Writing is easy

The past few posts this year have been about daily writing. I have set out the evidence for you that daily writing is a proven strategy for productivity. I have listed ten ways to write every day. I have explained how you can be productive by writing two hours a day. I have explored how to infuse creative energy into your daily writing. And, I have suggested that you just do it: sit down and write.

If you have read all of these posts, my question for you is: have you tried daily writing yet?

If you have started writing every day, that is excellent news. All you have to do now is persevere.

If, after reading all of these posts, you still cannot or have not carved out at least 30 minutes in your day for writing, I assure you, you are not alone.



I have worked as a writing coach, both for individuals, and as part of the New Faculty Success Program. Working as a writing coach, it became clear to me that people have different relationships to their writing, and that not everyone will write every day simply because they know that it is the best way to be productive.

It took me a while to understand that people face resistance to their writing because that was not my experience. Once I became convinced that I should at least try daily writing, I tried it and it worked. I had to work out a few kinks, but was able to implement the strategy immediately. I am not sure why some people face more resistance to their writing than others, nor why I rarely experience resistance to my writing. I just know that some people do and others do not.

I have been at a conference over the past few days, and have been delighted to meet many readers of this blog. When I meet people who read the blog, they often express awe at my ability to write on a consistent basis. I usually am unsure how to respond, as there is not a big secret to my productivity. It is a direct result of my sitting down and writing every day. Each morning, I sit down to write and, slowly but surely, articles and books are the end result.

I do understand that writing is not easy for everyone. However, I did want to share with you that it is easier for some people. I’d also like to make sure you know that people who do face resistance to their writing can be successful. For those who face resistance, being a productive writer requires overcoming that resistance.

I have written about this before. I discuss some strategies for overcoming resistance in this post on moving through your writing block and in this one on getting through your writing resistance.

Here are three more examples of strategies you can implement that may help you find the time to write.

1. Turn off the Internet on your computer before you go to sleep. When you wake up, go straight to your computer and write for at least 30 minutes before switching the Internet back on.
2. Before ending your work day, write down on a note pad exactly what your writing task will be the next day. For example, you could write: “Insert paragraph on strategic essentialism into literature review section of article.” Begin your next day with that task.
3. Find a writing accountability partner. This can be via phone or in person. If it is via phone, you designate a time to call one another and agree to write for a set period of time. Once that time is up, you call back to report. If you do this in person, you simply meet the other person somewhere and write together.

There are countless other strategies that you could implement to overcome your resistance to writing. The important thing to keep in mind is that you do not have to change yourself as a person to become a better and more productive writer. You simply have to change your behavior, and find strategies that work for you that ensure your productivity.

As you work on building time for writing into you day, keep in mind that the majority of writers face some sort of resistance to their writing and that many are able to overcome this resistance and produce scholarly material.

I do not know why some people face resistance to writing and others do not. I simply know that resistance to writing is a common problem in academia. And, I find comfort in the fact that I have witnessed many people overcome that resistance. I hope you do as well.

Start Writing and Don’t Stop

Do you have a writing project that you can’t seem to get moving on? Is there an article you need to finish, a short essay you need to begin, or page proofs you must attend to?

We all have different relationships with our writing, and most people have at least one kind of writing they find harder than other kinds. In this post, I will discuss one strategy that will help you to finish that very project that seems interminable.

The strategy I suggest is to find 20 to 30 minutes a day each weekday to dedicate to the project. (Or, try using a pomodoro timer.) When the time comes to work on it, turn off all distractions. Turn off your phone. Cut off the Internet. Put all of your reading material away. Open the document and work on it for 20 to 30 minutes.


Do not stop before 20 minutes are up for any reason. Well, anything that is not a real emergency, like a fire alarm. If, while writing, you realize you need a reference, or need to double-check a piece of information, or need to go back to your data, do not stop to check anything. Instead, make a note to yourself about that and find something else to do in the document that does not require fact-checking.

If you get stuck on a word choice, put down both words. You can make stylistic and grammatical changes later. There is no need to stop to check the thesaurus.

Don’t stop to check your data or to fix your tables. Just keep going and make a note to yourself.

Don’t stop for anything. It is only 20 to 30 minutes, and nearly all phone calls, emails, visitors, and even bathroom breaks can wait.

If you dedicate just 20 to 30 minutes to your writing project, you will be surprised to see how quickly you are able to move it along.

When you are nearly done, or when you find yourself with more time and less resistance, you may be able to take a longer writing session to tie things up. You can also use longer writing sessions to go back and check your references, make word choice changes, and fix your tables.

Concentrated, short writing sessions are often the best time to produce new prose, as this process takes lots of mental energy. By working on your project every day, with whatever time you have available, the ideas around the project will percolate in the back of your mind throughout the day, making it easier to get back in the saddle and begin to write again when the time comes.

Ready, Set, Write!

Reflection, Creativity, and the Writing Process

Writing, even academic writing, requires creative energy. As writers, we have to be mindful of protecting and nourishing our creative energies. If not, we risk burnout and serious drops in productivity. Writing well requires practice, but also knowing when to stop.

A few months ago, a friend called me up and said, “Tanya, today, when I was on the treadmill at the gym, I had this fabulous idea!” Does that resonate with you? Do you often have great ideas for writing projects when you are not writing or trying to write? I certainly do.

In fact, this has happened to me so many times recently that I feel compelled to write about it on this blog.

