Is making decisions usually one of your superpowers but you still can’t write your book? You need the power of decision.

Watch my video below, or read the post to find out how to make the decision to write your book. 

Hello my lovely writers!

Are you somebody who, once you make a decision about something and you’ve decided you’re going to do it, it happens? Would you say that is one of your superpowers and one of the things many people admire about you? 

When you make a decision, when you say you’re going to do something, even if nobody is watching you, even if nobody has asked for it, you say, ‘I’m going to do it,’ and it gets done? 

If this is you, you’re possibly wondering why this is not happening when you want to write your book. You say to yourself, ‘I want to write this book and I’ve told people I want to write it,’ but it’s still not happening and you end up wondering, ‘Why can’t I write my book?‘ 

The power of decision

The question I have for you then, is: Have you decided this is your time to write that book? 

Have you made the decision that you want to write your book? Have you really made the decision that this is your calling and that this is for you – there’s no two ways about it, you want to do it and you want it to happen? 

My guess is you haven’t really made the decision. There’s something holding you back, you’re not quite sure what it is and it frustrates you. It frustrates you but you haven’t yet made the decision you’re going to write this book but, once you do make that decision, it will happen. Just like so many other things in your life. That’s the power of decision. 

What’s holding you back?

A question for you to ask yourself is: Have you made that decision? If not, what’s holding you back? When you are ready to do it, commit yourself. Get it done and it will be the easiest thing for you to incorporate into your life, for you to work towards and for you to get done. 

Before you know it, you’ll be emailing me, saying, ‘Emma, I’ve written that book. I made the decision. I’ve written my book and here’s where you can get your copy.’ 

Have you made that decision? If not, have a think about whether you really want this. If you do really want it, embrace the power of decision. 

Emma xx

Emma Dhesi

Emma Dhesi is a Certified Author Accelerator Book Coach and bestselling author who helps writers let go of perfectionism, self-doubt and writer's block through her signature programme, Unlock Your Creative Block.

She is the host of the YouTube Channel, Emma Dhesi, where she interviews debut and experienced authors alike.

Through her 1:1 coaching programme, Emma helps new authors start and finish their first novel.

Emma provides personal written feedback on their pages and guides them through the emotional rollercoaster that is writing a novel!

Do you want to know the secret to effortless writing? Of course you do!

Watch my video below, or read the post, and I’ll share my secrets with you. 

Hello my lovely writers!

One of the things I always try to get writers to do is to relax more with their writing. I encourage them not to be so earnest and such a perfectionist about it. 

I encourage them to remember why they started writing in the first place. It was because it was fun or something to release them from the stresses of day-to-day living. 

Writing was enjoyable and, crucially, great for your brain as well. As creatives, we need to do something creative most days to keep our brain balanced. In the same way some people need to go for a walk, run or cycle ride, creatives need to do something creative. 

The secret to effortless writing

Lightening up with your writing and not taking it so seriously is twofold. On the one hand, you enjoy it more when you come to it with a lighter heart, and a sense of excitement and adventure, rather than a task that’s got to be done. 

Then on the other hand, by dint of that, you bring this lightness to your book for your reader as well. 

I’m currently reading a book by Lucy Foley called The Paris Apartment and, even though it’s a dark, dark story, there is a real lightness to it. 

There’s a kind of fun element to it, it bounces along nicely and that is probably because she does too. Lucy bounces along with this book and you can tell she enjoyed writing it and that translates through to the reader experience. If the writer has enjoyed writing it then the reader is going to enjoy reading it. 

Don’t take your writing so seriously

Harlan Coben also comes to mind as he loves the writing process. Harlan Coben enjoys the challenge it comes with and that shows in his writing. Whether or not you like his stories, or that genre of stories, you can see that lightness and the fluidity with which the stories go from one scene to the next. 

So, I really want to encourage you to try your best not to take this so seriously. Enjoy your writing, go with the flow, see where the story takes you and know you can come back and tweak things later. Doing this will have a ripple effect later on with your reader. Your reader is going to feel that joy and going to go along with you and have a much better experience. 

If you enjoy your writing, it’s twofold. You enjoy it and so does your reader. 

Emma xx

Emma Dhesi

Emma Dhesi is a Certified Author Accelerator Book Coach and bestselling author who helps writers let go of perfectionism, self-doubt and writer's block through her signature programme, Unlock Your Creative Block.

She is the host of the YouTube Channel, Emma Dhesi, where she interviews debut and experienced authors alike.

Through her 1:1 coaching programme, Emma helps new authors start and finish their first novel.

Emma provides personal written feedback on their pages and guides them through the emotional rollercoaster that is writing a novel!

Watch my video below, or read the post, to get some advice on project management for writers.

Hello my lovely writers!

I want to talk today about project management for writers. When we start writing, we have this wonderful creative idea, we have characters and we think, ‘Oh, what if this happened?’ and ‘Wouldn’t it be great if that happened?’ and we start writing our stories. 

