Cooper West ponderings

Gearing Up

Sep 21, 2013 | Modus Operandi, Writing

I graduated with my master’s degree just about a year ago. As I’ve talked about before, it was the end of a 2+ year journey that started with my divorce in 2010 (we divorced in April, I started grad school that August).

But let’s face it: 2012 is SO last year!

I’ve had a year to recuperate. I’ve worked at low-stress (and low-paying) jobs and kept my social life to a minimum and generally flown under the radar. I did finish up two novels that I started in 2011 and submitted them, and worked on other writing projects, but that’s been catch as catch can.

The other day I was talking to a friend about my desire to “up the ante” on my publishing career, and I realized that with my 40+ hour workweek, it was not something that was going to happen organically. More than just planning, I need to reframe how I think about that work.

In other words, I need to gear up for working at this every day the same way I did for graduate school.

Grad school took at least 1-2 hours of my day, every day, seven days a week, for two years. I’m not even counting class time, I’m just talking about the time I spent reading, writing, and doing group work (ugh group work blearghhhh). I never had a day off. I’m sure I stole a few here and there, but I paid for them because any day I did not put that time in meant another day I had to double up. This was all on top of working, at first part time but then full time the final year.

I’m not looking forward to working that hard again, but doing so would mean that in two years I will have 10 – 15 books and novellas published and making me money.

That’s based on the idea of putting one full novel out triannually (every four months), which requires ONLY a minimum of 500 words a day — theoretically that’s an easy target, but I also need to factor in wiggle room, so I think 750 words is reasonable. That is NOT including time I need to write blog entries, or edit, or format (for self-published work). Or time I want to spend on other writing projects I can’t talk about here.

Gearing up, and going in. Wish me luck!

 

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