Be Prepared

You just never know what’s going to happen. One day, you’re merrily turning out a 1,000 word article on a topic you’re familiar with; the next, something happens to completely disrupt your routine. This could be:

• illness (yours or a family member’s)

• bereavement

• having relatives or friends in town

In all of these cases, your carefully planned writing routine can go completely out the window. However, there are a few things that you can do to make it easier to manage the unexpected.

If you run your own blog, or blog for someone else, always work a few posts in advance. Use the future posting option in Wordpress to schedule some posts that will go out even if you are called away unexpectedly.

When working for writing clients, always plan to have the job finished a couple of days before the actual deadline. This will give you some leeway if you suddenly need to take a day off.

In your writing career, give as much value to clients as you can, so they will cut you some slack when you need it. Dedication at the start of a client relationship buys a lot of goodwill at a later stage.

Make friends with some other writers whose work ethic you know and trust. Most writers will be glad to step in to help you meet a deadline if things get tough.

Those are my suggestions for getting prepared — what are yours? I’d love to do a follow up post with some of your top tips for keeping your writing career going when life intervenes.