The Secret to Discipline is to start small. If you can’t write first thing in the morning for an hour, write for 5 minutes. Pick the time and place and project and Show Up, whether it’s first thing in the morning or 20 minutes of your noon hour. It helps to have a usual place since it’s one less thing to think about.
Repeat for 21 days, and you’ve made it a habit.
If you’d like some help creating that habit, try: Habit forge – http://habitforge.com/
Habitforge emails you every day and asks if you accomplished your goal for that day. You have to meet your goal for 21 consecutive days. Every time you skip a day, the counter is reset to day 1. Habitforge is free and you can have multiple goals.
Discipline is basically simple. The problem, I think, is that we all feel like we don’t have discipline. Or enough discipline. But we do.
And next time I’ll write about why discipline (as far as writing is concerned) isn’t really the problem anyway.
photo from iStockphoto.com #000014507470
I like to get up at 5 am EVERY morning to either write or blog (MWF). It’s not the only time I write, but I can’t seem to give it up for the chance to sleep in (unless I go somewhere for a vacation).
Cute puppy!
Stina! Thanks for stopping by.
Creativity Coach Eric Maisel totally agrees with your early morning writing.
I’m not sure I’m strong enough to handle 5 AM . . .
Verrah cute puppy. And neat about that site. I hadn’t heard of them.
I only recently bought WriteWayPro, and I’m finding the bar graph to be extremely helpful in getting butt into chair. Whatever works, huh?
When I wrote that novella for Samhain, I was testing WriteWayPro. And I’ve decided to keep using it for my novel. I’m finding it very helpful. Not only for tracking my word count, but also for the way it organizes scenes.
I just had to say I love this post Suzanne! Every word you typed is so very true. It really only takes a few minutes each day. A few minutes usually turn into something a bit longer. So write everyone write!
I also love the puppy picture!