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| Stones on the beach at Flamborough |
Do you work well in clutter? Does it really matter to you if the desk is
covered in piles of manuscripts, notes to remind you, a document stand
overflowing with ‘things to do’? Is it no problem for you to step over those
things you’re planning to sort out every time you enter the room?
On the other hand, do you have to have a tidy desk, with everything in
its place and nothing outstanding. Is that box of odds and sods already sorted
for sale on Ebay or ready for the local charity shop? Or does such a box never
exist in your life because you always clear these things as they come along? Is
your inbox only ever the place where new emails live for the short while it
takes you to deal with them? Are you obsessive about the places your things are
located, ensuring everything is always exactly where you want it?
I lie somewhere in between these two extremes of chaos and obsessive
tidiness.
For a number of reasons, with which I won’t bore you, I’ve had to allow
certain irritations to build up over the last few weeks. It’s always a question
of priorities. But I do find it difficult to be creative and disciplined in my
writing habits when the desk has a pile of correspondence awaiting attention,
the inbox has over 100 emails I need to explore further, the room I use as a
study is crowded with objects that need some attention before I can either sell
them or recycle them via the local Help the Aged shop.
So, on Wednesday afternoon, when I arrived home from the half week I
spend at an office in order to supplement my earnings from writing, I decided
enough was enough. It was time for a serious bout of deck-clearing. I want to
get on with the fantasy trilogy I’m writing, and all these interruptions are
getting in the way. The only solution is to deal with them.
So far, I’ve reduced the inbox to 13, and 12 of those are required for
future action I can’t actually take at the moment. I’ve updated the Writing
Contests page on this blog and therefore removed from the desk the pile of
magazines, leaflets and other printed matter I consult for this task. I’ve
restored my daughter’s old computer to a working state, which took some 10
hours of attention, reformatting and re-installing of software, so I can see if
that will sell on Ebay. Along the way,
I’ve dealt with all new emails (I get around 70 a day), posted a couple of
items on the blog, kept up to date with Pinterest and Twitter and Facebook and
LinkedIn, all of which are social sites I use to keep in touch with readers.
But, as a happily married man who wishes to remain so, I’ve also spent some
real quality time with my wife, who is a great support to my writing activity.
An earlier post on here describes our
day in Hull to see the Da Vinci drawings and watch the latest Bond film.
And we also managed a longish walk along the local cliffs near Flamborough. I
love the sea and find it refreshes my spirit. Took some pictures along the way,
which I’ll add to the albums I
have on Facebook when time allows.
Why am I telling you all this? Well, the lesson of the last few days has
been that I work better without clutter. And, if I’m able to keep it at bay,
I’ll get a lot more writing done. So, I’ve found my ideal working situation.
Have you found yours, or are you continually in a state where you’re either
fighting against a chaos over which you have no control, or are you so busy
keeping everything tidy that you have no real time to do what matters most; you
writing?
There you go. I’ve even found time to write and post this piece on the
blog. So, here’s your challenge: if you’re not already working in your ideal
environment, do something about it and sort it out so you can work in your
optimum way and actually get that writing done.
Good luck, and have fun!
4 comments:
Stuart,
Personally, I prefer to work sitting in my favourite recliner chair with this laptop perched across my legs. As for clutter, I have none as I use MS One Note to store everything from story notes to...
While I have a printer, I hardly use it.
Instead I use Calibre and Adobe to make .mobi (Kindle) and PDF copies of what ever project I'm working on, both of which allow me to increase the size of print onscreen for ease of reading and editing.
Since the world has moved on from the so-called good old days, I've moved with the times. No more paper galley proofs, double spaced. No more double spacing.
So, there you have it in a nutshell. :)
Ah, Jack. One Note. I have this but I've never got round to using it. Clearly something worth exploring. I use Moleskine notebooks to log ideas as they occur - 1 in each place I'm likely to be inspired and all of them free via letters to Writers' Forum Magazine. But, when I'm at my desk, I tend to use a couple of scrap pads to make notes on. Clearly, One Note would be a better idea. Thanks for this, Jack.
Hmm, I do both. My office is cluttered, but I can lay my hands on what I want. I take the attitude of all things go into the back and only emergencies sit in the front.If it ain't bleeding or dying, or if it ain't a gonna cause a hardship like the power cut off...it will wait until tomorrow. This way my chaos is controlled.
Sorry the southern transplant in me came out. lol
I do like order and finding what I need. For example a few years ago my daughter cleaned my office. Everything was organized, uncluttered, in file folders stowed away in my file cabinets, and some little items I was using as research were trashed. I went crazy because she forget to tell me where she put everything before she left! I spent the next six hours looking for this and that instead of writing.
There is chaos, controlled chaos, and minimalist nothingness that is total control.
Oh dear, the helping hand isn't always as helpful as it intends, is it? Sounds as though you prioritize, but in a slightly looser way than I do. As long as it works for you, that's what matters, JL. Thanks for your comment.
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