Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Breaks are not the enemy

Tip of the Day: don't focus all your energy on writing, make sure to keep living your life too. Your writing will thank you for it :)

Have you every felt guilty for taking a writing break? Sometimes it's hard not to. You see all these people succeeding and making deals and you feel left out and that the only way you can get a deal is by acting like go, go, go. And write, write, write.

But there's a reason the average person has two-days off a week for their day job. If all you are doing is go, go, go, then you can burn yourself out quickly.

It's hard to realize we aren't superwomen or men. And that we need our breaks. I'm just now learning this with writing and that it's okay to take some time off to chill. Small breaks. Longer ones if you have no deadlines and just need a breather.

It makes it a challenge to get back into the flow, but often when it does start flowing again it's much better for having that rest period. And your writing improves when you take time out to focus your brain on other things that are important to you.

So give yourself a break. Literally. And don't feel bad for it.

--Emily, Miss Querylicious

3 comments:

DeenaML said...

This is good advice for many things! You need to have other interests, too, besides writing and reading, in order to fuel your ideas!

Kate Fall said...

One of the things I struggle with is guilt. I'm learning it's OK not to feel guilty for living a balanced life.

Ironically, goals help me take breaks. They stop me from feeling like I should do more, more, more. Goals remind me that it will all get done when it should and I don't have to break my brain doing it.

Emily Marshall said...

Yes, Deena, other interests definitely fuel our writing. And Kate I struggle with guilt all the time too, and I LOVE your idea of the goals taking the guilt out of the equation. I think you might be right. I've never thought of it like that.