2016.

Promised.

Oops.

Today is August 3rd, so July is officially gone, and I totally blew my own deadline. No wonder I'm getting emails from readers wondering where they can find Book 3. It's supposed to be available. And yes, I am getting Facebook IMs and emails through my blog from readers going, "Are you done yet? Are you done yet?" One helpful reader already wrote to me twice and added suggestions about a prequel he'd really like to read.

Problem is, my personal life has been a bit chaotic over the last year. Distracting might be a better word in terms of making excuses for why the book isn't even finished. I do have a title, and beautiful cover art, created by the fabulous K.R. Conway ~

I'm so in love with this cover imagery! And as I get further into the book, I realize how perfectly the title fits the story. Initially I'd thought it was only the overarching deception, but there are myriad small ones floating all over Atlantis. Nothing is really what it seems.

...and I've been writing a lot more this summer. I'd gone down the wrong path earlier, and needed to start again because Kae was not strong enough in the first version. I'm pretty happy with the current way the book is flowing, despite the fact that Shea is acting a little jealous and bratty. He's a hormonal teenage boy who's been listening to his own press a little too much. It happens.

I'm still hoping for a summer release, if we can think of September as a shoulder season to summer. But that might be optimistic because I still have to get a beta reader's take on the story and, oh yeah, finish writing.

With this week's news of CHANNING TATUM playing the lead merman in an upcoming remake of the original mermaid movie from 1984 SPLASH... perhaps we are about to see a resurgance in all things mermaid and merman. So I need to finish this story and get on to the last installment of the series as fast as possible to take advantage of the merman frenzy.

One can only hope.

Either way, Channing Tatum will be shirtless and wet.

Writing Wednesday: Finding Time

One of my favorite Calvin and Hobbes quotes is:

 "There's Never Enough Time to Do 

All the Nothing You Want."

As a mother of three, a freelance editor, a wife, a daughter, and an author, there's also never enough time to do all the sh*t I have to get done in any given week, let alone a bunch of fun stuff too. And I'm not just talking Facebook updates, although I've been pretty lame with those as well.

Deadlines are my friend because they make me finish the work that's due, just like back in college. But Laundry has no deadline, so it tends to pile up until there is a Crisis involving a 13-year-old who's out of underwear.

Then there is the Revise and Resubmit request. There's no deadline on that. Will it get done? It should, because wouldn't I love to have another book come to life? And then there's the magazine column I thought was due Friday but was actually due last Friday. And this blog - last week I was totally absent except for the posts I'd scheduled ahead of time...

Deep Breath.

Even writers have to have priorities. At the moment, my family is my priority. Everything else can wait. Things will get done eventually. No one will go to school without clean underwear. (hopefully.)

* Respect Priorities.

* Meet Deadlines.

* Set Goals.

And another deep breath. Everything will get done, and the less stressed I am, the better chance of the actually meeting those deadlines. Pushing a goal back a bit doesn't mean you have to erase it completely. The finish line will still be there, I might just have to slow my pace.

We all have too much to do. What's your strategy? How do you accomplish your goals? What strategies do you use to meet deadlines and get laundry done?

Writer Wednesdays: Blizzards, School Closings and Deadlines

It's been quite the busy week here in the Northeast, what with the Big Blizzard Thing and all. I'm telling you, the Groundhog screwed up and annoyed Mother Nature with his prediction earlier this month. I feel like a disbelieving Bill Murray, insisting that the storm won't hit here. But it did.

This is not spring. And there is more snow coming tonight. And tomorrow.

Puppy loved the white-out conditions. All the people without power on Cape Cod (most of the Cape) didn't love it quite so much. My house was only out for a short period during the first night, when we were snuggled in bed anyway. It screwed up my computer, but not much else. Well, that's not true. Schools were closed. And some are still closed as the buildings suffered damage or are still being used as emergency shelters for those without power. So as a sidebar note, the storm wrecked the end of basketball seasons for two of my kids, missing games Friday, Monday, Tuesday and today that won't be made up - at least they each have one game remaining.

With the computer down and the kids home from school and sports.... I didn't get any writing done this week. Practically None. I'm on my third new paragraph on the WIP I wanted to have finished by the end of this month. Now I feel I'll be lucky to have the first draft finished by the end of the month.

I'm all about deadlines. Even though this is an "internal" deadline I set for myself, it's making me crazy to let it slip. I'm planning to spend today writing like a fiend to try and catch it all up and get those last 20-30,000 words onto the page. (Yeah right. No, it could happen...) I'm giving myself until Friday, and my son's last home game at 5 p.m. to get it done. Because next week is school vacation week...

What do you do when external forces mess up your writing schedule? Are you deadline oriented or go-with-the-flow? Any good tips for working around snowstorms and children?