Dear Writers,
Many of you know I was successful in my application to the WFTV Kay Mellor Lab last year, and I took part in the Showcase last week. I will be sending a separate newsletter later this week to outline my experience and hopefully answer some questions about how to apply this year.
For now, the one thing that is always on my mind is time.
There just isn’t enough of it. In my experience, women struggle the most with time management in terms of priority setting. Not exclusively, for sure, but stay with me.
Often it isn’t so much the logistical challenge of caring responsibilities, our impetuous health, mum-guilt, the daily grind, and the day job to boot. It’s the mental load all of this carries, which steals away valuable creative headspace.
If you’re reading this and you’re fortunate enough not to wake up exhausted every day, or perhaps you don’t have those caring responsibilities, or even manage to treat your body like a temple and biohack your way through menopause, please email me and tell me your secrets!
As we talked about in our first newsletter, balance is key. But it isn’t always easy. And if you’re like me, as soon as you start paying one area of your life more attention, the others get neglected.
So how do I manage my time, health, commitments, and everything else?
In truth, often, I don’t. Often I give my writing career too much, and I’m too tired to function properly in the day job. Or I dedicate time to moving more and eating better, and I’m not thinking about my scripts. Or I’m always writing and not spending enough time with the family. Or I’m with the family and not spending enough time writing. It goes on.
My top tips:
Keep the to-do list short. No one likes to be reminded of how little they’ve done each day!
Be more reactive. See an opportunity, go for it. You have nothing to lose, and everything to gain
Make a start on something. Boost your LinkedIn profile, open an Instagram account, write a scene that’s buzzing around your head.
I started to map my mental and physical patterns. The cycles that my energy and focus work in. I do a time audit every month, keeping a detailed record of everything I do, and then ask ChatGPT to analyse it:
You are highly responsive, which works for you. You reply quickly. You follow up. You keep threads warm.
Your best work happens in conversation, not isolation. Your momentum is clearly people-driven.
You create parallel tracks that feed each other. You are not doing one thing, you are building a system.
You are outcome-tolerant, not outcome-dependent. You log rejections alongside wins without slowing down.
Your risk point is overload, not inactivity. You are not at risk of doing too little. You are at risk of doing too much that is diffuse.
You send a wave of emails and messages. That triggers a cluster of meetings. Those meetings generate opportunities. Then you consolidate through posts, events, or sharing.
This is efficient. It suits someone balancing a day job. It also means you should protect the outreach phase, because everything else depends on it.
I then use this to help me adjust for the month ahead and keep on track.
I often fall into the trap of overdoing it, but I usually scale back and hit restart. I’ve done a lot of outreach this year, and now I am making time to write.
But as you can see, the business of writing isn’t just writing. You don’t need to do everything all at once. You just need to make a start. Whether that’s on a new script idea, networking, social media, or whatever you’ve been putting off!
Task this week:
What did you decide to make a start on? Let me know!
Best wishes,
Helen
Next up… Agents, why the rush? (And What Writers Should Expect)