I spent the winter break in Hawai’i, and made a point of walking along the beach every day. I had one of the most important epiphanies about my book project during one of those long beach walks. Here’s what happened. I woke up early and listened to the recording of an amazing oral history of Mateo – one of the deportees in Guatemala whom I had interviewed. As I listened to Mateo’s interview, I became enthralled with the richness of his story. I realized that this was the kind of rich data I was looking for. Not every interviewee has the trust or narrative ability to tell this kind of narrative, but Mateo did. I was particularly struck by his story of how he left Guatemala at the age of ten – alone! – to travel through Mexico and eventually to the United States. As I listened, I recalled other border-crossing narratives and thought to myself that it would be awesome to put Mateo’s story with others. After lunch, while walking along the beach, it became clear to me how I could put those narratives together into a chapter. I then had another epiphany – this one about how I could frame my book on deportees.

I have been struggling for months over how I want to frame the book, and, while walking along the beach, it became clear to me that I could structure the book as a narrative about the migration journey, using different stories to fill in the pieces. It sounds simple, but it was huge to me to finally be able to see how I could structure the book. Without a big idea, I felt stuck in the project.

The point is: the idea came to me when I was not writing, when I was walking along the beach. Since then, I have worked out two other minor writing challenges during my daily walks. These situations have taught me two important lessons:

1. It is important to make space in each day for reflection. Creativity is much less likely to happen if we don’t open up the space for it.
2. Creativity happens when we are engaged with our projects on a daily basis. The ideas occurred to me when I was not writing or attempting to write, but they happened after I had spent time working on the projects.

One of the beautiful beaches in Hawai'i where I walked, and reflected

For me, walking is an obvious way to build time for reflection into my life. What about you? How and when do you find time for reflection?

How to Be Productive by Writing Two Hours a Day

You can be extraordinarily productive by writing two hours a day, five days a week. I know because I practice daily writing and it works.

Many writers find the suggestion to write for two hours every day ludicrous and instead aim to write eight hours a day. Unable to write for eight hours, they berate themselves and spend lots of time thinking how much less productive they are than other writers.



I have tried many different ways of convincing writers that it is much better to write for two hours a day and move on to other things than to try incessantly to write all day without success. The former leads to feeling accomplished and productive on a daily basis, whereas the latter leads to burnout and less productivity. It may not make sense, but it is true: writing for two hours a day is a much more effective long-term strategy than trying to write for eight.

In 2007, I was lucky enough to have a post-doctoral fellowship that involved very few responsibilities. This seems like an ideal situation for someone who wants to write and be productive. I showed up to my office every day and tried to write for as long as I could. Usually I would burn out by lunch time. Other days, I would intend to write, yet find myself surfing around on the Internet or staring at the wall.

I decided to try to write for just two hours a day. It worked, and my writing projects began to move forward. However, I always had this sneaking feeling that I should be trying to write more. With 24 hours in the day, how could I dedicate just two to writing? One week, I decided to try and write as much as possible. I hammered out a full conference paper in one week by writing four to six hours a day. The next week, I showed up at my office on Monday and had trouble getting started. After a few minutes of writing, my mind began to wander and  I found myself surfing the Internet. That week went much less well than the previous one. My experiment taught me that I need to be mindful of my limits. If I over-extend my brain, it won't work as well the next week. I went back to writing two hours a day, and only try to write for three to four hours on an emergency basis.

Last year - 2011 - I wrote for two hours a day, Monday to Friday, for most of the year. I'd venture a guess that I did this about 46 of the 52 weeks during the year.

During the Spring 2011 semester, I wrote every day, Monday to Friday, for two hours. I did lots of different things during those two hours, but I mostly drafted new text, revised old drafts, and took notes from books and articles. Between January 1 and May 1, in four months, I drafted a total of about 42,000 words of new text. A large chunk of that writing - 25,000 words - was the first draft of my third book: Due Process Denied: Detentions and Deportations in the United States. 

It took me about 80 working days to write 42,000 new words, an average of about 525 words a day. Keep in mind that these 42,000 words were very rough drafts, and that I spent much of the remainder of the year revising these drafts. Nevertheless, by December 2011, my third book was in press and the remainder of those words (an article and a book chapter) were under review. Thus, even if I did not write any new text after May 2011, and only revised what I had written, this would have been a productive year.

During the Summer, I did spend a lot of time revising, and also wrote a small amount of new text. I wrote and/or revised for two hours a day for at least two months during the summer. By the end of the summer, I had written about 8,000 new words. In addition, I finalized and revised the short book that I drafted in the Spring, and completed a "revise and resubmit" from a journal. I also analyzed and coded some of my interviews.

During the Fall Semester, I also wrote two hours a day, every day, Monday to Friday, most of the time. There were a few exceptions when I was traveling, but I tried to make up for it. The Fall semester was not as productive as the Spring. In all, I wrote about 21,000 new words. I did not write as many new words as in the Spring because I spent quite a bit of time revising, in addition to taking notes, reading, and preparing and delivering ten presentations.

During AY 2011, then, I wrote about 70,000 new words. I almost never wrote more than two hours a day. There were also very few weekdays when I did not write. The major exceptions are during July when I took a two-week vacation and December when I took another two-week vacation from writing. Taking vacations allows me to maintain my equilibrium, renew my creativity, restore my energy, and continue to be productive.

If you focus on writing every day, you can’t help but be productive. Trying to write more than humanly possible will lead only to frustration and burnout. The best way to be productive and stress-free is to write every day for two hours a day on a consistent basis.

For me, the rewards are clear. The short book I drafted during Spring 2011 will be released in Spring 2012: Due Process Denied: Detentions and Deportations in the United States