Our topic this week at the SFF Seven involves our non-writing hobbies.
In various discussions around burn-out and sustainably productive writing habits, I’ve discovered that many professional authors (as in, getting paid to do it) have another creative outlet that is non-monetized. Ted Kooser, a U.S. Poet Laureate (1004-1006), told me that he painted as a hobby. His paintings were apparently glorious and much-sought, but he’d made the decision to only give them away. It was important to him to have a creative outlet that wasn’t connected to money. This was a startling thought to me at the time, and one I’ve come back to often.
Other authors I’ve talked with in various scenarios have also discovered that approach: that having a non-monetized creative outlet not only refills the well, but prevents burnout (or allows a creator to recover from it).
What happens to many of us – and I’m speaking of authors, but I imagine it happens with all creatives – is that we begin with writing as the hobby. It’s the passion, the special something that we do because we LOVE it. Eventually, with persistence, hard work, and luck, we make that hobby into the profession. Then it’s no longer the alternative to the day job and other responsibilities. It’s become work.
Which, let me be clear, is good and natural. I’m a big believer in treating writing like my job. That’s how I support myself and my family.
Still, to manage the creative self, I’ve found I need other outlets to refill the well and take the place of that other, special, and relaxing Thing. Keeping it non-monetized is the challenge. Especially since the pandemic began, I think we’ve all become adept at casting about for side-gigs. In fact, the gig-culture was going strong before that. It’s tempting to take that successful hobby – I imagine Ted Kooser’s friends admiring a painting, offering money for it, and him turning it down with a slight smile and shake of his head – and begin to dream of taking that art viral and making an avalanche of comforting money from it.
I sometimes think there’s a certain magic in refusing that temptation, in enjoying creativity for its own sake.
A well-kept secret about the reality of signing with an agent, one way to assess whether your agent is really working for you, and other thoughts on building the ability to produce work. Also, LONEN’S WAR is out in audio!
Transcript
00:01.21
jeffekennedy
Good morning, everyone! This is Jeffe Kennedy author of epic fantasy romance I’m here with my first cup of coffee.
00:20.70
jeffekennedy
Sheer ambrosia today is Tuesday August Second so it’s 8 2 2022 a good set of numbers. My birthday is coming up ah later this month in twenty days so that will be another set of eights and twos though I don’t know if I’ll get to podcasts that day I’ll um, be visiting my mother man stepdad in Tucson. So I don’t know maybe we can convince my mom to do a birthday podcast with me and we could just I don’t know reminisce about my birth. Probably we don’t want that. Let’s rethink. So anyway, today is exciting because the. Audio book of Lonen’s War releases today. Very exciting. Ah this is book one of the sorceer’s moon’s books of which there are None um sorceress moons was the none series I did. Totally indie that I did plan to self-publish from the beginning and did it indie all along that as opposed to some of the others where it was like a series that started in trab traad pub. That I continued in indie or it’s a lot of noises out there. Don’t know what that was um or one that I’d gotten the rights back and self-pubished so to. Ah, sorcers moons first came out in 2016 which is amazing right? Six years ago now and I started that when I first left the day job was kicked out of the nest in a fall of 2015 because my team was downsized and I decided to try to. Make it as a full-time writer without a day job. That’s my definition. Um, there are people who disagree with me but um, and I think it’s because being a full-time writer has a certain cachet and so people want to lay claim to it. But. Yeah, that’s what it is for me is if ah I have no other day job.
02:55.38
jeffekennedy
Ah, so ah, but Scribd Scr I bd scribb bought the audio rights for Sorcerous Moons which my lovely agent negotiated for me for those of you who are wondering how that works. For your indie pub books. You don’t have to have an agent to negotiate for you. But it’s great that my agent does want to do that for me and then she does get the percentage which is you know that’s fine. Ah she made a lot of changes to the contract. The negotiations took a long time. Ah, which I knew she was actively working on because she would send me updates as opposed to a previous agent who claimed to be spending a lot of time in negotiations when actually that meant he just wasn’t getting to it and it was sitting ah on his desk. If he had one not that I’m bitter. He claimed to spend a lot of time on negotiations on the contracts for a particular pair of books and I’ve compared it to the contracts that my previous agent. Ah. Put through that I know she did not do a lot of negotiating and I don’t see any difference so that’s one way that you know how do you know? I’m not a Broadway singer. But if I were. I would want to play Cinderella in any of her incarnations. That’s probably not true I like Amy Adams so so there’s a little bit of a stream of consciousness riffing for you. Ah, anyway, Lonen’s War out today. Dave started releasing the audiobook at the same time I have polled Sorcerous moons ah out of KU Lonen’s Reign book 6 will remain in KU until like September sixth because for some reason that never got uploaded into k u correctly, so it’s lagging behind the others but gradually the other books in the series are coming out of k u and I am putting them back up wide. So Lonen’s War is now wide again everywhere. So oh and I even had my phone out so I could show you the script listing here. It oh big flashing glare from the.
05:38.41
jeffekennedy
Rising sun if you’re on video but there’s the cover for Lonen’s War audio pretty cool and ah I’ve scribbed as an app on my phone and I really like it which I know is sounds like much right? because yo here I am. Like oh look listen to my audio book. Ah, but that’s exactly how I sound to but um, one cool thing that Scribd when they bought the rights to do audio for this series is they gave me a free subscription to scrib for like a year which. Let me tell you people none of my other audio book trad publishers have done that they in fact, some of my other books they would even give me a copy of my own frickin book on audio and I ended up having to buy it. Just so I could listen to it and know what my book sounded like on audio It’s such a huge mess. It’s stupid. Um, we all know we don’t really love audible and this is one of the big reasons. Why but scribbed is interesting because you can um. Read ebooks on here as well as listen to audiobooks and it’s a nice It’s a really nice app and they have a lot of stuff on here. I’m not a big audiobook listener but sometimes because I can listen. For free. Well, it’s actually is for free since I didn’t have to pay for my so so my subscription that I can try books out on audio that I’m not sure if I want to to buy and rate and then sometimes if I like them on audio i’ll. Stand by them and read them on kindmda or whatever. So anyway, I will put those links up in the show notes please check out the audio book if you’ve already read sorceress moons um, tell your friends who like to listen to fantasy romance on audio. Ah, Lonen’s War is a slow burn princess in a tower. One of the things that I learned as an aside at a polyon is that the readers who ask you to tell them about your books. They really want to hear the tropes and I am not. Always good at saying tropes. Ah I found that I was not good at explaining what dark wizard was about dark wizard did not sell as well in person as it does online. It was really interesting to see the difference of what things sold well in person as opposed to online. Ah.
08:26.63
jeffekennedy
But I did not do a good job of communicating what the dark wizard books were about for whatever reason. But I think it’s tropes I need to figure out what the tropes are for that book and series. Yeah, ah. But Lonen’s War. Do I even know my tropes I mean it’s enemies to lovers and he is attacking her city. He comes from the barbarians and she is literally a princess. Who is psychically fragile and so must live up in the tower away from all of the psychic energy of the city and because of this she’s like the only member of the royal family left alive when the barbarians win and. She ends up and lonan is a younger son but he is also ends up being the only one left alive of his family and so the 2 end up negotiating with each other to stop the violence to find a peace. Which of course inevitably involves them getting married right? Um, but that doesn’t happen till later. It is a slow burn I’ve seen I think it’s still like the top review on Amazon is this one person is like they don’t even touch each other. For the first book and it’s true but oria can’t be touched because of the um of her psychic abilities. She um, it’s it’s agonizing for her to be touched by somebody so they figure out very creative ways. To overcome that although much of that happens in book two after the wedding night. Um I’ve considered consolidating those and making them into a trilogy. You could put books 1 and 2 together and I mean it would work. 1 and 2 3 and 4 5 and 6 but I just left them as the separate books. So I do have um the audio books are they’re putting them out as a staggered release and let’s see if I can tell you. I think um, today’s August second I think the second one’s coming out. She gave me a tentative list. she said it might not happen um exactly on that she said it might change that’s it August Sixteenth is book 2 so they’re putting them out.
11:14.25
jeffekennedy
I think they’re looking at every two weeks so yeah by the time um the sixth book comes out and audio it will come out. It’ll be white. It’ll be out of k you so um. Have to kind of keep up with those things.
