It's fairly common for people to ask, “how do you find time to write while parenting/working full-time?” My answer: most often, you don't, but that's okay.
Despite a very supportive wife and a fairly good work environment, it's hard to find time to write. I often utilize my train commute to write, but that means everything is written using my phone, which also means lots of cases of “auto-wrong” messing things up. To be fair, it's still better than not writing at all, but even after getting great technical feedback from @WilmariClaasan, finding the time to go back for solid editing is a difficult task thanks to life in general.
I love my children and would never wish to go back to a time before them, but between parenting and working, there is maybe 1 hour and a half of free time for me, assuming commute counts as free time. For writing, that might be enough time if completely dedicated, but we are human and have many needs, chief among is rest and leisure.
After working 9 hours on a computer and holding babies, the hands and eyes need to rest. I learned this the painful way so be sure to stretch and rest. The warning that came with the game boy saying not to play when tired is valid. Doing so tires the eyes and do it repeatedly enough and I ended up with one of the worst headaches ever.
Beyond the need for rest, we also need to partake in the social world. Spouses need to date. People need to meet with friends. We need to enjoy the arts. We need to exercise and have fun. All of these are needed to maintain a healthy and happy mind. Yes, I sometimes want to write, but if we ignore everything else for too long, everything comes crashing down sooner or later.
Ok. Now that I made that case, here are tips to help with actual writing despite limited time.
- Use Swype, Gboard, or something similar for writing on mobile.
- It can be annoying to correct the mistakes, but it's way faster than tapping every key. Write too slowly and you may lose the flow or find it too difficult to write at all.
- Consider writing serialized short stories instead of full novels
- Take public transportation to enable extra writing time.
- Have a notebook to write down thoughts before bed. Organize by date and create an index in the back for easy reference
- This also helps with falling asleep when you have an active imagination
- Get a used Kindle or e-reader
- so you can read on the go
- You can load PDFs and docs for reading
- Chat with other writers and readers for feedback and inspiration
- Enjoy life to keep your mind fresh
Dream on,
J. D. Nyle
