: Writing discipline In today's frenetic, fast-paced lifestyle (especially if writing is not currently your career or means of earning an income), it can be extremely difficult to "make" or find

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My most available writing time is between "waking up" and "leaving for work", that usually gives me between 30 and 60 minutes each day, usually good for 300-400 words (and a quick read of the last two days worth of writing). However, I suspect that is not a scalable method.

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Quite simply: Block off the Internet as you write. For me, that involves turning off my secondary monitor so I can't see the taskbar. For you, it might involve physically unplugging the ethernet cable from the back of your computer.

I can't even begin to describe the difference this makes for me when I write.

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The second thing that has helped me is the 10x5x2 approach (it may have another name). The theory is that you write for 10 minutes, take 2 mintues off, then repeat 5 times (filling an hour). The idea is that the schedule will make you focus, but give you time to deal with necessary distractions if necessary - often I use the two minutes to stare at the ceiling and think. I wrote a little timer application to help me and use it every time I write now.

At the end of an hour (if I'm going to write more), I'll take a bio-break or get some coffee. I found that I can string up to 3 of these back to back before I need a longer break, but that I can do up to 6 in a day if I'm really pushing.

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I rely on two tactics to achieve steady progress in writing (I'll answer twice for voting ease).

The first is sort of obvious - write every day. I fell into a trap at one time where I felt that if I couldn't block off at least a few hours for writing that it was better to not bother. As a result, I would sometimes go for weeks without writing (that doesn't make editors too happy).

Eventually, I forced myself to write every day - even if I knew I could only write for 15-30 minutes (which almost always expanded into longer chunks of time). Now, when I have writing projects, I make sure I write every day - even if it's just edits or a sentence or two. For me, a lot of writing happens somewhere in the back of my mind when I'm away from a keyboard, and writing every day keeps those ideas moving.

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