History That Never Was

When I started writing, we had a weekly in-person writing group. It wasn’t super structured, and it wasn’t strict on what you could work on, but the goal was to share companionship and writing. It eventually evolved to be one evening and one weekend morning.

And then, the Fire Nation* attacked. (Read: the pandemic.)

While we tried to pivot one of the writing sessions to an online writing time, we very quickly drifted to spending that time catching up and chatting more than getting any writing done. And I have a difficult time getting writing done when people are talking nearby–some nights, I even need headphones if Jeremy is playing a video game that has a decent amount of dialogue. (Even if it’s a second play-through and I already know what happens.)

However, I find that I can be productive with co-working if it’s done in relative silence. And this works decently well in person or via Zoom. I started doing co-working sessions through SFWA’s weekly writing dates. Most Sunday afternoons, I log onto Zoom, chat with people I primarily know online only for 15 minutes, and then write in silence with them for 45 minutes, then repeat for the second hour. It works so well that I’ve also started hosting similar online co-working sessions for local friends on Sunday mornings or evenings, and I try to work out other co-working sessions with others when I can.

It doesn’t really matter what I’m working on–I might be writing a story or poetry, but I could also be editing or working on writing business tasks like social media or blog posts or submissions. Even if my camera is off, that enforced quiet time is a great block of time to get things done. And then, when we turn cameras back on and chat, I can be pleased with what I’ve gotten done in the time allotted!

Giving co-working a structure is one of the most important parts to me–if it’s less structured, it tends to devolve to conversation quickly. But even if I really want to talk something through, I know that there’s a talking window coming, so I can focus for the allotted time and then chat afterward!

 

Tags: advice, co-working, co-writing

This entry was posted by dawn.vogel on Monday, March 20th, 2023 at 6:00 am and is filed under Advice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.