When I first started writing novels, it took years to train myself to treat the thinking time as work. I still have a hard time with that. It is work, but I'm no longer wrecking my body doing it. Instead, I'm fighting through burnout and on the fiction side emptying the well without refilling it.4/?

I always feel that if I'm not writing I'm not working. The thinking and walking time isn't working but it should be.I always feel that if I'm not writing I'm not working. The thinking and walking time isn't working but it should be.

That's my problem also. There's just no glow; plus I have never felt so ignored as I do after publishing my stuffz. I do want to tell stories. So I am turning my head toward graphic and visual novels. Though I might psyched myself out on the VN front. After making one, I want it to be more.

Jarod and I call it "writing adjacent work" and it's so important!

My daughter switched from driving a huge dump truck on construction sites to project mgmt. She is constantly stunned by how little she actually does in an office. :D I could paint the entire house, & if I don't write that day, I will complain how I didn't get anything done. #amwriting

So, there are definite costs, but, as someone who has done the ditch digging side of labor too, I know that in so many ways it's _much_ easier and that leaves a part of me feeling guilty about claiming that it's _work_. 5/?

I've also had a hard time with this. However, after reading "Why We Sleep" I now feel like my naps are an important part of the creative process. Science!

I spent a few weeks tracking my time usage. Even figuring out *how* to track "thinking time" was a challenge, because I don't sit down and say, okay, starting now -- it happens while doing other things. Yet it *is* work, and a vital component of the job.

It’s like when your laptop tells you it’s doing ‘background’ tasks. You’re not tapping away at your keyboard but your story is brewing.