Dealing with Distractions Two-legged and Four-legged

Experts estimate it takes between 10 and 15 minutes for the average person to return to focused concentration every time they are interrupted. Multiply that by two or three times in the hour you set aside for your work, and it is clear how sixty minutes of writing time evaporates.  Whether you interrupt yourself or are interrupted by others, you need to have a plan for dealing with it. You may be caring for young children, parents, relatives, friends, and older/younger pets who require your attention, time, and love. Amid these obligations, it can be challenging to carve out time for our writing projects. This blog post will discuss ways to deal with disruptions children, partners, and family members create.

In addition, if you deal with your personal distraction issues, it is essential to find ways to ameliorate them, or you’ll never “find the time” to finish your writing project.

Here are some methods to stop interruptions or lessen their impact of them. suggestions

Things we cannot control: A short note about things beyond your control: infants and children.

  When children are young, and you are caring for them, you can’t just leave them in another room and ignore them, especially when they’re infants. When my kids were babies, I wrote while they napped and after their bedtime.

 As they grew older, I worked to find ways to entertain them, things that would keep them distracted while I worked. It was slow going and so frustrating working in small bits of time. But all those tiny bits of writing added up to my first novel.  When I get overwhelmed and think that I’m never I’m going to finish writing my book or I contemplate giving up, I have an inspirational photo I look at to remind me what’s possible.

In the photo my twins asleep in their little bouncy seats and I am working at my desk. It reminds me that if I wrote my master’s thesis between the time they were born and when they turned one, I can do anything. When I look at that photograph, I’m reminded of the power of small bits of time.

This works when caring for other family and friends as well. Sometimes, you need to care for other folks, and being a caregiver can become all-consuming. It is emotionally and physically exhausting, yet taking even the most minor bits of time to do something for yourself is self-care. Set yourself up to take advantage of writing in those snips of time and be encouraged, small acts done consistently can accomplish great things.

Things we can control: Here are some suggestions to cope with distractions and interruptions.