11:36.44
jeffekennedy
One thing I talked about with agent Sarah when we had lunch at Apollycon was I might just have the agency take over publishing the ah 7 contemporary bdsm books that I got back from Carina Press ah that would mean that the agency gets 15% of those books but would also mean that I don’t have to deal with them I’m trying to decide. Um, it would be good for me to do them myself. Algorithm wise I do get more money It’s also more work and. It’s no longer squarely on brand for me. So I don’t know if it would help with my other list. You know. Um, so still remaining on my notes that I took on the plane. 1 thing I was thinking about is how we learn how to work how we learn how to produce work and i. Got to have lunch with a newbie author at Apollycon. She’s an agency sister Tiff Holloman and she is not yet published so she signed with my same agent. Sarah Younger at Nancy Yost literary right before pandemic hit and excuse me that first book just didn’t so which happens sometimes um, actually happens more than people realize. And Tiff and I had lunch in part I think because she she did say that Sarah suggested that she make contact with me just because here I am I am the advice giver and ah, you know and I said you know I know it’s really frustrating when. The book that you signed an agent with doesn’t sell because there is a tendency to think when you’re a newbie author that once you get your agent that you haven’t made and I know so many people that it just doesn’t work out that way for whatever reason the book doesn’t sell. The agent doesn’t turn out I don’t know to be someone who actually does any work which is not the case with Sarah Sarah is awesome but
14:13.30
jeffekennedy
Sorry I’m starting to go down the mental path of like that first agent that didn’t like to work. Ah, if he had liked to work. He could have done a lot but he was just um I don’t know fatally and eternally distracted. So anyway, um, we talked about that Dave Tiff has written another book and they’re going out on submission with that so fingers crossed with her for her on that. Ah, really lovely. Go. She’s a lawyer works for the federal government. In Dc so she was local and so she came to the con to see how it was but then ah you know into meet with Sarah and so it was really nice that we got to have lunch with each other and one of the things we talked about was productivity. Ah, which of course is something people ask me about a lot and I talk about a lot on this podcast and I do a fair amount of author coaching on the topic because that’s always a question right? is how do we be productive. How do we get the work done and so I was giving her advice on writing in the morning. Before she goes to work. It’s ah yo that for me writing every day at the same time every day was the thing that worked and it’s the thing is is as I believe that is a guaranteed process. A lot of people feel like that’s not possible and I understand ah but. If you do that if you get in the habit of writing every day at the same time every day and it doesn’t have to be for very long that you will build a writing habit and that’s the most important thing that you need to reliably produce work. And she was lighting up as I was talking about this because she’s saying you know when I get home at the end of the day and after I’ve put the kid to bed and all of that and I said yeah, you’re done. You’re you’re out of juice and that’s why I write in the morning because that’s when I have the juice different people. Have different processes and some people have more juice late at night but if you have a day job if you have children if you have lots of day responsibilities then it’s not reasonable to expect your creative self to have much juice. At the end of the day after you’ve already done everything for everybody else, some people might but most of us know me I’m I’m kind of brain fried after these days. Ah after about five or six o’clock at night I am just I’m done and that’s when I want to read books.
16:53.20
jeffekennedy
Or watch shows and that was ah that’s where I’m at. I was thinking about talking about something ah that I just watched but or several things that I watched but I think I’ll save that and finish this thought. So anyway, one of the things I was thinking about was how no one ever taught me how to study. I did get the advice to write every day at the same time every day for more than one author and I resisted it for a very long time I did not want to do that. It felt incredibly difficult for me and part of the reason that I started doing it in the morning was it was the only time. That I could find where I could actually reliably write at the same time every day so I started getting up at four thirty or five and I was not a morning person so that I could write 2 hours before I went to work and then from there my day got progressively crazier. So. That was the one thing I could count on and as I told Tiff some of the stuff I wrote back then like hopeful monsters is one oh I’ll link to hopeful monsters if you all want to read that little story. Um, some of those things are seriously psychedelic and it’s because I was sleep deprived. And she was saying well I don’t know if I could go to bed early enough to be able to get up that early and I said I tell you what? at least the way it worked for me was if I made myself get up that early eventually I shifted and I was going to sleep early which is why I go to sleep around 9 because I wake up at 5 and that works for me. So anyway I was just thinking about in college my transition from high school to college and how in high school I just almost never studied I was fortunate enough to um. I’m an auditory learner so I could sit in class and listen and as long as the teacher had said it at some point I could put it down on the test I’m also good at absorbing from reading and I like to read so I would read the the assignments. Ah but I never worked very hard because I didn’t have to. And the classes I would have had to work in. Um I did not do great in and I was thinking about my transition to college because I went to a private liberal arts University Washington University in St Louis which I loved but I struggled in some of the classes because.
19:28.40
jeffekennedy
I needed to study and I didn’t know how and looking back mosquito if I had implemented that schedule then which of course never occurred to me but that first semester. I took a calculus class that started at seven thirty in the morning because I had already in high school been used to getting up that early. We had an ap biology class that I think school started at like 8 or 8:05 and the ap biology class had all um. Voted and agreed because we were hopeless overachievers to start class at seven thirty so that we could do some dissections and the sun is coming to get me here but I’m almost done. Ah, so I did that calculus class at 7:30 4 days a week and and I liked getting up and going to that class early but I didn’t work on learning the equations and so forth outside of class. Ah so it was not not. Not great and I felt like it was because I wasn’t good at it. But it’s simply that I couldn’t just absorb it and regurgitate it. So I wish if I were going back and I don’t often have something to say to my younger self but i. Wish that it had occurred to me or that someone had suggested it to me. Ah, if I had just in college and grad school gotten up early and studied did my. Um I could always do the readings I always did the readings. But if I just like run the math problems worked the various things biochemistry and so forth if I had just done that stuff for like 2 hours every morning I would have um. Probably would have done much much better than I did and I didn’t do abysmally but I didn’t do it brilliantly either. So there’s something to be said for that learning how to work incrementally incrementally which I know I’m a big fan of that. It took me a long time to figure it out and it was because I wanted to write novels and I had deadlines it was only after I had a traditional deal. Um, actually I ended up with several at once and I started to panic about being able to meet those deadlines.
22:10.55
jeffekennedy
That that was when I got really ritualized with my goals and deliberate about writing for a couple hours every morning and I still did it for a very long time up until I left the day job that was a nice circular. Discussion which I don’t often do wrap around to the beginning again. Um, and then I continued it after I got laid off because I already had the habit built so thoughts thoughts um, please share about the Lonen’s War audio book or and that’s wide now. Be nice to this series has new covers. So let’s um, we’ll be lovely to see it get a little resurgence and I will talk to you all on Thursday you all take care bye bye.
Transcript
00:00.31
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee. Today is say it with me Friday wooo. It’s also April first April fools stay here in the Us. Um. So far I have not seen any fooling I haven’t looked at much I looked at Instagram but I I think I probably say this every year am not a fan of April fools day I’m not a fan of pranks in general of trying to trick people. Um, just not my thing I know some families are much more into it. But for me, it’s um I think there’s a level of cruelty in pranks that is um, just not part of who I am.
01:07.76
jeffekennedy
It’s interesting because I w rid coffee yesterday and had a long conversation with Jim Sorensen and we always have interesting conversations. We were talking about how SFWA’s new membership requirements are. Based on affidavit. It’s based on the honor system which some people object to somebody There’s always somebody objecting to something but part of our reasoning on this is that if somebody wanted to game the system. If they wanted to cheat their way into membership. It’s not that difficult to falsify documentation in this day and age so and interestingly Jim commented that if there were rules that he might be. Tempted to cheat them just because he would feel like he was being clever in circumventing the rules. But if it’s on our system then he feels like he has to abide by it because it’s like oh well, if you expect me to be honorable then I guess I have to. Interesting psychology huh. So um I I wonder if there’s not something connected to that with like whether or not you like to play pranks on people I think some of it’s the getting away. It’s the feeling like you’re clever and that you’ve managed to trick somebody for me. It. Very rarely has to do with actual good humor and the stuff that is actual good humor. We don’t have to have a special day for it right? I did contemplate doing some sort of. April fools podcast today. In fact, I very nearly when I start up Zencastr here I label all of my episodes by date. So I had the you know saw yesterday’s March thirty first twenty twenty two and I was very very tempted to label Today’s March Thirty second 2022 but then my ah my inner data nerd rebelled because it would be incorrect.
03:36.74
jeffekennedy
The other conversation that Jim and I had was about answering questions on Panels and at conferences. Um, and I don’t remember how we got on that topic but we were talking about. When people ask how there are certain questions that come up almost every time in interviews or when you’re on a panel or when you’re doing a q and a and that sort of thing I’m going to pause because I know that i’s something I plan to talk about today if I made a note which I thought I did. And not finding it a well I’ll go I’ll keep on this one and then I might have to look if I still have time I know something kind of important I think I promised someone I would talk about it today if I forget and I brought and you were the one I promised. Ah, remind me and I’ll talk about it. Well maybe not Monday we have to talk about that too. Anyway. So we were talking about answering questions and like there are certain questions that come up over and over again and that are difficult to answer and I was using this as an example that one of them is. Well I so what I was explaining is that one way that I handle that that I’ve come to handle this over time is that I try to answer the content of the question. The what I think the person is really wanting to know but they’ve kind of gone for this very standard. Um. Almost empty question and so the example I was using is the where do you get your ideas people ask where do you get your ideas a whole lot and that I think people aren’t really, they aren’t asking where do you get your ideas that they want to know something else. Basically they want to know. How do they get good ideas and become successful writing them and so I was in the midst of this is sort of a meta explanation I was in the midst of explaining this to Jim when he cut in and said being clever. And said, um, well that Harlan Ellison always said Schenectady New York that he sends off a self-address stamped envelope and they send him back ideas and and I said well that but that’s an asshole answer and that Harlan Ellison it should be pointed out. Was an asshole and Jim said yes, but it’s amusing to the audience and that’s what matters so we got into this big debate about it because I was like I can understand why he thinks performing for the audience and being amusing is like your job when you’re on that kind of thing.
