You’d rather have a leather-bound book than a blu-ray…
You love to read. You edit emails in your head and can’t help but notice when a friend ends his sentence with a preposition, even though part of you knows there’s nothing wrong with it. You have a notepad filled with background and world-building notes and a hard drive packed with outlines and first chapters. More than anything in the world, you want to be an author.
The caveat…
You are also a parent to one, two, three, maybe even seven children (I have no idea how you manage), and—whether you’re a stay-at-home mother, a middle-school teacher, or a brain surgeon—you don’t have time to write that novel you’ve been putting off for the last four (or fourteen) years, let alone time to improve your craft.
What can you do?
If you want to be a writer, you have to practice writing. I know what you’re thinking, ‘To do that, I would need time to practice; to have time to practice, I would need to be a writer.’ Good news, you aren’t Yossarian, and there is a solution. Let’s look at four easy ways to improve your craft without sacrificing valuable time with your family.
1. Read Out Loud
You have children; read to them. Depending on their age, you can get away with just about anything. When my oldest child was a newborn, I would read novels to her—novels I would have read anyway.
Not only is reading out loud a good way for you to improve flow in your writing, but it’s also essential that your child be exposed to language at a young age. When they get a little older, you’ll need to get more creative. Try reading the classics; they’re usually available with pictures, and can benefit everyone.
2. Get Inventive
Do your kids ever ask you to tell them stories at night? Do you ever make excuses? If you do, stop it. Find the time. And, when you do, don’t just regurgitate the same old fairy tales and fables; give them something original. Push yourself to give them something they’ve never heard before. Make it fun and make it unique. If you do it often enough, you’re bound to spark ideas for your own writing. Do it even when they don’t ask.
3. Try Something Outside Your Comfort Zone
We both know you find time to read. You can’t help yourself. Whether that means staying up late, eager to get a moment to yourself, or powering up your e-reader on the subway, you aren’t one to miss out on your favorite author’s newest novel. Even though you know you’ll be tired at work the next day, or that you could be prepping for your meeting, you will gladly sacrifice a few minutes in order to indulge your creative appetite.
I’m not judging, but I suggest changing it up every now and then. You love Vampire Romances? Read a Historical Fiction. You can’t get enough of Presidential Biographies? Try out some Science Fiction or Fantasy. This kind of variety will stretch your mind and help make you a better writer. Who knows, you might even find a new genre to love.
4. The Keystone
Finally, you actually do need to practice writing. There’s no shortcut for putting pen to paper (or fingers to tiny, plastic grapheme-buttons). Force yourself to set aside thirty minutes each day, and write. There are thousands of writing exercises available online, and if you don’t like those, work on a novel or a magazine article.
It doesn’t matter what you write; the important thing is that you develop your voice. If the first million wards are practice, you might as well start chipping away.
Tim and his wife parent their three small children in Oregon, where he spends too much time wearing ties, commuting, and sharpening pencils. He stretches the imagination and bends the mind in his short story, “Proxy”, in A Dash of Madness: a Thriller Anthology, scheduled for release on July 31, 2013.