by Jenna Kalinsky.
Writers have a reputation for being sweat-stained, frustrated, and a little thin in both the sweater elbows and soul. Back in the day, we drank. Now, we jog. I’m sure some people good at time management do both.
Why? Because writing is notoriously hard. When Red Smith once famously said, “Writing is easy. All you have to do is open a vein,” on one hand, lighten up, dude! On the other, he was kind of right.
Writers have a long-standing love-hate relationship with writing namely for two reasons:
Unless you have a high-income-earning partner, have a plushy trust fund, and/or are far enough along in your career that you can earn a living from your writing, you’ve got to fight to stuff the work between the cracks of everything else.
It’s not uncommon for writers to have to start their day at 5 a.m. before their toddler stirs or they have to get to their day job. Or to thunk down at the computer, half-awake after a long day of cooking, commuting, and caregiving. Plus, you still need to floss! It never ends!
The idea of spending time on “self-care” may seem illusive to writers, whose every moment is accounted for in your effort to squeeze the writing in amongst all else.
Yet writers need self-care more than they know. Without it, they can feel fatigued and their writing less joyful and more a burden. From there, it’s a short step to stopping altogether.
The solution to both staying buoyed and buoyed for your writing is this: begin viewing the very thing that makes you need self-care as the self-care itself.
In this way, a writer can feel rewarded, whole, and rejuvenated from their writing and by their writing.
By shifting your mindset, viewing your writing through a different lens, and even talking about your writing using new language, you can turn your burden into an alleviation, a release, and a fulfilling pleasure.
Self-care is typically thought of as indulgences we give ourselves that remove us from the burdens of our lives. Facials, yoga, buying a new pair of shoes.
According to Psychotherapist and OLP instructor Vaishali Patel, all forms of self care—from micro actions to intensive gestures— are equally powerful.
This means that while spa days and vacations are amazing, taking a short break to stretch, watching a kitten video, or acknowledging having finally sent that email are all restorative.
Ultimately, all it takes to attend to the self in a way that will make you feel better is to be aware you’re caring for yourself in that moment.
This mindful acknowledgment that you’re engaging in self-care already makes you feel better and more whole.
The trick is teaching yourself to be that mindful:
• pause while walking to note the patch of pure blue in the sky
• take a deep breath when the kids are acting up
• celebrate having read a paragraph in a book that blew your mind.
If you know that even these tiny gestures of mindfulness will recharge you from within, you’ll be more likely to do them … mindfully.
Indeed, Socrates was on to something when he noted the examined life is worth living.
One of the best examples of re-seeing one’s reality is visual artist Lenka Clayton’s Artist Residency in Motherhood. When her son was 18 months old, rather than view him as a barrier to her writing, she decided to use her newfound motherhood to make art because of and inspired by it.
In her manifesto, she states,
I will undergo this self-imposed artist residency in order to fully experience and explore the fragmented focus, nap-length studio time, limited movement and resources and general upheaval that parenthood brings and allow it to shape the direction of my work, rather than try to work ‘despite it.'
Hers is a perfect example of what it looks like to embrace her life and make the best kind of lemon aide from an 18-month-old lemon (kidding, children are beautiful. It’s just an expression).
Self-care doesn’t have to be a break from the things we do; self-care can also be the actual doing of the things we do.
When you pause to consider it, you will probably realize that when you write, you are caring for yourself. You are paying attention to the needs of your inner landscape, the you inside that requires that conversation with the page.
For you, doing what you need to do, giving your writing its time and protecting that time is the ultimate gesture of self-care.
It’s a tiny shift to go from “have to” to “get to,” but it makes a world of difference.
You don’t have to write. You don’t have to get my 500 words in. You get to.
Positive language changes everything. You can dread having to plant your “bum in the chair” to do the work, or you can celebrate that you are lucky enough to get to have that time to do what gives you so much.
There’s actually a name for this “Jedi mind-tricking yourself through language use: “Anxiety Reappraisal,” which you can read about in “Don’t Feel Like Writing? 2 Tricks for Turning Dread into Enthusiasm.”
Self-care is essential for everyone and everything that gives to others. Even machines have self-care; it is called maintenance. We cannot function long term without taking care of ourselves. Without it our health, our relationships, and our self-identity all suffer. Not only that, but we cannot be amazing at what we do if we don’t take superior care of ourselves. So, if we want to go out there and change the world, we NEED to invest time, energy, and resources in nurturing ourselves.
Every writer knows deep down that they don’t have to write. You could close your laptop and never do it again.
Sure, you may be called to it, but it’s still a choice, one you make even when it’s hard, even when your “soul is as thin as a playing card” because the benefit truly outweighs the hassle of fitting it in.
I’ve written on scraps of paper, in hotels on hotel stationery, in automobiles. If it arrives you know. If you know it really has come, then you have to put it down.
Granted, the squeezing it in is still hard, and respect to every writer out there who finds a way to make it work. Toni Morrison wrote her first novel on the train to and from work, writers the world over awake in the dark, and some even risk personal safety or political persecution to get the words down. But they do it because it’s important.
When you arrive at your appointed writing time and you pause to recognize that the writing you do is noble, meaningful, and relevant—a gift—you will feel that little bit more cared for and feel calmer, happier, and a better writer. Even, or especially, at five in the morning.
We are here to support, inspire, and guide you through your writing process and with your projects. Toiling alone works for only so long; collaborate with a writing coach or mentor, and see how quickly your spirit lifts and how much more productive and motivated you can be.
Feel free to reach out for a free chat about how we can help you reach your goals. Your writing matters, and we’re here to help you do it.
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3 Responses
Thanks so much for this article. Self care is so key. I’ve recently managed to re-frame my thinking around life’s intrusions into my writing process: everything I do feeds into my writing. My time with my aging, fragile parents, with demanding family, with work and friends in crisis – all sustain my writing life. This thinking isn’t always available to me, but when I can click into it, I know I’m living a writing life, and not only in the moments of bum to chair.
Kath, what a beautiful meditation on what self-care can look like for a writer. It’s viewing everything through a lens of compassion and possibility and just letting it come. There’s a lot of trust involved in being a creative, and during times when you are forced to give your attention elsewhere, it’s a comfort to know the ideas and meaning can still enter and bide their time until you can get them to the page. Thank you for sharing this lovely idea-
I am writing my fifth book which I hope will be published this summer. This winter was especially hard for me when I usually do some of my best writing. The blizzard and three feet of snow blocking all my exits, seven large trees down and what looked like an endless winter of one challenge after another. For me, my self-care is getting outside in my garden, making sure I stay connected with friends where I live and far away. I stopped writing as my concentration would not hold. I’m a panster with a general idea of where the storyline is going, and my characters have always seemed to speak to me and lead the way. This winter the characters did not speak and I remember JK had told me when she was editing my first book – just get something down. So that’s what I did. I love cooking and decided that my self-care break was writing. It worked and I am about to send five more chapters of my next book to my publisher. I hope to finish and publish by the end of May. My advice is to think positively about your writing take breaks doing something tht makes you happy to refresh your energy, and then write. Getting something down on paper moves you forward and the process of self-care and writing will begin to form a positive circle.