06:28.96
jeffekennedy
But he’s much more in this niche profession of like you know he works on like transformers in Ji Joe so he goes mainly to fan conventions it and he said well do you feel like you have this. Onus or this responsibility to answer people’s questions sincerely and authentically and I said yes, um, but I guess that’s who I am I mean that’s like I’m always trying to give sincere and authentic answers answers for better or worse and i. I said you know I feel like um sure you get a laugh out of saying something like I send off to Schenectady New York for my ideas and you know ha ha ha it’s it’s the equivalent of like an April fools joke. It’s like let me let me make fun of you for and asking this question. Instead of honoring what you are really wanting to know. Um, but this is this is where we fall out and you know and I could see both sides of it. Um I think I’m there to pass long information Jim thinks he’s there to entertain people. Um, so I think the best answer that I’ve ever heard to this one is something that John Scalzi has talked about when I saw him here in Santa Fe because somebody asked where you get your ideas. And he said that he thinks that a better way to address. It is to think in terms of that. Really the question is how do you know? an idea is a good one and and he talked about his method for this that if he gets an idea he sits on it. He doesn’t write it down. He just molds it over. If he still has it the next morning he gives a little bit more thought if he still has it in a week gives it a little more thought and he said and if the idea persists for like six months then it’s a worthwhile idea and he actually invests in it and I find that a really useful both approach. And way of answering that question in an am. Um, authentic and useful way. Um, and and Jim kind of disagreed. But or maybe he didn’t disagree but um. He still thought that it was better to give a funny answer.
08:59.66
jeffekennedy
Or if not better, certainly easier. Um, and I mentioned that this had backfired on me because when I did that interview with Julia Quinn I don’t know if that like went up and got recorded or or what. Was an interesting interview but 1 of the people in the online chat asked where she got her ideas and and I sort of translated that into this. Maybe it’s you know, saying that was the question and but that maybe it was more useful to think of it in these terms of How do you know? It’s a good idea and Julia Quinn completely bamboozled me and she said oh no, she said I’m not one of these writers who has tons of ideas she says I’m the one who’s always sitting there going. What can I write about this time. So so then she actually talked about. what she does to get ideas so that’s what I get for assuming and and maybe that part of the take home messages. You know we’re all different. You know the whole find out what your process is and own it and I’m still looking around for like where I wrote down. But maybe I just didn’t write it down. Whatever it was I was thinking of talking about yesterday. Alas, maybe it will return to my brain eventually. So um, yeah yesterday I did not get my 2000 words. In fact, ah, barely eked out I don’t think Cphon got a thousand you guys. Ah some of it was going to ride her coffee I think I got eight eighty five so I’m actually going to try for 3000 today if I do 3021 ah, have 10000 for the week. So I and then I’ll have the weekend to recupering so we shall see what happens? Um, yeah, we shall see.
11:09.78
jeffekennedy
Yeah, I’m not quite sure why I crashed yesterday I actually was feeling kind of fuzzy I don’t know if it was being off schedule or being fuzzy or what sometimes we don’t know next week is going to be a little different I am um. Going up to Colorado to spend a little bit of time with my husband’s siblings so we are driving up on Sunday and staying there Sunday and Monday nights so I made you a podcast on Monday and Tuesday morning I don’t know I want to try to keep getting my 2000 words and we don’t have to get up and leave early on Tuesday so I’m hoping that I might be able to get words before we hit the rod and drive back but that’ll take priority over podcasting so we’ll just see see how I feel tra la tra lay. And then I am home for a couple of nights and then Thursday afternoon I drive down to beautiful protellus new mexico home of Deronda Jones incidentally I’m going to be at Eastern New Mexico University’s Jack Williamson lectureship talking to students and being part of panels Jack Williamson is a very famous ah old timey science fiction writer. What’s interesting about him is like I never read him and don’t know him don’t know his work really. But apparently he coined. Whole bunch of commonly used science fiction words today. How’s that for a cool legacy Melinda Snodgrass told me that and now I have to find that list of words. Okay, you guys I did the thing where I failed to properly unpause. So now I have to. I’m not sure if I’m repeating words coined by Jack Williamson this is the point this thing I’m trying to get at ah terraforming these are not all in 1 place but um, also genetic engineering ion drive. It turns out that he um got his bachelor’s degree and master of arts from Eastern New Mexico university and Portales so that’s why they did the lectureship for him and I was trying to find I wish they did have them all in 1 place. But. They don’t so anyway I think that’s really cool to have that kind of legacy that um there are all these words that are attributed to you I know um I have a friend who writes fantasy who was credited with coining hydromancy.
14:01.50
jeffekennedy
Using water magic and she was so pleased to be credited with that. So anyway, I won’t keep um, looking for these. Oh here’s another oh psionics. He’s credited with them coming up with the word psionics psi. Um, but I already mentioned genetic engineering. So anyway, that’s really cool should be a fun lectureship. So. I should be able to do a podcast on Thursday but I don’t know if I will on Friday again I’ll have to prioritize getting those words I’m so be a disrupted week. We will see how I do I’m hoping that going for a lower word count will help me. Actually get those words and then we’ll go from there I may have to rethink my schedule. So um, only other news is that yesterday the FIERCE HEARTS anthology came out that was incredibly well received. I will borrow a post from Instagram put it on the photos showing that was number 1 in all the subcategories. Thank you everyone for supporting this anthology to benefit Ukraine that’s just really an incredible amazing thing. Um. I do think it’s funny that like my name is first. Ah, it’s like I don’t know if I’m that high profile you guys but hope hope I could bring you readers I mentioned yesterday that the book contains a sneak peek. The. Prologue in first 2 chapters of the storm princess and the Raven King the book I’m currently attempting to write I’m actually doing okay, um, where am I don’t do that Jeffe but there I like hit the x instead of. Maximize not I mean to duta done to du I’ve got 36000 words so not slouching. Um and that’s kind of fun to write. So um, on that note I think I will go get to writing. I hope that you all have a fabulous weekend I will be patchy here maybe next week but we shall um, it’ll be what it is right? I don’t know how many of you look for me at like a particular time regularly or if you just wait to see it pop up.
16:43.80
jeffekennedy
Probably a mix of wells anyway, um you guys have good time and I will talk to you all sometime next week you all take care bye bye.
Transcript
00:00.80
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee. Ah happy chair dance. Today is Thursday March Twenty Fourth only a week of March left and which means that the first quarter of 2022 is almost gone. How did this happen. We don’t know it’s a mystery. I always love that line in Shakespeare in love with the I can’t think of the afters name but the date owner where he’s like it’ll work out. People are like how how and he’s like I don’t know it just ah yeah, something like that that was probably bad. Ah. Not a brilliant anecdote. There’s another movie quote from you for you. Ah, so my week is going well the ah 2000 words a day is working remarkably well um, I’m yeah on track so far this week we’ll see what happens yesterday Darynda proposed a slight change to our um. Morning routine. So we’re starting at Eight o’clock this morning well almost eight o’clock I there eight o’clock was the plan and then I as you guys may or may not know I don’t set an alarm I wake up naturally which is like something that I cling to I don’t want to have to set an alarm. Now that I’m a full-time writer. It’s like the one gift I give myself. It’s a a special thing for me that I get to wake up naturally otherwise I tend to be a real bitch of a boss so this morning for whatever reason it It’s very interesting if you do sleep on a natural calendar. You will find that and I’ve been doing this for what almost seven years now wow ah your sleep time or at least my sleep time waxes and wanes from night to night. Some nights are shorter and some are longer and last night was a longer night for whatever reason. Um, because as I recall I think I was in bed by like nine I usually I’d start turning into a pumpkin after about eight o’clock and of course the daylight savings time.
02:34.82
jeffekennedy
Has kind of messed that up. But you know my evenings are very low key and I start winding down early and I’m one of those people who falls asleep really fast. So I was asleep for a few hours and then my elderly cat Isabel beautiful fluffy Isabel. She doesn’t get as much press as Jackson does I’m not quite sure why maybe because Jackson was like the kitten and Jackson’s very charismatic and I think feel like Isabel does get short shrift because sometimes people will say well you know does because because. Visitors you know Jackson is so gregarious and so engaging and charismatic and everyone’s well people will say be like well does isabel do anything almost in those exact words you know like is there anything special about her Isabelle’s also a main coon cat and she is blue smoke. Min ku cap and I’ll put her photo on the show notes here. So and I realize I’m going off off topic but hey that’s the brand here at first cup of coffee. So last night. Isabel Isabel is now 16 and she sleeps a lot and she’s deaf and last night every once’s while she wakes up I don’t know if there are nightmares or I’ve tried to look it up and it’s like ah a kind of dementia in cats. Otherwise she doesn’t seem to have any kinds of dementia but she woke up and she was crying and crying. And she has this very loud meow now that she’s deaf and I was sound asleep. But for some reason that penetrated which very little does I’ve often joked or I don’t joke David says that the great thing that he brings to our relationship is that if the house burns down. During the night that he will carry me out of it and save my life because he thinks I’d sleep through it. So this penetrated and I got up and I didn’t know David wasn’t in bed. He’s often up at night. So I went blially out looking and. He like came out of the kitchen and I said where is she and he said I don’t know and she was back in his office and that was at Eleven Fifty five so I’ve been asleep for a few hours and so I picked her up and brought her in. Bed with me which she just doesn’t come do on her own anymore. She used to sleep with me every night but now she sleeps in his office which is the warmest room in the house and I think that’s why I’m interested to see if this changes as summer comes on but we have um, brick floors with radiant heat.
