Day Dreaming, Night Writing

If you have never heard of Tim Ferris, or the Four Hour Work Week, I highly recommend checking him and his website out. Then again, if you were to recommend the same thing to me, I probably would not do it at first. Seeing as a buddy did tell me the exact same thing at least a year again, and I just briefly glanced at the website, flicked through it, shrugged my shoulders, then moved on. Same way I kind of am with music. If a song is played for me, or recommended to me, I will half listen to it, pretend to give two thumbs up to whoever played it for me, and then quickly forget about it. I prefer to discover these things on my own, for some stubborn reason. However, every now and again, it is good to be pointed in the right direction, as the same buddy did again today. I got two links earlier, showing how Tim Ferris had turned his blog into a book, which hit number 1 on the New York Times bestseller list. I can’t believe he copied my plan!

Anyways, from these links, and through the long tail of the web, I managed to get a wealth of information on helping me in my book process. Whereas contract advice and details are not so abundant on the internet, to me at least, writing advice is in plentiful, and good quality as well. However, after spending the majority of my morning and afternoon reading different articles, and building up gems of advice here and there, I was kind of annoyed with myself that maybe I should have spent that time actually writing. Was reading this stuff not just a way of fooling myself and procrastinating the day away?  Thankfully, I realized this was not the case. I’ve said this before, like study in college, I get my best (? most) writing done at night. It takes me far, far, far longer to write a blog during the day, than at night, for example.

I read earlier that Tim Ferris was told by a few big name authors whom he interviewed, that he should sit in front of his computer from 8am to 6pm and just see what came out writing wise. He tried, and found it awful. When I saw that he too got his best work done from 1am to 4am, it gave me my little epiphany. It is not about quantity, or how many hours, its all about the quality and productivity I put in during the selected times. It was good to get this perspective back again. For some reason, I have still been trying to force myself into having some sort of a 9-5 schedule. Seeing as most people I know in Ireland work 9 to 5, I think I felt I should set similar hours for myself. Well, maybe 10.30 until whenever I had dinner. Kind of, in the sense that I felt like I should be working, writing, or making some sort of inroads during these times. Yet not really pumped to write. And then I would just feel like a bum, or guilty for some reason, for sleeping in past 10 or 11, then not being 100% productive during the day. 

Time to shuffle my schedule to make the most of my days and nights. What I have been trying to do is spread my work throughout the entire day. Then stay up late at night, writing an old blogaruu, attempt a script or the likes, but feeling too wrecked lately. I realized today that I just have to be wiser when I pick my times to be productive, and then boom on with the writing during those times. Instead of doing drips and drabs all day long. At the end of the day, it is all about quality. Start off well, and continue on from there. If a bus was to fall out of the sky and hit me on the head, I need to make sure that the material I have written is the best it can be up to that point. At least the outline is being laid for the writing process, fail to prepare and all that!

Another good point which I was reminded about elsewhere today, was the whole thing about to help you keep a positive outlook in your own life, it is better to surround yourself with positive folk. Cull the negative downers, they will just try to take you down with them, kind of thing. Sounds la de da, but I think it is too true. While I’m on that subject, isn’t it great fun too when someone tells you all the time that they are bored?! I’m bored. Entertain me. I’m bored. I’m boring. Good work. With that in mind, it is time to surround myself with productive people only. The culling axe will have to be taken out once again! Which leaves me in a bit of a conundrum. I presume the majority of people who read the blog, do so at work. Meaning, they are dodging, and not being so productive. Re de de. Although, seeing as it is such an educational blog, technically you are expanding your mind, which is always worthwhile. You’re back in!

Song on, chilled swaying kind of one…

Feel It All Around – Washed Out

Another Radiohead remix…

Song And Cry – Radiohead and Jay-Z (Jaydiohead)

To end on a complete and utter bizarre note, who wants to see this weird video that I saw through Twitter earlier? Ha, highly productive and educational!

Tags: Blog, Book, Feel It All Around, Jay-Z, Jaydiohead, Positive, Productive, Radiohead, Song and Cry, The 4-Hour Work Week, Tim Ferris, Ultimate Muscle Roller Legend, Washed Out, Writing