Changes I Made Post-Burnout: Writing Process

Welcome to my follow-up post on changes I’ve made post-burnout!

In the previous post (which I recommend reading first), I talked a bit about discovering my top three Clifton Strengths, which were:

-          Focus

-          Discipline

-          Achievement

Yes. I know. My name is Sylvia Mercedes, and I am a workaholic.

BUT . . . these ARE my strengths and, when utilized properly, can be turned in to veritable superpowers of production. But only if they’re used correctly.

I thoroughly enjoyed Becca Syme’s online conference this summer, which focused on utilizing our individual writing strengths to grow our platforms and strengthen our writing careers. After sinking deep into Burnout last year, I have been scrambling to recover my previous writing pace and (hopefully) rebuild my lagging indie career.

The most important thing I learned about myself as an indie author—I am a RESPAWN AUTHOR.

That is to say, my platform/business grows by the quick and consistent production of more books.

Not social media posts.

Not viral TikToks (Lord, help me!)

Not gorgeous character art (But . . . the pretties . . . ?)

Not interviews or features or any of the other more flashy trappings of an indie romantasy novelist’s career.

More books.

That’s it.

Which means . . . I have to buckle down, utilize my Focus strength, and WRITE.

So this is what I’ve done.

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WRITING PROCESS CHANGES TO SUPERCHAGE MY WRITING SPEED:

First: I cut out social media

Not ABSOLUTELY entirely. You’ll still see me post now and again, as I have inspiration or inclination.

But I deleted the apps from my phone, removing the temptation to scroll (which, for me, tends to lead to comparison games that do NOT bode well for my mental health).

I’m no longer desperately trying to MAKE something take off in social media spheres.

I’m focusing on writing more books. That’s it.

Now this was a really scary change to make. In this day and age, social media success is basically THE SUCCESS that we see and are aware of. Which can easily lead one to believe social media success is THE ONLY SUCCESS to be had.

According to Becca Syme . . . this ain’t so.

In fact, there are numerous authors out there, whom you’ve never heard of, who aren’t on social media at all . . . and who are making fantastic livings by doing what they do best: WRITING BOOKS.

And let’s be honest . . . I am the worst at social media. The more I try to be winsome and charming, the more I look like I’m TRYING TO BE WINSOME AND CHARMING.

I’m awkward.

I’m nervous.

I’m illiterate in all things social-media-language.

It’s just not a sphere in which I shine.

And if the name of the game these days is leaning into my STRENGTHS as opposed to fighting my WEAKNESSES . . . You see where I’m going with this?

So yeah. Social Media Virality is not going to be my means to fame and fortune.

But I sure as heck can write books. Lots of books. GOOD books. Quickly.

So that’s what I’m focusing on right now.

(I guess this is almost more of a lifestyle change than a writing process change. But social media was so tangled up in my work day, it’s hard for me to separate the two, so it ended up over here.)

Second: Utilize my Snap Draft Method . . . but differently

Okay, so what is the Snap Draft Method?

I don’t want to go into too much detail about this now  . . . that’s a blog post in and of itself.

Long story short: the snap draft is an INCREDIBLY ROUGH DRAFT that I write before I write the polished draft.

I’ve been using this method for years, so snap drafting itself is not a process change for me.

But here’s the thing: I used to write entire manuscripts in snap draft . . . we’re talking about 100K words of insanely messy, raw material, all pounded out in about three weeks of creative exertion.

Then I would turn around and spend the next four or five weeks POLISHING the snap draft—transforming that mess into something beautiful.

This method worked . . . until it didn’t.

I found myself becoming more and more intimidated by the ENORMITY of the mess. The snap drafting itself was fun and exciting . . . but the process of transforming it into polished work was just so very exhausting.

Also . . . there were always things I would discover and change during the polish. Things that were not evident when in the creative mad-dash of the snap draft. Sometimes those changes would take the book in such wildly different directions, rendering days and days worth of snap draft obsolete. So I’d have to start large chunks of the book over again.

It just wasn’t a smooth process. Not anymore.

So now I do what I call my Snap-and-Polish method. It basically goes like this:

-          Snap draft 1-4 chapters at a time. No more than 4!

-          Polish them immediately so that I can see what the final product will look like.

-          Move on  to the next 1-4 chapters

I find I like to polish in the morning . . . when I start work at 5 am, my brain is always at its freshest, so that’s when I want to be applying it to the more challenging task of refining rough prose into something pretty.

Then I spend my afternoon snap drafting the next chunk of book (so I’ll have it to polish in the morning).

Snap drafting is generally just really, really fun, low pressure work, so I’m happy to do it in the afternoons when my brain is a bit more mushy.

So that was the big change. Snap-and-Polish as opposed to Snap-the-Entire-Thing-and-Then-Polish.

Third: Twenty Minute Timers

When snap drafting, I race the timer to try to generate THE MOST words I can in twenty minutes (my record is 1514). When polishing, I simply use the timer to keep my brain completely in gear, no distractions allowed until the timer goes off.

Now I’ve been using timers for six or seven years now. The change I made was the time . . . 20 minutes, as opposed to 40 minutes.

Unfortunately, with the advent of Twin-Mom-Brain, I simply cannot maintain healthy focus for 40 minutes at a time anymore! Maybe someday I’ll get back up there . . . but these days, 20 minutes is very doable.

Using the timer method, I usually snap draft between 5k and 10k words a day, which I then polish the following morning. As a result, entire manuscripts get written VERY quickly.

And, because I’ve done a lot of the messy problem solving in the snap draft, the polished draft is just that: polished. Clean. In need of a proof read, yes, but otherwise basically ready to go.

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So there you have it. My writing process these days is focused on quick production and as much ENJOYMENT as possible. I’m leaning into my strengths—habits are my friend, a sense of achievement motivates me, give me all the early morning hours, please—and concentrating on the thing I actually love doing most: writing.

It’s been a miraculous difference thus far. After the last several years of struggle, I actually love DOING what I do again. And that’s a wonderful thing.