05:21.90
jeffekennedy
And I have the temperature in his office. David’s just I mean he’s skinny skinnier than I am and and he’s just ah, you know as he gets older. He gets colder so the warmth in his office come guest room is. Up there and Isabelle has this little throw rug that we’ve put down for her and it’s this one corner of the floor that she’s figured out is like where the radiant heat gathers. There’s certain places where the floors definitely warmer than others and the cats have found those in their feline way. So she. Spends a lot of time sleeping on that little rug in his office and but I brought her into bed with me since she seemed disturbed and she slept by my pillow for most of the night so that was nice because I know I woke up once around 4 and she was there and I went back to sleep. And normally if I go back to sleep like that it means another hour and a half and sometimes I’ll calculate it because it’s like far is a little early to get up but usually like another hour and a half and that’s right in line with you know, like scientific studies on sleep cycles that a full cycle is an hour and a half more or less. So but then I woke up at six thirty oops so um yeah we’re supposed to start at 8 it’s seven fifty seven now but we moved at tape 15 at my behest during it was ready because she said she wants to. To start and were earlier which is big because she originally for her meeting me at 9 was a lot for her and I had you guys know I track everything you know I was like well you know I’m usually starting by 9 we could just make it be 9 but for me writing wise the earlier I start the better off I am and I do have graphs to show that I get better work counts if I start earlier. So this works great for me. It’s just a little bit of adjustment. Especially after daylight savings time kicking in but it’ll be interesting to see how that works I’m going to keep doing the two k per day this week and then next week I might see if I can go up to 2.5 um, yeah, we’ll just sort of see I’m going to experiment a little bit I’m going to be curious. We have some travel coming up so that’s going to change things around some we are going to go up to Blackhack Colorado.
08:10.51
jeffekennedy
And meet up with David’s siblings for a couple of nights just a little get together and I’m going to do the It’s a it’s a casino hotel thing and I don’t really like and I’m like. But they do have a spa and I’m going to do I’ve been dying for a body scrub and they do a body scrub and wrap so very excited for that and then at on April Seventh and eighth I will be down in portalis. New Mexico fabulous Portales which is ah where Doronda Jones lives ah and it’s down right near the Texas panhandle but it’s where Jack Williamson famed science fiction writers from. And I’m going to be down there and doing some panels and stuff I believe they will also be streaming looks like some interesting panel topics too. There’s a new guy in charge this year David Sweeten who seems to be I haven’t met him in real life yet. But he seems to be just really on the ball I’m really smart and he thinks I’m a great writer so you know clearly he has excellent taste and discernment. So I’m looking forward to this last year I was on a weird panel that it’s it’s this happened. To me a lot and I think it might be the whole crossover fantasy romance um woman writer with kissing in her books is ity a is it really not fantasy confusion but there are certain conferences. Especially these very little ones where I think what happens is that the organizers don’t really this always sounds bad. They don’t know who I am ah and I think this can happen to any of us you know, like there are certain people that they know what they write. But what happens is is if you are a writer that like quivers doing programming hasn’t actually read if they don’t know much about you then they end up sort of sticking you on panels in weird places like I got put on a panel that. Like a great transgressor on this and I’ve complained about it before is mile highcon up in Denver which I like to go up there because I have family up there. Denver’s my hometown. A lot of people in the area I know.
10:55.37
jeffekennedy
I’d like Mile Hi Con but they always put me on these fucking weird panels like once they put me on a superhero panel. You honest like I don’t really write superheroes or not even really I don’t write superheroes at all and I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to say. And so last year with the old organizer on the Jack Williamson lectureship I got put on this panel on what was it was like writing science fiction or something. I wish I could remember the topic but it was really kind of strange I was like I do not know why I’m on this panel and the bad thing is is there are a couple of reasons for writers to do panels 1 is that it’s fun. Um, some of the. Most gratifying times that I’ve had as a writer is being on a panel with other wonderful writers where we end up having these amazing conversations. That’s the pinnacle because then you get a lot out of it being on the panel. So that’s good reason. Um. Reason that we do it is promo is to know, get ourselves out there um have people know who we are the other reason to do it is to be nice to you know, pay it forward contribute to the community. It’s like and I and a lot of writers view it that way. Because they’ll be like I don’t want to be on more than one panel for the conferences and I’m like really then why are you going? What are you doing there. They’re like oh it’s so exhausting. Really you know it’s like you know they’ll be like I’m on three panels cisconfer and. 1 every day and it’s exhausting like oh well, what do you do all day I know I’m bitching I just think about people who have jobs that you know like where they actually have to work really hard i. Well I will always say that being a writer is mentally draining and you really have to balance that creative flow and be smart about how you do it, especially if you’re a full-time writer or not even especially, it’s I think it’s worse if you’re trying to maintain another career and kids and family and all of that too. You know you really have to balance that energy but you know some of these writers I know for a fact have like never had a full-time job and you know there are jobs that you know like if you are working at it all day long. That’s all it’s a lot It’s.
13:37.90
jeffekennedy
Just you know a lot of running around in meetings and dealing with stuff and I will always say that the most the hardest job I ever had was being a cocktail waitress you know, full stop I am so glad that I don’t have to make my living as a cocktail waitress. Because waiting tables sucks you guys it sucks and it’s really hard and I know that people who haven’t done it sit back and be like well she goes a scurry back and forth between the kitchen. It’s like you have no idea absolutely no idea which is why I always tip well unless somebody really. Sponning it in anyway. So I’m sure I had a pointer in there somewhere I got interviewed on um, was it Tuesday afternoon yeah Tuesday afternoon by the kingdom of thirst podcast Abigail a great interviewer. We had so much fun I really enjoyed her podcast I should go ahead and link to it in here. So that. In fact, I’m going to type that in right now so that you guys can check it out but my old air. And a couple of weeks um kingdom of podcasts but she was talking about this podcast about first cup of coffee and just saying how. Relaxing. It is that it’s zen and I love that I love that it’s she said it’s just like having a conversation with your friend over coffee and it’s just like a nice chill thing to do and I love that I think that’s awesome. So. If I can’t think of stuff to stay say I feel like I can always fall back on the fact that that I’m just offering a zen experience here. Actually really, it’s more of a Dallas experience but we’re not going to to quibble lines there. So um, my point and I did have 1 oh that darinda and I are starting earlier. Um and maybe trying to get our 3 hours done by noon which is great and yesterday I was done by like 1130 and I got more stuff done on the to do list. You guys will be delighted to hear it i. Um, trying not to obsess about like getting everything off the list which I think is helpful. You know it’s that um, you’ll like the measureable goals. The ones that you can actually reach so but I got several things done off the list and so that’s great I got.
16:24.41
jeffekennedy
Bright Familiar uploaded, the audiobook. So just waiting for approval on that and then that will be out soon and other just little piddly things. Oh and so this is where I was had kind of started with all of this I did register for. World con in Chicago at the end of August beginning of September – Chicon. So I am planning to attend that and I also went ahead and registered for world fantasy con in November so planning to be at that and I will be at a polycon. In July so I need to get fact, let me make a note tear put this on my list I’ll get carene to put these appearances on the website.
17:20.45
jeffekennedy
So that’ll be good. So it’s like um, yeah for but but that’s the sound of the ah the world gradually sort of like revving up again. We’re kicking into gear. The other thing that happened yesterday is I got to. Email with an amazing writer someone who I particularly fangirl cut to exchange emails. You guys I can’t tell you what it is yet, but it’s very exciting, very exciting news. Not my career related but otherwise related. So. If you are canny. Your little brains will be thinking about what could this be? Ah yeah, so it was um yeah, particular little fan Girll moment there that I got to email with this writer from my myer. Who I admire I almost never use whom I just dislike whom I once had an editor my quiinsington editor had a special note saying this author hates whom don’t use it. So so yeah, it’ll be interesting to see how shaking it up here. A little bit will do and. Feeling good about things. So on that note I’m gonna go and meet up with the fabulous Darynda Jones and I will talk to you all tomorrow you take care bye bye.
Transcript
00:00.14
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee. Oh that’s so good. Today is Tuesday March fifteenth if you’re on video you will see that I actually have a latte if you’re on audio only you probably heard how much happy I have that made no sense. How happy I am to have my latte I am um, doing things slightly out of bounce today because I am in my health marathon finally getting all of these things handled like a responsible adult. Ah, usually don’t go in for the adulting thing but this feels very much adulting. So um I get to have a colonoscopy tomorrow afternoon a girl never forgets her first colonoscopy. um yeah it’s um I don’t know if it’s even a funny story but I feel like it’s a funny story I may tell you guys this story? Um, but it’s not writing related but the the short the tl tl deal. Tiol didn’t listen. Is that I um have to do the fasting for the colonoscopy these rituals of getting older. It’s just one of those you know you’re supposed to do it when you hit a certain age and. So I can’t eat anything solid after 10 a m today and my appointment’s not till three o’clock tomorrow afternoon. So I figured id better go ahead and have my breakfast if I were doing my sixteen eight fasting thing I wouldn’t get to eat till like noon. So I figured well. Last solid food for more than 24 hours I’ll take advantage so I figured that means I get to have my latte small reward make you sure I didn’t smear my lip pencil. There. So.
