When I first started writing way back in the dark ages, even before the internet was dial-up…What’s dial-up, you ask? For readers who aren’t familiar with the term, back in the late nineties when you connected to the internet, first you heard a dial tone, then a series of screeching, beeps, and static as the modem connected to the ISP that might go on forever while the user sat there waiting and waiting for everything to connect…
Oh, and this was before Word, so everything was DOS…and even before that, it was an electric typewriter, and before that, a manual one (that’s what I started on), and the only critique groups were—gasp—in person. Only in my corner of the world, there were no critique groups. I wrote and wrote and kept getting rejections because I made the same mistakes over and over because there was no one to tell me what I was doing wrong.
Writing was hard. It took a lot of discipline to show up and keep going.
Let me tell you a little secret. Writing is still hard, even with all the shortcuts and conveniences we have. Need to research gunrunning? Instead of getting in the car and driving to the library and looking through the card catalogue for books or articles on the subject, just put your research question in Giggle, I mean Google, and instantly there are hundreds of articles on gun running at your fingertips. Off you go on a rabbit trail. Not only that, there are a gazillion books on writing.
When I started, I had a handful of books from my local library, and probably the best thing I could’ve had—the Writers Digest Magazine featuring a monthly column by Lawrence Block. Each installment felt like a masterclass in creative writing. Here’s a link to one of his columns—columns he wrote every month for fourteen years–talk about discipline! Later came Nancy Kress and then our own James Scott Bell.
However, books and articles don’t teach discipline, and in MHO, discipline is the difference between wanting to write and actually writing. Here’s my definition of discipline: Showing up and doing the hard work when you don’t feel like it.
I’ve known writers who love to talk about writing and who love to have written, but when it comes to actually sitting behind a computer and actually putting something on paper, they are MIA. Unfortunately, no one can give you the discipline to write. Only you can do that, and if you don’t have a deadline, either from a publisher or a self-imposed one, it’s hard to make yourself sit at the computer and run (or plod) toward the finish line unless you have that drive to create a story and put what’s in your head on paper.
So TKZers, what advice do you have on developing discipline? And if I don’t show up to answer comments, then you’ll know the ice storm brought down the power lines in my area…