But when you think about it, writing a long form piece of fiction is a project. It’s not a small sewing project, for example, that you can complete in three hours on a Saturday afternoon. Writing a book is a big project that’s going to take you months or – for some people – years, particularly if it’s your first book. 

Project management for writers

I want to encourage you to start thinking about your novel as a project, a project that needs management and, like any other project, we need to set milestones for it. Project management might be something you do in your work life but you’ve never thought, ‘Oh, I need to apply these same project management skills to my creative life,’ but it’s incredibly helpful if you can. 

I always encourage writers to set a date by which they want to have their first draft written because, as newer writers, that in itself is a huge feat and a giant milestone. 

Set a date in the future when you think you’ll be able to write this book. This will vary depending on your lifestyle as, if you are someone who is retired, for example, you’ll have more time available to you, and perhaps able to write it quicker than someone working full-time who has only one or two days a week in which to write. If you’re working and you’ve got kids or other caring responsibilities, you might only have one afternoon a week to do it. 

Have a look at your own lifestyle and determine how often you can write and how much you can write in each writing session and work it out from there. What will be a realistic goal for you to achieve this first draft by? 

Remember, this isn’t a race, it’s a marathon and, the busier you are outside of writing, the longer that marathon is going to be. 

Give yourself deadlines

Give yourself those deadlines, give yourself something to aim for and, if you’re writing a first draft, aim to get that skeleton chapter one, chapter two, chapter three or chapter four, just so you get through to that first draft. 

The first draft doesn’t need to be perfect, you just need to get something down. You need to keep moving. You need to keep that momentum and, what that allows you to do is, as you finish each chapter, or that skeleton draft of each chapter, you can tick it off so you see the achievement you’re making. You see the progress you’re making and it feels like you’re getting somewhere and that you are actually getting towards that milestone of writing your first draft. 

Software gives you a visual reminder

If you have writing software available to you, that’s wonderful as well, as you see a visual reminder every time you open Scrivener, or Atticus, for example. Every time you open your writing program, you see a new chapter and every time you close the program, there’s a new chapter in there, which gives you that feel-good feeling, that burst of adrenaline, that happy hormone that is a serotonin release that makes you feel good and in turn will make you much more likely to come back to the page because you’ve got good memories about the last time you were there. 

See if you can do that because it will help you stay motivated and, as we know with anything that takes time to do, there’s ups and downs and we need to find ways to keep us motivated, keep us buoyant, keep us going and remain resilient throughout it all until we get to the end. 

An extra tip

Here’s an extra tip. Try and keep to a routine with that writing. If you know you can write three or four days a week, or three or four sessions a week, try and make them the same sessions nine out of ten weeks to get continuity going. If you know you only have one afternoon a week, then make sure it’s that same afternoon if you can so you have this feeling of continuity and momentum. The more routine something feels, the easier it is to do. When it’s something new, we feel it’s going to be an uphill battle, and then we are much less likely to do it but if we’re able to make writing a routine in our week, it’s going to feel less stressful, less difficult and we’re much more likely to turn up and do it. 

Set yourself a milestone. When are you going to finish this first draft by? If you use software, use that to see you’ve got these clear set milestones coming up and that you’ve written chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 3 and so on so you can see it. If you can, try and establish that routine so it feels nice and easy. As easy as brushing your teeth, say. 

Does this resonate with you?

Do you see now why project management for writers is important? Let me know in the comments if this resonates with you and if you’ve found ways of making writing a regular part of your week. It’s so, so important to build that routine, that momentum and keep going until the end. 

I’d love to hear from you, so let me know below. 

Emma xx

Emma Dhesi

Emma Dhesi is a Certified Author Accelerator Book Coach and bestselling author who helps writers let go of perfectionism, self-doubt and writer's block through her signature programme, Unlock Your Creative Block.

She is the host of the YouTube Channel, Emma Dhesi, where she interviews debut and experienced authors alike.

Through her 1:1 coaching programme, Emma helps new authors start and finish their first novel.

Emma provides personal written feedback on their pages and guides them through the emotional rollercoaster that is writing a novel!

Writing rules are guidelines. We are artists and there is no absolute. 

Watch my video below, or read the post, to find out why writing rules are guidelines. 

Hello my lovely writers!

I was reminded recently of a workshop I attended with the lovely Tiffany Yates Martin from Fox Editorial. She hosted a really good workshop on deep third point of view and some participants got confused about the difference between a deep third point of view and first point of view, where the overlap is and how there are some similarities as well as some differences. 

Some participants wanted absolute hard and fast rules on how to know when something is deep third, how to use it and why you would use it instead of first.

It got to the point where Tiffany wasn’t able to give an absolute. 