02:30.88
jeffekennedy
So I’ll I’ll tell you this this story because I think it’s funny so I’m seeing this new general practitioner he had ordered you know all these things I had to do mammogram bone density colonoscopy you know, joy joy and. Yeah they’d said the physician’s assistant when she gave me in New Mexico we get doctor’s orders you have to have like an order from a gp to go see a specialist. Maybe they do that everywhere did we did not have to do it in Wyoming so it was a real adjustment when we came here that was like you have to have a doctor’s order to do anything. So when she handed me the order she had said um I guess they’re not very good about getting back to people so just keep calling I was like oh okay so I call get their voicemail and I’m you know ready to leave a message and. Their voicemail is incredibly long. You know and they say leave a message with your you know referring physician and your name and your date of birth and the reason for the procedure. It’s like gestural enterology associates and. And they said do not leave more than 1 voicemail only leave one voicemail and we will call you back in within five business days I was like wow five business days okay so I leave the message with all of the information as instructed. And Mark it on my calendar for like five business days later and I even went business days took out the weekend and any relevant holidays to tag back reader. They did not call me back. So I even gave them a couple extra days I think because I didn’t feel like. Calling you know how that is right? and it’s like oh I do and can’t make phone calls today. So then I called them back and I get the same message. So I say I left a previous message. No I’m not supposed to but nobody called me back in the five business days and I noticed they also had something on there when they said or you can stop by our offices at reader. They did not call me back so I was like okay yesterday afternoon I had to go in for my fiscal and I thought since I’m going to be in that kind of general neighborhood. It’s not a big town I live outside of town but it’s still only like fifteen twenty minutes but you know I treat it like I’m going on an arctic expedition once a year coil are out there this morning. So.
05:21.31
jeffekennedy
I Go to the doctor and actually everything’s great. My blood work is great. Everything is wonderful. Much much Physician Love which surprised me because I thought I was I don’t know.
05:40.78
jeffekennedy
That’s actually another story off to decide if I’m going to tell you guys that so he says you know any trouble with any of the other tests and I said well I said to gastroenterology people. I left them a couple of voicemails and they’ve never gotten back to me and and he’s kind of a serious gentle guy and I could see behind him the I don’t know what to aid I’m not sure I don’t know if she was a p a or what but she said she was very sweet but she was in there because I had to have a. You know pelvic of the examined papin stuff so she was she was like I’ll be your chaperone today. But so I could see her behind him when she kind of closes her eyes and shakes her head a little bit and I I just know that this is a thing right? They’re just never calling anybody back ever and he’s like oh. Yeah, he says you know they’ve had trouble since the pandemic and I’m thinking this is not pandemic. This is like something else and he says but you can’t stop by in person and I thought and I said actually that’s what I’ve planning to do today I had my order in the car and I’m just going to stop by there. So. So I do I stop by there and step in the door and there’s a sort of a receptionist and there’s 1 guy gal talking the receptionist and she says um, hi ma’am do you have an appointment and I said ah. No, and she said are you here to schedule an appointment and I said yes and she said okay, sit here behind the divider and you know so like our mask mandate is lifted this place acts like we are you know, major height of pandemic thing. They sta the dividers up they have the. Caution tape across the every other chair. It’s not that I’m against it. But it’s sort of like everybody every other place has opened up a lot more. You know like the the doctor’s office I was just in doesn’t have the social distancing on the chairs anymore you have to. There’s a little screaming machine that you have to like verify that you don’t have covid and haven’t been around anywhere from that covid and you put a sticker you know, verifying that your visitor for the day but you know and they have some of the dividers but this place is like crazy right? so. So I go and sit behind the divider in my chair next to the caution shape take chair and displaces like tomb. You guys. It’s empty and and they have big signs like on the outside too saying procedures are not done here and I’m like what do they do in this office. So the receptionist this other gal comes out.
08:20.90
jeffekennedy
And she said do you need to schedule an appointment and I said yes and she said I can help you with that so she takes me back so we sort of wents through this cubicle farm which is empty. She’s sitting at her desk and there’s a gallot another desk and I can’t there’s like There’s not phones ringing because clearly it’s all going straight to boysmail ah guys I I don’t know what anybody in this office is doing right? I mean this might be a cream puffed job if you need a job in Santa Fe where you don’t actually have to do any work. This is the job. So but so she like gets in the computer and she gets my information and she said how soon do you want to do this procedure and part of their voicemail message has this whole thing about if this is an emergency procedure ordered by your doctor. Have your doctor call directly and all this kind of thing and I said well whenever you know I don’t really care and she said well she said we could get you in this week I have openings on Wednesday Thursday and Friday afternoons this is when I stare into the camera. They have openings Wednesday Thursday and Friday afternoon I was like okay and she offers me like 6 different times 6 different openings now it’s occurred to me now that I’ve read the instructions and it’s like no eating after 10 a m today for my 3 Pm appointment tomorrow I can have clear liquids broths that sort of thing nothing purple or blue and you know you have to do the purging and all of that I was like well I’m sure most people don’t want to do those appointments in the afternoon because you know people want do it in the morning so they can eat but still I mean. It’s not like they’re so slam jam packed that they can’t be scheduling people right when David had his ah difficulties stomach stuff before Christmas. Had suggested that we also go to the gastroenterology people. So I I kind of left out that bit of backstory that I had heard this voicemail was before and they had never called back and David decided he didn’t need it so you know we didn’t pursue but ah so I was like well let’s do it Wednesday afternoon because this is a. Ah, much more relaxed week for me might as well get it done with I just I just can’t even but ah so um, you guys aren’t here to hear here to hear about my um.
11:03.64
jeffekennedy
Antics with the medical establishment. Um, yes, so yesterday I did get my 2000 words it felt it felt really good to only go for 2000 words it felt incredibly relaxed. I did have it my head that I needed to get to this doctor’s appointment in the afternoon. Um, which is a really funny thing and I’ve I’ve talked to a lot of people about this who have you know we’re we’re very lucky and blessed and privileged to have these. Kind of unscheduled lives where we work from home where we work for ourselves where we don’t have a really structured schedule and some people do fine with a really structured schedule. Other people do not and you I think that’s part of. Knowing what your process is and owning it I I think you have to know what kind of worker you are some people simply simply do not self direct and that’s it’s not a. Negative I mean I think it’s so tempting to think of this stuff as a negative but it’s it’s just what it is. It’s like if you have brown hair or you know, maybe you can learn to color your hair but maybe you just have brown hair. You know, maybe your hair is so dark that it doesn’t bleach out when I got my mammogram back to medical stuff the hispanic gal or the nurse was an hispanic gal and she really liked my hair color and she was and she said i. She said I don’t want to be offensive but can I ask if it’s natural and I said oh no honey was my stylist. Thank you and she said my hair doesn’t bleach out light enough for me to get that color you know and it’s hard when you have that really really naturally dark hair. Although it’s you know I I colored my hair black for a long time and I really wanted that. Glossy, rich, black like the hispanic ladies have but it sometimes you just have to take the cards you’re dealt. You have to take what you’re born with and you learn to work around it I spent a long time in my day job. Being kind of mental management for a team of people who worked across the country all working out of their homes I’ve been working out of my home for a long time even when I had the day job I started an office and then they closed that office and moved me home.
13:46.55
jeffekennedy
And 1 of the great take-home lessons of this was that some people do great working from home and other people do not there was this one guy who had been in the military. He’d been in a couple of branches in the military. Very sharp. Um, really. A great dynamic worker in many ways except that you he could not deal with working from home. He would slack off and we found out much later like he would log on to our company chat and then. So it would appear he was there and then he would go take a nap and then he would come and if you messaged him and he didn’t answer. He’d come back and say oh you know I was not I wasn’t looking at the chat I didn’t have you know I’ve had my head down in this document he got shit done working from home. Um, he was great when he was with a group of people. He could not make him sit down and work. You know I found out later that he was like going out and having long lunches with people. He was just like fucking around all day but that was his kind of personality. He did really well in. A more military situation which is incredibly structured where someone is telling you what to do all the time and there are many many people like this who if you want to you know if you do better in an office environment. A lot of people prefer going to an office and being there and. Now we’re all working I think some of it has to do with you know, like how gregarious of a person you are if you’re an extrovert versus an introvert I think one of the reason that so many writers and other creatives are introverts is because. We don’t need to be around people if you want to be particularly a writer I think but probably other kinds of creatives too. You spend a lot of time by yourself in your own head and introverts are happy with that. Extroverts are miserable but you can also be an introvert and still need structure. So if you are finding that and this is something that lots of writers talk about you know, even if they have the time to write. Ah, somehow they just never quite. Do you know? There’s always something else. There’s a lot of procrastinating dread and procrastination. Ah, there’s there’s just a difficulty in creating that structure. So yeah.