  1. Environment. Our environment impacts so much of what we do. If you can work to music, create a playlist and listen to it every time you work on that piece. If you need quiet, noise-canceling headphones or a less expensive alternative is soft earplugs can block distracting sounds. It is essential to create or find a location is conducive to concentration and deep work. If you are fortunate enough to have a dedicated writing space, make it work for you. Have a chair you love, a desk you need/want, music/ambient sound or silence, and lighting that doesn’t hurt your eyes. Many folks who write do not have a dedicated workspace. I did not for years and I used whatever spare corner of the house was available or worked at my local tea shop or library. My solution to not having my own space was to create a mini environment. At the library, I would reserve a study room, at the tea shop, I would find an out-of-the-way table, but the number one way was to work to specific music related to the project. When I put on my headphones, all I can hear is the soundtrack I’ve created for that project, and then it’s effortless for me to sink into what I’m doing no matter what else is going on around me, my brain is trained to go into writing mode when the music starts. I have other friends that are able to accomplish this with nature sounds or by listening to white noise.     There are great free apps, such as Rain Rain (https://www.rainrainapp.com) with all sorts of environmental sounds you can play to block out all other sounds. A search on YouTube will also turn up various playlists and background sounds for writing. If you require silence, an investment in noise-canceling headphones may be worthwhile. Or the less expensive straightforward solution of hearing protectors, either the soft ear plugs or the over-ear variety you can find at the hardware store. Take the time to write down what your perfect writing space would look like. Let yourself go and list everything that would make it perfect. Take a break and then go through the list and figure out your essentials versus luxuries (because who wouldn’t write in a cabana next to the ocean with endless cups of tea?) and focus on what you can fix now. Then do those things. Your environment can be your best help or your worst enemy regarding writing. Take   the time to do what you can to fix what is not working.
  2. Training.If your two-legged or four-legged or at a point in their lives where they can respond to training, for lack of a better word, it is time to establish boundaries. Rehearse saying: “I am working now. Is this an emergency?” Treat “our writing as a job. Remind them you are serious about your writing. Write in your appointment book. Write it on the family calendar as work so folks understand it’s not optional.  This will not be easy in many cases. Stick with it. Most kids are impulsive. Mine also are gifted with ADD/ADHD. For years they would bust into the room and interrupt me in the middle of whatever I was working on to tell me whatever random thing they were thinking about. I always had my door open because when they were younger, I wanted to be able to hear if there was some issue I needed to attend to, but now, they have learned after many, many, many repetitions of “I love you and want to talk with you, but I am working now. Are you bleeding? Is someone in danger? Is it an emergency? Is someone or something on fire?” to not interrupt unless it is a critical issue. Teaching them to respect my work time and helping them understand what an emergency is has enabled them not to interrupt each other when working on schoolwork. With partners, it may involve a very frank conversation with your partner and other family members so they understand that when you’re working you’re not to be disturbed unless it’s an emergency. Explain to the folks you are living with or caring for the impact of disruptions on your writing. Be brave, be bold, and be kind in your discussion. As far as our four-legged companions, if you live with other family arranging with them to have them attend to pet needs while you are working will help. Scheduling their walks or playtime can also stop pets from interrupting you. Your mileage will vary with your pets and your living situation. After living with a parrot, and multiple dogs over the years, most of the time they have been the easiest to deal with when it came to learning a routine. My dog is the first one into the office most days when it is writing time and often comes to look for me if I’m not at my desk at my usual start time. Be patient and consistent with training.
  1. Value your own time. I want to encourage you to value your own time and self-care. No matter if you are writing for publication or journaling for your mental health. You are worth that time. And most importantly you deserve uninterrupted time for your deep work. Stop feeling guilty for taking an hour or thirty minutes or however long you set aside to write for yourself. You are entitled to time alone. So many times, we give our time away without even thinking. We surrender our time to other things and projects that don’t impact our health and well-being. Taking an hour to write can be as crucial to our mental health as taking an hour to go to the gym or a walk around the block. They go hand-in-hand. Give yourself permission for self-care.
  1. Dealing with self-distraction. As someone who deals with ADHD, I excel at self-distraction. For years I didn’t understand how to handle self-distraction, which only worsened with the advent of smartphones and social media. Putting physical distance between yourself and your phone can help tremendously. If you need ideas on how to separate yourself from your phone, I recommend the book {How to Break up with your Phone, (https://www.amazon.com/How-Break-Up-Your-Phone-ebook/dp/B072J77B68/} I put my phone in another room so I can’t random check into social media or fall into the internet void as I research some information. To avoid tumbling down the rabbit hole of the internet on my computer, I work on full screen so I can’t see other applications or tabs while I am writing. If I am writing story notes or working on character outlines by hand, I put all my electronics in another room. Or I work someplace without Internet access. These things may not work for you. Knowing yourself and anticipating what might distract you will help you find ways to deal with yourself.   A note about Research: If I’m working on something and I run across an item I need to research, I put brackets in my document and make a note to myself in the document about it.  I used to keep a notebook next to my computer, but after misplacing my research notebook for several weeks, I started making notes directly in the document. Using brackets, I can do a global search and compile an ‘items to be researched list’ once I finish the project or the scene. If it impacts a chapter or makes it so I can’t go forward without knowing that bit of information, I will write as far as I can without stopping to research. That said, some people can’t continue writing until they know the answers to all their research question. They have to know everything before they can write anything. I am a discovery writer and can write scenes out of order because I don’t work to a set outline. For those who work to a detailed outline, it would cause them immense distress and make it impossible to keep writing. If you are one of those people who has to know the research answers before you can begin or continue your writing, understand that if you interrupt your writing time for research, it will take you at least twice as long to complete a project. My advice is to save your research for a dedicated research time. The mental skills used in crafting words are very different from the skills used in research. Shifting back and forth between them is inefficient.I know too many people who have become so bogged down in research and have never completed their novel. There is always something more to know. Set limits on your research and get to work on writing. As with all suggestions, your mileage may vary, but this tiny change massively impacted my ability to complete projects. Another way to stop self-interruptions caused by internet access is to try an app that will lock you out of social media and your browser for set periods. There are a number of them out there, I can’t recommend one as I have not ever used any of them.  I opted for the simpler solution of placing my phone out of reach.
  1. Goals as Distractions: Setting intentions. Stick with me on this one. Having a set number of words to accomplish in a day can become its own distraction. Constantly checking your word count to see if you have met your goal is not conducive to deep work. It can also create a self-defeating loop. If you constantly do not meet your word count goals. My solution for this is to set intentions versus goals. Word count goals because create stress for many people. Try reframing your plans for the day.  Saying “I intend to write words today,” and is open-ended does not carry the same weight emotionally setting a specific goal. Any words will count and you will have met your intentions. No one will ever know or care that you wrote your novel fifteen minutes at a time or ten words at a time. Writing in the margins, those little snatches and bits of time count. And if that’s all you can eke out of your day because you are mentally or physically drained because of other issues in your life, if all you can do is open the document and write one sentence, you will eventually be finished. If you write one page daily at the end of the year, you will have 365 pages of work. So don’t quit. Take break if you need one but don’t give up on don’t writing if it is what you genuinely want to do.

