You have to Make the Most Out of Your Time
The best way to look at this, is to consider all the time and effort and energy people devote to things other than their day job
- Television and Movies – if you are serious about being an author then you have to say goodbye to weekends spent bingeing on Netflix. 1 or 2 TV Shows a week are OK. 1 or 2 Movies a month is all you can afford. You are now making the jump from a consumer to a creator. So focus on CREATING i.e. writing, and cut down on consuming
- Weekends – Sorry, if you want to still have weekends and also be an author, then you need to quit. Until you are making enough from your book sales to quit your day job, you can’t afford weekends. At most, take one weekend off a month to recharge
- Vacations – 1 or 2 vacations a year are fine and good. More than that and you have to question whether you really want to be a writer or would perhaps be better off as a travel blogger
- Hobbies – Writing is your passion and passions take precedence over Hobbies
- Sitting around doing nothing – Now you no longer have the time to sit around doing nothing. Taking up to 1 hour a day for some me time is fine. Nothing beyond that. After you are 90, you can spend half the day sitting on the porch, sipping your coffee, watching the grass grow. Right now you need to WRITE
- Reading Books or Magazines – The irony of life. If you want to succeed as an author you will have to give up reading except when it is for market research. You have to read a bit to keep abreast of what is happening in your book genres – everything else is a luxury
- Playing Games – No, no games for you. If you can’t give up games then either become a gamer/streamer with your own channel, or start writing in Gaming related Genres, or even books based on games. In all other cases, you must give up video games completely. They are an extreme form of ‘consumer/mindless zombie’ mindset and will hurt your ability to succeed as an author
- Surfing the Internet – Another thing you can ill afford. If there is a zombie apocalypse and your life is in danger, rest assured that someone in the real world will let you know. There is no ‘breaking news’ that is worth more than building your career as an author
- Watching Cat videos on YouTube – Please, do we even have to discuss this
- Social Networks – these are not just a waste of time, they train you to be Pavlov’s Dog always looking for external validation, and they train you to be a mindless zombie consumer. Being a CREATOR is the exact opposite and you absolutely must stay away from social networks
- Time with Friends – Not going to lie to you. If you succeed as an author, you will be so busy you will lose most of your friends. So if your friends are too precious to you, then find something other than writing books
Take away 8*5 = 40 hours for work, and 7*7 = 49 hours for sleep, and you are left with 7*24 – 89 = 99 hours a week
Getting 30 hours out of those 99 hours for writing is child’s play
Getting 50 to 60 hours is also possible, if you are serious enough
You have to Use Your Work Time properly
After cleaning up how you use your personal time, look at all the things people do during their job hours, which have nothing to do with their job
- Checking email
- Shopping at work
- Checking social networks
- Reading the news
- Gossiping with coworkers
- Extending Coffee Breaks and Toilet Breaks
- Extending Lunch Breaks
- Pointless Meetings
The list is almost endless
Most people spend roughly 10 hours out of their 40 hour work week doing actually productive, impactful work. They spend another 10 hours doing low impact work. They waste the remaining 20 hours
However, until and unless you keep a journal or use a software like Rescue Time to track what you are actually doing, you will keep lying to yourself that you worked for 40 hours
The solution is simple – Get 30 productive and impactful hours at work. Get at least another 5 hours of low impact yet necessary work. Then you are doing 35 out of 40 hours, instead of 20 out of 40
You will find that you start getting bonuses and promotions at work in your quest to use your time more efficiently. You might even discover that you like your day job more than you like writing – the Horror!
Very Important Note on Getting the Most Out of Yourself
Most of us use only 5% to 6% of our brains
Most of us use only 20% to 40% of our waking time efficiently
You can use 8% to 10% of your brain and get a massive advantage over everyone else
You can start using 50% to 70% of your waking time efficiently and get an even bigger advantage
Right now you are not stumbling or walking – you are crawling, compared to what you can achieve
Start walking. Then start running
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