16:36.44
jeffekennedy
If you are struggling with that and I know many many people who do then you have to find a way to create that structure. You might need somebody else to tell you to do it. That’s 1 reason why Darynda and I meet on Zoom and work together. Because she really needs that I have to meet jeffie at Nine o’clock and so I can’t screw around I have to get there and I need to be there and be ready to work. It’s just something she knows about herself and she’s willing to admit about herself. So you know again, it’s not a good bad thing. It’s knowing which things in yourself. Um are not optimal for producing what you want to produce and finding ways to correct for that.
17:31.16
jeffekennedy
so um so yeah it did make a difference for oh that’s where I started on all this was that 1 thing that we’ve noticed for those of us who have these kind of unstructured lives where we don’t have fixed schedules. Is if we have something in the afternoon and these days I almost always have some kind of appointment in the afternoon usually an online meeting but leaving the house is worse that it creates a sense of pressure. It creates this deadline I need to get my stuff done by then even if I’m normally done by them. You know because I always tell people. I’m available after like two o’clock mountain time which gives me plenty of room to get things done theoretically. But I’m also fighting with the clock right now because of daylight savings time. So I’m a little better today. It’s um, it’s just 8 53 right now. So. I’m ah I’m working it backwards. So hopefully I’ll get um, a little bit earlier. But yeah yesterday duinda and I didn’t start writing until like nine forty five which is latish but I did get the 2000 words it felt good. It felt more relaxed. I mean do that this whole week and then reevaluate so we shall see so on that note I am going to get this uploaded and get to work I hope you all have a fabulous Tuesday and I will talk to you all on Thursday you all take care bye bye.
Transcript
00:00.39
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee which is actually green tea this morning see how I am just. Getting healthy all over the place today is Monday March Fourteenth Pi Day three fourteen three point one four I don’t know why people think that’s funny except that they like to post pictures of Pi which has nothing to do with pi pi but. Such is the internet. Ah so um, hope you all had a good weekend I had a um I had a very unstructured weekend I had 1 scheduled meeting counted one and. It only lasted like 20 minutes so I actually did not do a whole hell of a lot I was trying to figure out what I actually did with my time David was out driving a lot and I just kind of I don’t know I hermited. There were. It was not great weather I mean it was sunny and so it was nice inside the house but there was a ah sharp cold wind blowing. Um yesterday I did go out and start raking out on the east side of the house pulled out the dead getritus from the winter there. Consider doing it out in the secret garden because the daffodils are starting to come up but I did not do that. Um I did not have a a strong plan and so not a lot happened I read a lot I’m now on the fifth book of. Juliette Marillier’s Sevenwaters series and it was funny because David left yesterday morning I did laundry I washed all the clothes and David was very appreciative of that. Um.
02:18.18
jeffekennedy
And I cleaned up the kitchen but it was funny cause he came home I don’t know around 5 or so and he asked me you know he asked me if I had a good day and I said yes, it was nice and relaxing and he said what did you do and I’m like I’m not sure, but that’s sure what I did I got. A couple of things off of my to do list. You know those things that sit on your to do list and sort of gain gravity with every day that you slide it down the to- do list god I hate those things. Ah, ah, you know and then they don’t take that long to do I don’t know what is to deal with those It’s that dread and procrastination right? Just hard to get to that stuff I almost feel like I should have written down what I did all weekend but I’m also ah but. Since like my warring selves right? I’m also was trying to relax and forcing myself to relax. That’s an old joke David and I have from back when we taught Tai Chi classes there was this because Tai Chi you try to let go of force and you relax and so you. Get into these standing forms or postures and movements and you try to do them in the most relaxed way possible and so we would do a lot of exercises with like heavy arms. You know where you would try to you know, let someone else take the weight of your arm and give it out and you would give it up and it’s it’s really not easy to do. There are a lot of um, it’s part of that practice of of giving up control and relaxing letting things go and there was this one young guy who came to take the classes and he was just um. Not the kind of guy who gave up control easily and David was working with him and saying um and the guy is like oh a hair and David’s like okay you you you need to try to to let go you know? don’t don’t force it and the guy so says. Um. Says I’m forcing myself to relax, but not how it works reader. Oh my ts hot. so um yeah so I was definitely I was going back and forth especially yesterday because Saturday I was getting more things done yesterday I was thinking I could do an unplugged day and then I didn’t and I kind of regretted it I I should have stayed unplugged I was not sticking with my resolve very well.
05:04.95
jeffekennedy
And I have not been sticking with results very well lately. So I don’t know what my deal is I’m trying to ah I did a yoga class yesterday. Um, and that was funny because you know I did it on the the Vimeo at least it wasn’t zoom. It wasn’t live. My favorite yoga teacher and I thought okay I’m gonna do this in class and you know because I really need to get back into the in yoga and and she was talking about. Um you know, like settling into it and letting go and listening to. Yeah she’s my favorite yoga teacher. She’s great, but she was starting out with saying um you know to ask yourself a question you know to have a a question for your practice and I thought I don’t know what my question is so I’m like can my question be what is my question and I decided it could and. She was um, you know, just encouraging us to sit with it and stay in it and all of this and I was not doing a good job of staying in it and I thought and oh and she was saying you know to listen to our bodies and what. Bodies need and I got halfway through the class and I thought I must don’t want to be doing this so I stopped and I thought well you know at least half an hour you feel good was half an hour more than I had been doing. Um. So yeah, I’m just trying to listen to myself and figure out what it is that I need to be doing what makes me happy to be doing and sort of to restore this equilibrium I have been doing some financial stuff and that makes me happy to like get the numbers in order. Been moving some money around and doing a few things that I’m excited about that are going to put us in a better financial place and so that’s part of what I’m thinking about and I am excited to try this um lower word count goal and see how it goes. Um. Megan Ciana Doidge commented that that she does the wax and wane thing too and and I think that’s very true that um. And and I do I follow that same pattern when I’m starting a new book in particular, especially if I’ve had a couple of weeks off or I’ve been doing a lot of editing it does take a while to ramp up in those words again and so maybe reducing my word count goal.
07:49.92
jeffekennedy
Isn’t the right thing to do because when I was figuring out and I talked about this on Friday that you know my average is a little shy of 10000 words a week that is the average overall and it’s not um. And the thing to remember about averages math is that it’s a combination of the highs and the lows and so if I reduce my word count goal overall will that drop the average down. That’s the question or is it more sustainable and I think that the difference here is. Is that little birdie on the porch caught my attention that is looking at those weeks that I’ve actually gotten 15000 words a week um or ah, yeah, 15000 words a week so 3000 words a day and early twenty Twenty one I was doing a little bit better but still there are not that many weeks where I have actually hit 15000 words a week. So I think that’s the difference. I do think that there’s something to be said for yes at different points the the book will go at different rates of speed and Megan was saying that towards the end sometimes she’ll get four or five thousand words a day and. And I certainly have days like that. But I don’t I don’t do them I I don’t let myself do that unless I’m like seriously behind like I was with gray magic I don’t know it’s it’s an eternal push pull isn’t it. Trying to figure out the difference between what we the disciplines we impose upon ourselves and and when we need to listen to what we organically want to be doing um and I think that’s um, you know it’s pertinent today because. We just switched to daylight savings time in the us I think europe does it like maybe did it two weeks ago or does it in two weeks I forget I know there’s like two weeks where my assistant and I are off sync. Um, you know and so for me. It’s one of the consequences of having you know that I don’t wake up with an alarm clock I do not require myself to wake up at a particular time and that was something I decided a whole long time ago when I first went stopped doing the day job because a long time ago. Very long time ago now.
10:39.70
jeffekennedy
I did ah a writers residency at u crosss if you get a chance to do one of those things I do recommend it. It. It was um, it was extraordinary for me and a lot of voice. it was early on in my career and it was the first time. That anyone knew me primarily as a writer that introduced me as a writer like at the moment I arrived they took me around and introduced me to the other residents and they said this is Jeffe Kennedy she’s a writer and I was like I am? but um, but that’s amazing. Especially for you guys when you’re first starting out deb someone identify you as a writer first and foremost now I’m used to it is that sad that I’m used to it. Maybe it’s not sad I think it’s pretty wonderful. Um I’ve been reflecting on that how how fortunate I am um how you know my relative success. You know it’s one of those things where I’m not I’m always striving for more. But I’m really having to reflect on the fact that I do have a really robust career and that’s been growing and doing better all the time I don’t want to lose my train of thought but I do want to share and I put it on social media yesterday I went to look at the Amazon listing for gray magic. To grab the link or something I don’t remember why because I don’t normally go look at my reviews and I was startled to see that there were 108 reviews on Grey Magic already and it’s just been two weeks that it’s out I think that’s the fastest that any of my books has ever accrued reviews I remember this one time. And bank camp. Yeah sorry ah juvenile humor for the win. Grace Draven my bestie when we were early on when we were friends and radiance was still climbing the charts and all of that I remember her posting that. Radiance had a thousand Amazon reviews and she was so excited to pass that milestone and I was like that bitch Bitch! Ah but now Dark Wizard has like 350 something so I’m thinking I’m going to pass that milestone. And I’m gonna throw it in Grace’s face actually Grace is so generous. She’s always I said her my thing about my hundred and eight reviews that she was like that’s fantastic. She never says to me. Oh you, you poor sweet summer child. Ah so anyway, um.