If you are finding it hard to get back into a writing project after a long break, I wrote a blog post about how to get back to work after a long pause, and you can find it here {https://blog.writingwhiledistracted.com/?p=2244}

I hope that you find some of these suggestions helpful. I’ll be I’ll next month with When the Words Won’t Come: The Writers’ Block and distraction connection, brain dumps, impulse control, and plot bunny wrangling.”

 Until next time keep writing,

Brenda

Please feel free to forward this post to other writers you know, they can sign up here for free writing resources and my newsletter just for writers and those who want to be.

https://www.brendalmurphy.com/resources-for-writers.html

Full Circle

It has been a wild four months since I last posted. So much as happened in the world and in my life. As the pandemic spun out around the world, I helped my kids get through the last few months of school at home, planted five new raspberry bushes, and ten fruit trees. In April, I lost my dearest Aunt to a fall, and then I was informed I was a finalist for a GCLS Goldie, and then the most amazing thing, I won.

And through it all, I completed a novella for a project with friends. It took me as long to write thirty thousand words as it usually takes me to write sixty thousand. A big part of struggling to write was dealing with grief.

Grief over my aunt, grief for my kids not being able to be with their grandparents, and friends, grief for friends who died, friends who lost parents, siblings and partners, and grief over losing the ability to work undisturbed.

I started writing when my twins were little. I was home with them and wrote in snippets and margins of time I snatched for myself. And then they went to preschool, and hallelujah, I had two hours and forty-five minutes to myself.

I used that time to write my first two books, and then they went to kindergarten and my day stretched to 5 hours, and then the miracle of miracles they went to elementary school. I had full days to work. It was marvelous. I could stretch out, relax, and work as I wanted to, I even had a dedicated office. And then COVID-19. And now, my kids are home 24/7 and my wife is using my office for innumerable meetings.  I am back to working in the living room, or on our porch, or where ever and whenever I can snatch moments.

I fought against the change in my circumstances at first, raged, fretted, and whined quietly to myself. But in the end, I just needed to remind myself that I wrote and submitted two manuscripts a year for three years writing two hours and forty-five minutes a day.   I can do it again. Hell, my Goldie winning novel, Double Six was written during NANOWRIMO, and if I can draft a 60k novel in thirty days I can do anything.

What is the point of all of this?

Don’t let circumstances steal your art. Find a way to keep creating. I’ll be over here, sneaking in a writing sprint in the early morning before my kids get up, or doing edits after everyone has gone to bed, or knocking out a blog post when I can.

I won’t quit, I won’t whine, and I won’t dwell on what was. I will embrace new challenges and keep working, and keep writing because I’ve come too far along my writing journey to quit now. I won’t be precious about how and where I create,  I will just get on with it.

For you creatives out there, keep creating, the world needs your words and art, now more than ever.

Until next time, stay safe and well.

Available August 17th from Ninestar Press

Brenda Murphy writes short fiction and novels. Her novel, Double Six, won the 2020 GCLS Goldie for Erotica. She loves tattoos and sideshows and yes, those are her monkeys.  When she is not loitering at her local tea shop and writing, she wrangles two kids, one dog, and an unrepentant parrot.  She blogs about life as a writer with ADHD and publishes random thoughts and photographs on her blog Writing While Distracted. 

