Image: two women walk together on either side of the painted lines along a remote road that leads up a steep hill near Reykjavik, Iceland.
Picture by Rod Lengthy on Unsplash

At this time’s submit is by romance creator and ebook coach Trisha Jenn Loehr (@trishajennreads).

The parable of the solo author is persistent, but all of us crave group. Only a few, if any, printed books are written in isolation.

I’ve tried the solo author route, and it didn’t work. It was too straightforward to deprioritize my writing as a result of there have been dishes that wanted to be carried out, or I used to be drained from my workday and simply needed to veg on the sofa, or the writing was arduous and pushing via that irritating plot drawback to make my phrase rely aim was too overwhelming. I wasn’t accountable to anybody however myself.

So I reached out to a author pal who was additionally struggling to prioritize her writing and make progress towards her targets (each of our targets centered round that ever-elusive idea of really ending a writing venture).

Over the previous 12 months I’ve met commonly with a writing buddy to replace and encourage one another on our writing initiatives. And we’ve each made extra progress than ever earlier than.

In a single 12 months of getting a writing accountability associate, or “writing buddy”, I’ve completed extra on my inventive writing than I’ve in almost a decade:

  • Six quick tales written
  • Two submissions to contests and 4 submissions to anthologies or literary magazines
  • My first acceptance and publishing contract
  • Deliberate and drafted a whole romance novel
  • Made progress on revisions on an previous novel draft
  • Embraced my id as an creator

My writing buddy re-outlined a novel venture and found which parts of her story slot in ebook one in all her deliberate sequence and which parts wanted to maneuver to subsequent books, did a revision of the primary novel, wrote eight quick tales, acquired her first publication, and even learn her story aloud on the launch occasion for the anthology she’s featured in.

So how did we do that? By scheduling a weekly writing replace e-mail (and messaging the opposite for his or her replace if it wasn’t in our inbox on time), assembly bi-weekly over video chat (additionally within the calendar), and giving written suggestions on one another’s initiatives.

Regardless of difficult life circumstances that make writing much more troublesome, growing a structured partnership with a writing buddy may also help you make progress in your writing targets.

Three issues contributed to our success as writing buddies: belief, scheduling and tips, and micro-goals.

1. Construct a writing partnership with somebody you already know and belief—somebody as dedicated as you might be.

Writing accountability teams or critique relationships typically disintegrate as a result of the individuals haven’t established a relationship constructed on belief and shared targets (somewhat than competitors) or they simply aren’t on the identical web page. They may have completely different concepts on what consistency seems to be like or on what stage of suggestions to offer. Some individuals might get greater than they provide, which ends up in resentment from different members of the group.

Discuss expectations, suggestions types, and weekly or month-to-month time commitments earlier than agreeing to a partnership.

My writing buddy and I had been mates for 11 years and sporadically encouraging each other on our writing journeys earlier than we began our formal partnership and developed a construction for it.

2. Set common deadlines and tips for connecting with each other and sharing updates in your writing life. Put these in your calendar and deal with them as essential appointments.

  • How typically and in what technique will you replace one another in your writing progress? Will you e-mail or textual content each other? Will you meet in individual or just about?
  • Will you share your phrase rely targets and achievements? Will you ask for assist outlining or brainstorming? Will you share craft or analysis assets? Will you alternate pages for suggestions?

My writing buddy and I ship weekly e-mail updates on Sunday evenings about what writing we completed (or didn’t) the earlier week. We additionally meet bi-weekly over Google Meet to talk about our initiatives, what’s working or not working, brainstorm collectively about our respective WIPs, set targets, and debrief about the newest episodes of Survivor (which completely isn’t writing-related however is a crucial a part of our friendship).

Once we alternate pages for suggestions, we specify what sort of suggestions we would like and once we want it by—ideas on character or construction or pacing, options to fill a plot gap, or assist trimming phrase rely so the story will meet submission necessities for a contest.

We additionally commonly textual content one another encouragement (there’s a whole lot of GIFs) or random updates (“Hey look, I’m truly writing!”) or questions associated to our writing (“Do you assume my character would react this fashion or that means in X state of affairs?”).

3. Deal with achievable micro-goals that may transfer you each towards your macro-goals.

Huge targets like multi-book publishing offers (a woman can dream!) are achieved via the numerous, many micro-goals we accomplish on the way in which—issues like growing a private writing routine, finishing a narrative or a novel draft, sharing your writing with one other individual (scary!) or by submitting to a submission name (even scarier!).

Take time by your self and along with your writing buddy to brainstorm a sequence of smaller, achievable targets that match or coordinate so you possibly can stroll alongside each other in your journeys. If in case you have utterly disparate targets, you won’t be finest suited to a partnership.

Phrase rely targets like writing 500 phrases a day or 5,000 phrases every week might be great. However phrase rely isn’t the one means of measuring writing progress. Actually, focusing solely on phrase rely can typically be detrimental to your writing progress, as a result of when life inevitably occurs and your day job requires a bunch of unplanned additional time otherwise you or a member of the family will get sick, that phrase rely is unlikely to be reached. Phrase rely might also go down throughout revisions, which doesn’t precisely replicate the essential progress you’re making in your manuscript.

Writing progress may appear to be:

  • Making choices a couple of story or venture—which adjustments to make within the subsequent revision and even the selection to shelve a venture
  • Sharing your writing by submitting to a contest or journal
  • Scheduling common writing time or attending a weekend writing retreat
  • Studying a ebook associated to your venture or doing different analysis
  • Setting a deadline to finish a primary draft or revision

Final summer season, my writing buddy and I set a aim to gather rejections. And that meant we would have liked to draft, full, and submit quick tales. We helped each other analysis alternatives, despatched our drafts forwards and backwards for suggestions, and despatched screenshots of our submission confirmations—adopted by screenshots of plenty of rejection emails and one acceptance e-mail every.

A writing buddy makes this writing factor means much less lonely.

The essential factor I’ve found with a writing buddy is the need of mixing encouragement and accountability. I do know I’ve somebody in my nook once I want a pep discuss as a result of I didn’t write as a lot as I’d hoped to or when my story acquired rejected or my character is veering off my mapped story path. Generally that pep discuss is a reminder of all of the issues I did accomplish. However I even have somebody to provide me a crucial kick within the pants when I’m letting concern win and am too scared to hit submit or once I’m lamenting for the fourth day in a row that I’m too drained to jot down.

Figuring out that somebody is ready for my writing replace (even when that replace is that I didn’t meet whichever writing aim I set final week) and is out there to assist me brainstorm via a writing block has been an enormous assist for me.

Maybe a writing buddy would possibly provide help to obtain your writing targets too. Are you able to consider anybody in your circle of acquaintance who you would suggest a partnership to?