13:23.27
jeffekennedy
1 thing about being on that writer’s retreat at Ucrosss was it was my schedule was totally up to me and so I decided that I would not set an alarm and that I would go by natural calendar. And just see what it was and I think it’s one of the first times in my life since maybe like summers and high school or something that I had not set an alarm clock and there’s really something to be said and and I’m sorry for those of you who have schedules where it’s not something you can do. But there really is something to be said for waking up on our natural rhythm because our sleep cycles are slightly different every night and the alarm clock disrupts that but waking up, you know at the natural cessation of a cycle is um, it’s so much more restful. Ah, so the downside of it is when daylight savings time occurs like this my sleep cycle is still attuned to to me to my natural place rather than of the clock. So I didn’t start this podcast till nine o’clock which is eight o’clock in real time and so now I’m feelinging a little behind and I’m having to work breathe through that I’m not behind the clock doesn’t matter. Although. My appointments in like the afternoons and stuff haven’t changed so in some ways it does matter I have a doctor’s appointment this afternoon. Oh Joy. So um, so yeah, that whole figuring out I remember when I was younger and I would like take the weekend off or something and I never thought of it that way but where I would end up screwing around all weekend. And the time would just kind of vanish and I didn’t feel bad about it in the same way. Um, but I was really kind of trying to do that really kind of. Do you hear me. But I’m I’m very torn I was I probably should have unplugged yesterday and just. Given myself over to not doing anything at all on the computer but I did do some things and then I started fretting about the things that I didn’t do so.
15:56.33
jeffekennedy
But yeah, what’s interesting during that yoga class and thinking I don’t want to be doing this anymore. That’s enough maybe that was a real thing that that was enough. Yeah, so I don’t know what else. It’s been interesting reading these books I’m reading Seer of Sevenwaters which the author puts at the front that she was writing this while she was receiving cancer treatments in like 2007 I’m going to sneeze. I’ve learned how to pause and not sneeze in your ears. Um, and it’s still very good. She’s an excellent writer and I love these stories. It’s interesting that this fourth book and fifth book have started kind of a new cycle and she. Says on the fourth book. Heir of Sevenwaters that she thanks her agent for helping her brainstorm the novel and it’s very interesting because it feels like the first three she had very definite ideas for and this next set. Um. Are much closer together in time which is what I’d said originally that I was surprised by book 2 that she did a generational leap and now she’s staying very much within a much shorter timeline I don’t know it’s almost It would be interesting to talk to her. Because I feel like she had an idea for the first 3 books that was kind of this epic sweep and these next books don’t have quite the same heft and it could be that she wasn’t feeling good. It’s hard to write books when you don’t feel good. But I’m still loving it and and to be fair. There are very few authors who can stand up to being glommed in this way to having one book after another read and it. You know and and especially when I’m reading with my writer brain because I do notice repetitions and 1 mistake and I always worry about people doing that to my books so so yeah today is the first day of trying for the 2000 words a day. And we’ll just see what we get and a noble experiment right? And yeah, but in that guess not a lot to report I think we’re just always trying to find ways to.
18:44.14
jeffekennedy
To be kind to ourselves and still produce the things that we want to do right? Um, special shout out to Meghan by the way who she posted to social media. So I’m sure it’s fine. Had a hysterectomy and I told her that. Every woman I know who’s had a hysterectomy says it was best thing they ever did so I hope it is for you too. Mehan and I hope you are at home now and recovering well um, yeah, suchha life right? but. Hope you recover and you’ll be back on your feet because Megan also uses walking desk walking in right and again and all the rest of you get out there on your feet, get some exercise, be kind to yourselves if you can get on your feet and I will talk to you all tomorrow take care. But bye.
Transcript
00:00.30
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee.
00:22.59
jeffekennedy
So um, do you know what today is say it with me. It’s Friday whoo. Um, March Eleventh and snowy day here in Santa Fe a lovely snow. It’s like being inside of a snow globe kind of snow with the constant sifting. We got a fair amount of cuing accumulation I don’t know if we got the 4 to eight inches that they said that we might probably depends on how one measures it. Ah. Seems like we got a fair amount of moisture in it though. So that’s awesome and it’s um, very cozy weather very curl up and sleep weather then I slept a lot last night slept in this morning did not want to wake up so been moving slowly this morning. It’s eight thirty as I record this which is late for me and my mother must be still sleep because she has not replied to my good morning yet. So maybe it’s sleepy all around and I think that’s. That’s an okay thing I’m trying to let this be okay so that’s my um sort of what take home lesson from yesterday. Um I did go back and look and I I know I keep doing this so I’m sorry if you guys get sick of hearing me do this. But. I do think that you know what? I always say you guys could probably even say this with me figure out what your process is and own it and I think that that’s something that we don’t stop doing that’s it’s an iterative process. It changes over the course of our lives it changes with each book. I think that we are constantly learning ourselves and I mean that’s the point of life right to refine ourselves to try to become better at what we’re doing all the time become a better person. Strive for those goals that are important to us so I did I did a little better yesterday writing I have an open my progress count. Yeah, but I definitely. Got good words going yesterday. Um, and came out with a total of eleven fifty I mean not not anything to write home about I guess it’s enough to podcast about well.
03:10.20
jeffekennedy
Whether it is or not is debatable but I was happy to get the eleven fifty and I looked over you know I’ve really been trying to take a good look at what I do over time. And actually I’m gonna check something here and I won’t make you guys listen? Okay yeah I just wanted to check some math on that um from having been pushing pretty hard in the first couple of months first few months of 2021? Um, and not so much in or at least trying to find different ways to back off in 2022 I haven’t I’ve actually written more words so far in 2022 so someone that was pushing hard with gray magic. So we’ll see but. Going back over my productivity over all time I decide to go and look at and see how often did I really hit 15000 words a week because I always say that I figured that out a long time ago that I thought 3000 words a day was pretty sustainable for me. So I went and looked to see if this thing that I’m always spouting 3000 words a day five days a week how often do I actually hit that and you know what I haven’t hit it all that often I’m somewhat chagrined to report that I really don’t. Get that? Um, every once in a while I do but for the most part I don’t and if I look at my overall averages since however long it’s been. We know how? well it’s been. Jeffe. It’s 2012 so 10 years now right we’re looking at 10 years of data. Um I write about look at this I wrote it down Nine Thousand two hundred and forty six words a week and this shouldn’t come as. Ah, big shock because I had previously determined when I was looking going through this before that and I’d even put this in my planning schedule for this coming year that I was writing closer to 1500 words a day. Spread over 7 work seven days a week so I could calculate it on a weekly basis. Um, and yeah so I am officially you heard it here first. Um I’m revising down.
05:56.91
jeffekennedy
I am going to try to write 2000 words a day that’s slightly higher than what my average has been but I’m going to see if I can write 10000 words a week and see see if that’s sustainable because. I’ve been kidding myself about the 3000 words a day clearly, it has not been sustainable because the average is so much lower than that. So um, that feels a little scary because I feel like I should. Pushing for more than that. But those of you who have been listening to me for a long time know that I always think I’m going to scale up and push for more and it doesn’t work and I think it’s been making me um I think it’s been draining me. Over the long term so I’m going for for that which seems kind of luxurious but I’m feeling like last year was a good year I’m met a lot of goals. We’re doing much better financially and. I’m a big believer in that we must reward ourselves for effort because if we constantly push ourselves then it can be um, well have the a negative effect. It has the opposite effect of what we want I don’t think I’ve talked about this. Recently but I feel like we have to treat our our internal selves. Our creative selves are so creative. Subconscious however, you want to think of it as um, as like a puppy puppy or a kitten and it. Puppy analogy works better because people go to a lot more work to train dogs I think you can train to cats. But most people have experience with trying to teach dogs to like pee outside and that sort of thing and if you’re training your puppy to do the work that you want it to do. You can’t be constantly. Pushing it. You can’t be haranguing it nonstop. You have to let it play you have to give it treats and I feel like we have to do that for ourselves too. Ah, you know, especially if ourselves you know delivers the book on time like we want then we. Then we need to give it a treat. You can’t just um, be working all the time and yes I am talking to myself I I do have a tendency to to work all the time and I know that’s um, not always a positive can be useful but I’m working on.
