What To Do When Scheduling No Longer Works

It shouldn’t come as a huge surprise that I am a fan of having a weekly schedule for my work.

(I am aware that I radiate intense organizational vibes, and I will not apologize for having a plan for everything I do lol)

So while historically setting a structured schedule for getting my work done has worked well for me,

I have recently been exploring other forms of creative writing, I am finding that the system that has served me for almost three decades of my life is no longer working as well as I woud like.

(Yes, I know that is dramatic, but that’s just my style babyyyy).

Allow me to explain:

I have a history with planning

As long as I can remember, I have been a ✨girlie who needs a weekly plan✨ in order to stay on top of my workload.

(Obviously, the plan isn’t always maintained perfectly, but having a structure and a rough plan of how I am going to tackle projects helps calm down my very fast brain from spiraling with stress).

And while this system has worked very well for me in getting my freelancing work done,

I have noticed that it is not as effective for other types of writing, like exploring creative fiction writing.

(And this has been nothing but frustrating for me).

For those of you who don’t know, I am currently dipping my toes into attempting fiction writing,

(Link to follow that journey on my free Substack here, I would love to have ya!)

And when I started that project, I made the logical assumption that setting a weekly writing schedule would be the natural step to keep me moving forward.

Turns out, I was wrong — because HOLY MOLEY is creative fiction writing a totally different beast.

Turns out, you can’t just plan to be creative

Basically, I made the bold assumption that if I blocked time off on my calendar consistently to sit down and write fiction I would be able to stumble my way through creating something resembling a fiction story.

(Great idea in theory, impossible in reality, I am learning).

While this system works super well for me for creating something short or focused,

(Like freelance projects or this newsletter, for example),

Fiction writing is so much bigger, nebulous, and creatively demanding, meaning that it takes a lot more out of me every time I sit down to write.

So far, fiction writing for me has been very feast of famine:

I will have periods where I feel like I can write a lot quite quickly and others where I just sit down and stare into the void internally and sometimes externally screaming.

So while I know these cycles of productivity are normal, I find that when I am struggling to write, my ability to stick to my schedule disappears in thin air, which is totally new struggle for me.

TL;DR — different writing projects require different approaches

Basically, this article is a call for help from my fellow freelancers who have tried to dip their toes into different creative pursuits and struggled with having to change up how you approach it.

Did you find that the systems you use to create your typical work were effective for new creative projects, or did you also struggle to keep the system going?

I’m incredibly interested to hear more about anything any of you are willing to share,

(And I would LOVE to hear how any of you have tackled this issue in the past!)

Leave a comment and let me know your experiences,

(Especially if you are not a system/schedule person, I would love to hear about other ways that people get things done that are different from how I have done it!)

Until next week,