You can find her on Facebook by clicking here.  Sign Up for her email list and receive a free erotic short story HERE Check out more information about her upcoming releases and appearances at   www.brendalmurphy.com

Books available at

Amazon 

NineStar Press

Double Six

Complex Dimensions

Knotted Legacy

Both Ends of the Whip

ONE  

Sum of the Whole 

Dominique and Other Stories 

 

Return of the Spiral Notebook

If you have followed this blog from the beginning, you might remember one of my first posts was about the simple spiral notebook. At that time I was a mostly stay-home parent with young children. I kept a spiral notebook at hand to jot down ideas, and storylines, and thoughts that I wanted to explore as blog posts, and short stories. Then my kids went to pre-school, and I had much more time to devote to my writing, and I dedicated two hours and forty-five minutes to my writing Monday through Friday (the time I had between when I arrived home from dropping them off and when I had to leave to pick them up). It was miraculous, and I managed to get a collection of short stories written and published, and then wonder of wonders they went to kindergarten and later on to grade school, and I had much more time to devote to writing. I focused on writing novels and managed to write four books in two years, not a prodigious sum but for me, but it was doable and not overwhelming.

And then we bought the house next to ours to renovate as a rental and future home for any family member that might need to live close enough for us to care for them. I have done ninety percent of the renovation myself. I was sick and had surgery in December of this year. And then my mom and dad had some health issues that required me to make the eight-hour drive to their house on a regular basis. And then my sweet dog passed away suddenly in the Spring, leaving me short one office companion, and melancholy. 

All of this means that this year, I’m not sure that I will manage to produce two manuscripts to submit to my editor. It also means that I have been carting around my faithful spiral notebook so that when I’m in the middle of painting, or plumbing, or laying floor tiles, and come up with a new thought/idea/storyline/blog post I have a place to capture it. I know that some people use their phone for these types of things but let us say a cheap notebook and pen is more forgiving of paint-stained fingers.

At this point, you may be asking what my point is, and it is this: Never be afraid of adjusting your goals to fit your life, don’t feel bad about it, do what you need to do, and hold tight to those ideas for future projects. Life is full of seasons, don’t give up, be willing to bend, and ready to snap back when the storm has passed. 

Brenda Murphy writes short fiction and novels. She loves tattoos and sideshows and yes, those are her monkeys.  When she is not loitering at her local tea shop and writing, she wrangles two kids, one dog, and an unrepentant parrot.  She reviews books, blogs about life as a writer with ADHD and publishes photographs on her blog Writing While Distracted.    You can find her on Facebook by clicking here. Or if Twitter is your thing follow me @BMurphySideshow 

Website: www.brendalmurphy.com

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/Writing-While-Distracted

Books available at

Amazon

NineStar Press

Knotted Legacy

Both Ends of the Whip

ONE  

Sum of the Whole 

Recover and Reset

I had planned on taking a break from novel writing over the Summer. I had home projects planned. I had visions of spending lots of time at the pool, hiking, and gardening and hanging out with my kids. I had planned on some promotion and marketing of my novel, Sum of the Whole,  set to release on June 19th

But then my mom had some serious health issues, and then this happened:

 My kiddo tumbled off the pirate ship. Surgery, two pins and one hot pink cast later I needed to change my ideas about summer.  Heartrending? Yes. Stressful? Yes. Overwhelming? Yes. Frustrating? Yes. Anxiety level off the charts? Yes. So I did the thing I always do when I don’t know what thing I should do next, and want some imaginary control over my life. I wrote.

 I wrote an outline while my mom was in the hospital.

The day after my daughter got home from the hospital I started writing my next novel.

I’ve left the deadline the original one that I set when I had planned out my summer and work projects. I don’t expect to finish writing it this summer, but when I sit down in the Fall when the kids go back to school I will be a bit ahead of schedule. It also gives me a sense of accomplishing something on those days I feel stuck.

My advice when life veers off the expected trajectory, take time to recover and reset.  Do the thing that grounds you, the thing that makes the rest of the world fall away even if it is just for an hour. Do that. And remember this:

“Nature never hurries, yet everything is accomplished.” Lao Tzu 

 

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Slow But Steady: Any Progress is Progress

I love this turtle because he helps me to remember that no matter how slow you are moving, if you keep moving you will get there. Through kids being sick, through family illness, through birth, death, and all of life’s messy bits, and most of all through your own inability to focus, if you keep moving you will reach your destination. Remember this when you are frustrated with your creative output: keep going.

I had a short fiction piece accepted this week for publication in an upcoming anthology. My kids think it is pretty awesome that I’m going to have a story in “a chapter book”, and so do I.   I’m not going to go into how long it has been since I had a piece published, or how many rejections proceeded this acceptance, or how many times I have submitted manuscripts, because none of it matters. The point of this post is this: all those days that I squeezed in fifteen minutes of writing made a difference. Not giving up is what matters. If you quit writing, it is impossible to get anything published.

