3 Simple Ways I’m Preparing To Write My Next Book
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I’m getting the itch again to write another book.
The itch has been there for a while. When I was close to finishing Unfussy Life, I wanted to start writing another book (three of them, actually). Now, my squirrel brain very well could have run off and started another project even though I wasn’t done with the first one. (This is an extremely common symptom of perfectionism, by the way).
But no! I had to finish that big book.
I published it in April 2021 and I’m so glad I did.
If you’ve been hanging out around here for a while, you know that I wrote the book a few years ago — the very first, very shitty first draft of it came out of me a few Novembers ago during NaNoWriMo (national novel writing month).
2024 Update: I now call a “Shitty First Draft” a “Surrendered First Draft.”
I love the idea of a creative container of 30 days and 50,000 words to get a bunch of focused writing work done. I still have (and plan to run) my business and continue serving my clients this November when I work on my next book.
2024 Update: I no longer participate in NaNoWriMo. Read why.
I don’t know if I’ll ever be one of those writers who sits around and writes for six hours a day — and really, I don’t think I want to. Sure, I love writing. I also love variety and task-switching throughout the day. Whether editing a client’s SFD (shitty first draft), copy reviews for coaching community members, writing a social post, or drafting a sales page for a client — I love the creative inspiration that task switching brings me.
The month that I drafted the very shitty preliminary draft of Unfussy Life, I didn’t prep at all.
2017 book writing me:
Pick a random day in October, set a timer, play Metallica, and write 30 topic ideas on index cards (my goal was to write a chapter a day).
Every day in November — write at least 1,667 words. I pulled a random card and wrote like hell. I tracked my word count progress in a Google Sheet and created a separate Google Doc for each chapter. No revisiting, no revising, no thinking — only super-fast writing.
I didn’t plan ahead and continued publishing weekly blog and newsletter content — this aspect felt a little draining.
3 ways I’m preparing to write my next book during NaNoWriMo:
2021 book writing me:
Starting now (I’m writing this in August), I’m writing at least 500 SFD words a day for my blog content. I’ll revisit those drafts, polish them, and schedule them for each week (or every other week) through November. Being ahead on my content will help me to focus on book writing. And if I need to reorder any blogs based on world or life events, I will adjust them.
Each week, I’ll write a weekly newsletter to my email subscribers. It’s usually based on whatever content I created for the blog that week. Sometimes, the email will point to an older but relevant topic. I rarely schedule newsletters way in advance. There’s so much more power in my message when I sit down to write in the moment. When I write something weeks ahead of time, I’m creating with the energy of that week, which will be very different from future weeks.
Book outlining — I’m using August to dream and journal about what my next book will look like. During September, I’ll plan. In October, I’ll prep, and in November, I’ll write the book. And if I still have the stamina, I’ll do a first round of edits in December.
I’m still serving my writing community, private coaching clients, and copywriting clients. We’ll also likely have a hockey tournament with some travel in there, too.
This deliberate approach to book writing feels different from the pantsing (flying by the seat of my pants) I did a few years ago.
Pantsing worked fine for me then, and I’ll always be winging it to some degree — it’s how I love to create. Though it was frustrating many times during the editing process (my poor editor), and the multiple times I revisited and reorganized it.
This time, I hope the book’s flow will be more apparent from the beginning. And I also know from experience that even if I go into the writing process with the best intentions, writing is an act of co-creating with the Divine, and the direction may shift while writing. That’s the magic.
I’ve already proved to my unconscious mind that I know how to write, edit, and publish a book. So, doing it again, my brain will be like, “Oh yeah, we got this.” While it was often uncomfortable during the writing process the first time, I’ve created the container for the next book (and the next, and the next).
And that’s the whole point. Until I started writing and publishing my blog weekly, I didn’t have the mental container. Now, 10 years later, blogging feels like breathing.
This year, planning feels uncomfortable. And even though I know plans sometimes go out the window, tweaking a plan is easier than pantsing the whole time.
2023 Update — this book I started in 2021 was released in 2023!
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