How to Create a Writing Habit

TL;DR: Keep your promises to yourself, build momentum, and then work your way towards building a writing habit.

Just experiment, just prove it to yourself. If you practice this really small, literally a five minute routine that you do every single day, even if your heart is in it or if it isn’t, then you’ll learn how to trust yourself. You’ll start thinking, “Oh, yeah, I can do that. I did this every single day for like, 90 days in a row. And that was an amazing feeling. But the funny thing is, is even without trying, you are transforming through that process, you learn how to rely on yourself. And then when it really matters with something you care passionately about like writing, you can rise to the occasion. And that will create such a healthy relationship between you and what you believe you are capable of.

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Transcript:

Hello, this is Alex Knepper. I am just hopping on here because I wanted to share a story. And I don't I don't really know how to start, but let's just talk about how last year, it was October. And I was really struggling with finding out what my purpose is trying to figure out what makes me happy, where I want to invest my time, different projects that I wanted to work on, everything seemed to be pulling me in all sorts of different directions.

And one thing that was really calling to me was just journaling about it, and trying to figure out where all this like kind of chaos was coming from and why I just couldn't seem to think straight or why I felt like I just didn't have a clear path ahead of me. And so I realized that obviously, I was having, like, some problems figuring out what what I actually wanted. That was the first thing that was wrong is that I didn't know what I was chasing. And journaling. And doing self reflection really helped me with that. And so I decided that I wanted to just work on myself.

And one of the first things I did, I wish I remembered how I got on this trajectory, but I started meditating every single day. And what I would do is I would go to Spotify, and I just looked up five minute meditation. And I found one that I really, really liked. And again, it's just an audio recording like a podcast, they had one episode, it's mantra meditations, I love it, I still use it to this day, even though I know the meditation forwards and backwards. But I started to just listen to this every single day.

And the thing is, at the beginning, I wasn't actually meditating, I was just listening to this audio for five minutes and trying to limit any other distractions that were around me during that those five minutes. Those are, that was my time. And the funny thing that started to happen is that I eventually started to meditate. That is, what just sort of started to happen. I wasn't trying to meditate. In the beginning, I didn't really understand how to meditate. But just by showing up every single day, and turning on that five minute meditation recording, that helps me develop that habit where I would miss it if I wasn't doing it. Or I would feel like really off balance if I wasn't meditating.

So the thing I learned from this is that when it comes to developing a new habit, it's not necessarily about what you're doing. It's just the fact that you are doing it. So in the beginning of starting these five minute meditations, I wasn't able to meditate. But I just got into the routine of turning on the meditation and just trying my hardest to be quiet for five minutes. And then eventually, it just became so easy for me to do this.

So fast forward a couple of months, in February of this year, I had a major injury. And I had to go to physical therapy. And the injury was preventing me from being able to walk. And I don't want to get into details because it like so freaks me out. But so I had to go to physical therapy for it. And they had told me that I needed to do these workouts twice a day, every single day. And I was so scared by the pain that I was in scared that something like this might happen to me again that I started doing the physical therapy twice a day, every day.

But the thing is, I swear that I never would have been able to do something as challenging as that had I not understood the power of just showing up every day from during the five minute meditations only a few months before.

So I really do think that once you get over the hump of learning how to trust yourself, right? Because if you show up for yourself every single day and you attempt to do the thing that you say you're going to do, you begin to trust yourself and that brings a lot of power.

So when I was meditating every day I trusted myself to come to each day with graciousness and peace.

When I showed up every single day to do physical therapy, I promised myself that I was going to heal my body with physical therapy.

And so I think by proxy, you can take this a step further for people who want to write, and write books and write often and write well, is just get into the habit of showing up and writing something down. It can be, I hate writing, and this is stupid, or I'm never going to be a published author, or I don't have anything to say, just write that down, and get in the habit. Because like I said, In the beginning of my story, it's not necessarily what you're practicing, that is the biggest issue, it's that you haven't developed a habit to support the thing that you're trying to do in the first place.

So it's not about writing at first, it's about building the habit of writing. It's not what you write, it's that you're writing in the first place. Because let's be honest, a lot of us suffer from perfectionism. So we think everything that we have to write has to be perfect. But that's not necessarily how it works.

I've been working in the publishing industry for four years. And I have seen many scripts in all shapes and sizes all throughout the process. And I have to say, the books that we get in the beginning are unrecognizable to the books that end up on the bookshelves. So even the best writers, people who were this is their career, they're not always producing excellent writing every single time, what they're coming up with, first of all, they have the habit to actually produce something because a publisher or an editor, if you're going to Self Publish, and just go that way, they need something to work with.

So your job as a writer, is to just produce something that they can work with, it doesn't have to be good. And I'd like to remind anyone who's listening to this, that a prerequisite to being a writer, or calling yourself a writer is not that you produce good writing. It's never about good writing. It's just about writing. And then just to take a step back, it's not about what you write, but it's about developing that habit of writing. And that's what's going to allow you to succeed in the sphere, of publishing and literature.

So yeah, I've, over the past couple months, I've had like a couple of, of epiphanies. And I think, the other piece of advice that I would impart to anyone who wants to develop a strong writing routine. And if you're finding that you're meeting a lot of resistance with that, find a different habit that's easier for you, and just prove to yourself that you can do it.

It can be something like, I'm going to play video games every single day for 10 minutes. And it's like, okay, that's super, super fun. But you just need to be able to prove yourself to yourself that you're able to rise up to the occasion, and you're able to do keep your promises to yourself.

We're so drawn and so motivated to keep promises to other people, like our bosses, or family or partners or friends, you always show up for them. But we're not in the practice of showing up for ourselves. We feel like we can let ourselves down more than anyone else. And so my challenge to you would be create consistency in your life, show up for yourself in a small way.

Keep your promise to yourself, build momentum, and then work your way towards building a writing habit. Just experiment, just prove it to yourself like I did with my meditation practice. The meditating had nothing to do with the physical therapy, which changed my life. By the way. It was the fact that I was able to practice this really small, literally a five minute routine that I would do every single day, even if my heart was in it or if it wasn't in it. And then I learned how to trust myself. Oh, yeah, I can do that. I did this every single day for like, 90 days in a row. And that was an amazing feeling. And, and the funny thing is, is even without trying, like I was transforming through that process, I was able to learn those lessons and learn that I could rely on myself. And then when it really mattered with something like physical therapy, I was able to rise to the occasion and really helped myself out. And that created such a healthy relationship between me and what I believed I was capable of.

And so It's something that I've been trying to apply to my own writing practice. And I think it's something that would be helpful for any writer or any creative who just needs to get themselves in the mindset. Just Just don't think about the writing. Think about the habit of writing. Yeah, so I think that's all I wanted to share today. Thank you. For my one listener who's hanging out and listening to me. I hope this was helpful. If it was, I'd love to hear your feedback, or think about or please reply and let me know what you're working on and how you might want to apply this to your own life. It's been a pleasure to speak for you and I'm going to figure out how to end this. I think it's here. Okay. Bye.