I will confess to struggling mightily in the warm months to stick to my writing schedule. The lure of outside kicks my ADHD into high gear. After a winter of being inside all I want to do is play. My kids are home in the summer time, and that cuts into my writing time as well. I have some ways of dealing with kids at home and last year I posted some tips for sticking to your writing schedule when your kids are out of school, and you can read them here .

Even if you take some writing breaks over the summer, make it productive, read that To Be Read Pile, collect photographs, experiences, and memories to feed your writing later.

Most of all don’t give up, if you keep writing you will finish. Just keep moving. If you can only write one sentence, write a sentence. Like snowflakes it will add up. It may take years for you to accomplish what others accomplish in a month, it is okay, just keep writing.

Stick with it. Keep going, don’t quit, enjoy the journey as much as the destination.

Writer’s block? I don’t have time for that.

Age: One Day
This is how old my kids were when I started writing my thesis.
This is how old they were when I finished.
At the celebration lunch.

You did it Mom!

One year.  Did I mention that we moved out of state, and went on a trip that lasted a month? It was crazy hard, and sometimes I don’t know how I did it.

I do know that I created some rituals and routines to keep my words flowing. I had a deadline. I could not wait until I felt like writing, or was inspired. Writer’s block was just not an option.
I found that creating small rituals helped me focus when I did have time to write. When I talk about rituals, I am talking about little things that reminded me that I was at the keyboard for a reason. Here are some tips to help you stay on track and keep your writing project going.

1. Use every second. Work when you can. Even if it is only for thirty minutes, it will add up.

Yep, I worked every time they napped.

2. Always take five minutes at the end of your work session to make a note to yourself about what you need to write, or accomplish the next time you work. This saves time when get back to writing, and keeps the project moving forward.

3. Keep your project materials together. Searching for materials wastes time, and distracts you from writing.

4. Find a way to organize your notes and materials that works for you. Once you find a way, stick with it until the end of the project. If you are tempted to stop work to reorganize, resist. Reorganizing is a huge waste of time. If you want to try a different method, save it for the next project.

5. Write, even when you don’t feel like writing, when you want to quit, when you are sick and tired, and would rather do anything else. Keep going.

6. Ask for help when you need it. I had a babysitter once a week for six hours. I did not go to the grocery store, do laundry, sleep or any of the hundred other things that needed to be done. Guard your work time.

7. If you work with music on, create a playlist that you use for all your work sessions for your project. Music can help shift your mood, and stimulate your writing. My playlist was called “Write the MotherF*$^er”.  I still use it.

8.  Make yourself accountable to someone. If you are in school, this would be your advisor. If you are working on your own, find a critique group or writing partner.

9. Do not point a baby you just fed at your research notebook. This is a bonus tip. I was cleaning out my project files last week  and I found my thesis research notebook. It still smells faintly of baby vomit.

10. Believe. Believe in your project. Believe in your ability.

I believe in you. Get to work.

Writing with Kids: Seven Tips to Keep Your Writing Schedule on Track

Pond 2014

Summer is my favorite time of year.  I love being in the garden, playing with my kids, hiking and cooking out. I really love not having to get the kids up and out for school in the morning. The down side of Summer is trying to make sure that I meet my writing goals.  In addition to everyday distractions, out of town guests, vacations, and kids at home make it difficult to keep a regular writing schedule. There are so many more shiny objects to deal with in Summer!

These are my seven tips to keep you writing over the Summer.

1. Change your schedule, get up before the kids, or stay up after they go to bed.

2. Barter with them: leave me alone to write for one hour, or set a timer for younger kids, and then we can play a game/ go to the pool/ etc.

3. Use family trips for research, take notes for current or future works.

4. Save Summer for edits. I find it easier to fix things than write new words when I have short bits of time.

5. Treat your writing like a job, because it is.  Explain to your family that you have to write for a certain time each day.

6. Establish a quiet time each day, use it as your writing time. Having a set time each day for reading, drawing, painting, or other quiet creative activity is good for everyone. If your kids have summer reading for school, or as part of a library summer reading program this is great way to help them meet their goals

7. Don’t give up! Something is better than nothing, use the time you have to get words written.

Finally, don’t stress. Give yourself permission to have smaller writing goals, and have fun. Summer only happens once a year, and if you have kids, they are only kids once.