Writing rules are guidelines

Tiffany reminded us that, in all the craft books we read, in all the guidelines we’re given and in all the rules we’re told about how you show don’t tell, always use active voice, etc., that these are simply guidelines. 

When we’re beginning our writing life and trying to understand how it all works, we can get caught up in the rules of writing. You’ll see this in some of the comments on social media – people picking up on very intricate things about what’s correct and what’s incorrect. A bit pedantically, I feel, sometimes. 

What I loved about Tiffany’s advice was that she reminded us these are guidelines and, once you know the guidelines, you can go ahead and break them but, ultimately, if it works, it works. 

In art there is no absolute

It reminded me that we are artists and in art there is no absolute. Throughout the history of painting, people are always trying to break those rules, push those boundaries and come up with something new. 

For us in our fiction, we can do something similar. Yes, we want to know we’ve got narrative drive and yes, we want to know something’s easy to read, particularly if we’re writing commercial genre fiction. 

But out there on the edges, you’ll see more experimental literary writers trying something new and different. Not necessarily easy to read but they’re pushing boundaries and they’re breaking the rules in a very deliberate way. They know there is trial and error in writing.

Don’t worry about the rules

That might not be the type of fiction you want to write but the emotions are the same. If you’re writing something and it flows and it works and it does what you need it to do, don’t worry about the rules. 

Keep the flow going, keep the story pushing forward, keep your momentum going as the creator, particularly in first drafting, but don’t get too hung up on the rules. 

The rules are there for you to have a baseline knowledge but, if you find in your creativity, in the art of writing your fiction, you need to switch things around and that it works best if you break a particular rule or guideline, go for it. 

Emma xx

Emma Dhesi

Emma Dhesi is a Certified Author Accelerator Book Coach and bestselling author who helps writers let go of perfectionism, self-doubt and writer's block through her signature programme, Unlock Your Creative Block.

She is the host of the YouTube Channel, Emma Dhesi, where she interviews debut and experienced authors alike.

Through her 1:1 coaching programme, Emma helps new authors start and finish their first novel.

Emma provides personal written feedback on their pages and guides them through the emotional rollercoaster that is writing a novel!

When the thought of writing feels overwhelming, it’s because you need to develop a writing routine.

Watch my video below, or read the post, to find out why a writing routine is necessary.

Hello my lovely writers!

When you think about writing your book, often you’ll be thinking about the finished product, which is your book on the book shelf or in the store. When you’re thinking about that level of project and the amount of work involved, it can feel overwhelming to the point of analysis paralysis. 

When the thought of writing feels overwhelming

It all feels too much. There’s too many things to take in and you don’t know where to start, let alone how to carry on to the finish line. 

That’s why it’s important to come back to your work regularly. You’ll hear people talk about writing with consistency, building a writing routine and having a writing habit. You might be rolling your eyes, thinking, I’ve heard this so many times, but you’re not doing it and that’s why the writing process can feel big, daunting and scary. 

It’s because you’re taking big chunks of time away from your work so, if you’re anything like I used to be, you forget what’s happening in your book. I would forget characters’ names and everything about the story. That meant, when I came to my desk or my notepad, I’d have to read back through so much to remind myself what was going on, by which time, I would have run out of the time I had allocated for my writing and had to go off and do something else.

I’d wasted valuable time that could have been spent writing new content and getting the story on the page. 

You need consistency, habit and routine

That is one of the reasons why consistency, habit and routine – while it doesn’t sound glamorous or like the romantic, artistic writing life we want and see in our imaginations – is the work of being a writer. That is what it takes to get the words down on the page, even when you don’t feel like it. You need to step up to the plate, to the page, even for just fifteen minutes and get some words down. 

It’s by doing that consistently and regularly, that you get to the end of the draft. You then get to the end of the revision, the second revision, the third revision – however many revisions you need – until you do get to that glamorous, exciting part where you find the agent and the book gets published, or you publish the book, whatever your chosen path is. 

Then you can take a breath and bask in the glory of getting that work out into the public. Then you get to feel proud of the work you’ve put in because you know how hard you worked on that project. Then you can enjoy the glory that comes at the end, the bits you see on social media or on TV when writers come on and promote their books. 

Those writers are going through what you’re going through now, which is getting that routine going, being consistent with it and putting in the hard work of being a writer. Once you’ve done that, then you get the excitement of publication and then you get to lap up all the fun of the fair. 

A writing routine may not be sexy but it’s necessary. 

Emma xx

Emma Dhesi

Emma Dhesi is a Certified Author Accelerator Book Coach and bestselling author who helps writers let go of perfectionism, self-doubt and writer's block through her signature programme, Unlock Your Creative Block.

She is the host of the YouTube Channel, Emma Dhesi, where she interviews debut and experienced authors alike.

Through her 1:1 coaching programme, Emma helps new authors start and finish their first novel.

Emma provides personal written feedback on their pages and guides them through the emotional rollercoaster that is writing a novel!