08:45.54
jeffekennedy
This year seeing if I can get a little bit better at figuring out what my actual creative sustainably creative output is um and I don’t even remember I should have I have to ask grace because you know we we do talk regularly and we strategize and for. 2021 our mantra our plan was to work smarter not harder and I don’t remember now what we said this year’s was gonna be isn’t that funny I’m gonna message her. Okay, we’ll see if she replies. Um, it’s funny cause I forgot. We’re we’re on slightly different schedules. She tends to be more nocturnal than I am so I forgot that I had sent her something last night something gossiping that another author was doing I was like look at this What do you think of this and she sent me back a bunch of messages later last night when she got around to looking at it. So I had to go down a bit of a rabbit hole and read it and of course she totally agrees with me so this is the the core of our friendship but ah so we’ll see if she answers she may not be around right now. But. I think that’s funny I’m I’m gonna bet you guys I bet you? Well I can’t bet you actual money. We’ll just bet virtual point with a bet bit coin ha n fts um I bet she won’t remember either. Maybe she will so anyway. Um, I am trying to back things off and it’s funny because I spoke with Megan the other day on Wednesday and I texted her in the morning and said I’m jonesing for our Las Vegas cabana because we had so much fun doing that that was last April a year Agoapril and I said I’m joing for that and she says I’m actually um oh I can’t say this nope sorry I can’t tell you because I can’t get hurt in trouble. But anyway I was saying how i. Said you know it’s funny even though I have total freedom to take the day off anytime I want I I don’t I almost never do and she said that she actually understood that because it’s hard when you work for yourself because it’s like stealing from yourself and I thought that was a really good insight. so um so yeah that’s that’s my plan. We’ll see how it goes um, it sounds um, luxurious, vaguely hedonistic to only go for 2000 words a day which I know don’t ah you know don’t measure yourselves by that.
11:34.96
jeffekennedy
Some people do way more. Some people do way less. Um, we’ll see how it works. It’s all about figure out what your process is your process and own it no reply from grace yet. So. Um, the other thing I was going to mention is one of the younger writers messaged me yesterday younger being a um younger in the career. Not necessarily I’ve never been her in person I think she’s actually younger too. But she referenced a um article that was a daily dot about someone being sexually harassed by a guy at a self-publishing conference which I had read. She asked me if I’d read it and I was like yeah I thought it’s been passed around. I’ll link to it so you guys can read it and it’s kind of funny because here’s another one of those consequences of the pandemic because we haven’t been going to conferences this kind of thing hasn’t come up for the last couple of years and like now that people are going out and about it’s like yeah. Just a long just like people are getting in car wrecks and getting murdered again turns out when we leave our houses. We also get things like sexual harassment and she wanted to know what I thought about it and I asked her if she was familiar with the concept of the missing stare and. She was not so I sent her a blog link to that and I’ll I’ll link to that for you guys too just in case but the missing stare was coined and the article will say who coined it. But basically it’s the idea that there will be lots of people in a community who know about problematic people and. Very often. It’s creepy guys and it’s the analogy is that like you go to a house party and that everybody who’s familiar with this house knows that on the staircase there is a stair that’s missing and everybody is so accustomed. To navigating around this missing stare that they don’t think to tell new people about it and then the new person falls to the missing stair and and they’re like why didn’t you tell me the stair was missing and everybody’s like oh yeah, yeah, that missing stare. It’s a real problem. So. This is what happens in communities like writing communities and the sff community has long had a real problem with it because it’s interesting my theory and this is just Jeffie’s theory of why this kind of thing happens is a particularly in this community.
14:27.72
jeffekennedy
Is that the people who write science fiction fantasy are usually not the people who were the popular kids at school there’s exceptions but you know mostly we’re nerdy people we’re into fandoms, we’re smart, we’re into reading. Books um, you know and in general the people who were glomming star trek and Firefly and reading all of Lord of the rings were also not the people who were playing football or on the cheerleading squad. Oh Grace is typing back. We’ll see if she remembers so when corollary to this is that a lot of the guys who become successful in writing books are also guys who did not get. Laid by the pretty girls in high school and of course I’m making generalizations. Ah she is so funny. She says considering how shitty 22 her 2022 has been for us so far I think my mantra will will be head down carry on.
15:44.10
jeffekennedy
I’m going to just say I love that you don’t remember what we decided.
15:54.51
jeffekennedy
Decided either. Okay I won’t make you guys pay attention to me. Um, messaging with Grace so maybe head down carry on is a decent mantra for the year I know we decided on something. Clearly it did not stick so probably wasn’t useful then if we didn’t so anyway, um, this guy up. Okay, we regain my um attention for this. She says I can barely remember what I said last week I center a heart okay I’m gonna I I’ll take her off the window here so that I won’t be distracted so um and i. Read a very interesting article that this happened in Silicon Valley also because a lot of these guys who are the computer nerds are also not the guys who got laid by the pretty girls in high school. So these guys finally get to a place where they are. Successful within their pond. They are finally a big fish and a small pond and whatever it is in that biological boy nature that affects some of them and I will you know, not all mend this because you know there are a lot of really wonderful men in this. Science fiction and fantasy community. They’ve been great to me. In fact, supportive and appreciative of my work in ways that I never expected them to be but there are these other guys who see this as finally this is their chance to be the big fish to be the herd bull. And they start hitting on the girls and a lot of them and it’s not an excuse by any stretch of imagination but they are not always with the best social skills and they do it badly and they. Sometimes do it. You know with twisted maliciousness. So what’s the solution to this and that’s what this gal was asking me. How do we know which guys are the missing stairs I mean that’s that’s really the question. And it’s something that we’ve gone round and round about because a lot of people have suggested that we keep lists and some women I know do keep lists of who are the creepers and the problem is is then the guys start getting upset saying that there should not be secret lists kept against them.
18:33.65
jeffekennedy
So it ends up being a whisper network thing because that’s the only way you know is by talking to other women. It’s like okay who do you need to avoid in the bar who has the grabbby hands at the publisher party who is going to try to get you alone in a corner. Um. And and we have to let each other know. So that’s 1 thing is talking to each other. You can always ask other women. Um, you know come to you know women like me established women in the field and if you’re going to be working with some guy. I mean you can’t really ask us for a list of everyone who’s creepy. But if you’re gonna be on a panel with some guy you can always say you know is you see a good one and we will tell me we may not know but sometimes knowing nothing is is a good sign because it means that nobody’s ever had. Cause to talk about them. So um, the other thing that you can do and I told her this and it’s a remarkably effective trick. Thank you internet is you can Google them and I’ve discovered that one of the easiest things to do is to. Google say Jo Shmo controversy and you will get hits and ah if there’s a bunch of hits that’s much more likely that you know it’s more than 1 person has been talking about it so you will find and I gave her 1 person that you could you know look up. What had happened with them. There was one that was a while back with Myke Cole Sam Sykes and Paul Krueger and if you google those names and controversy. You will see exactly what happened and what people were saying about them. So. It’s um, some people will counter. Some guys will counter and say well that those are smear campaigns and so forth. But you know if if it’s coming from several different points in a community then you know I mean we’re not, we’re not gonna take them to trial. We’re not gonna prosecute them but like. Those particular guys. Um, ended up getting dropped from their publishing houses and dropped by their agents which is the um the hammer that we have to deal with problematic guys like that you know it’s like well. You know, nobody’s gonna take you to court for being an asshole in the bar but um, but yeah, you also don’t have to be celebrated by the community and that’s the answer we have and I’m going a little along today. So sorry, but um.
21:23.56
jeffekennedy
In the indie space in the self-p publishing space. It’s still a problem and will probably continue to be a problem until we selfpolice the community because selfp publishing sphere is still kind of the frontier. It’s like the frontier town where there’s not. Not a sheriff and a lot of the people who are drawn to self- publishing are drawn to it because there are no rules. No leash on what they’re doing and some of them come into it particularly because they are of the. Nobody can tell me what to do kind of attitude which is true in self- publishing nobody can tell you what to do? It’s all based on you know, can you sell the book to anybody and so I think we’re going to continue to see problems with these people because there is no. You know what are we going to do get Amazon to remove their account because they’re an asshole on the bar. It’s not gonna happen. So all we can do is self police and 1 thing that a lot of the really upstanding guys in the community have done is. To really take it upon themselves to be the ones who say no I don’t stand back and you know let this guy be an asshole that they have to you know stand up for the women in the community too and not tolerate the bro behavior which you know is kind of that code. Sometimes and a lot of these guys are being really good about that and saying no, we’re not going to be complicit in letting these guys do whatever they want that if we’re going to have a safe and welcoming community then then we will stand up and we will call it out the bad behavior. So I think that’s what we have to look for is um, the more established members in the community who don’t care about whether or not Joe Schmo is going to somehow um damage their career if you don’t. Let him fondle you in the bar or be an asshole. Um, and you know you look around and you see who the the good guys are and and go to them for help and and that’s what you do is you know who who will have your back because. The majority of people will have your back. it’s it’s um we’re we’re just trying to get a lot better about acknowledging those missing stairs and repairing them so that’s me going on a little bit long today but that’ll hold you over the weekend.
24:10.91
jeffekennedy
Hope you all a wonderful weekend I hope you get to do some things that are relaxing and restorative and I’m planning to do the same so I will talk to you all on Monday you all take care bye bye.
00:01.30
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee. So full confession. Um, first of all today is Thursday March tenth. That’s not the confession. But I’ve already been sipping on the coffee. So I sat down here once already to start the podcast. Staring at my face and the video screening here and I was thinking I look so tired I look so tired and washed out. What’s you know What’s wrong him? Well I feel a little droopy this morning but well I look really washed out and then I realize I forgot to put my makeup on I’d like totally skipped. Putting on makeup somehow so I had to like go back and actually put on the the up how is your day going but I don’t know why I’m spacey today I slept a long time last night. And woke up about 20 until 6 didn’t get out of bed until after 6 because I was just so sleepy I was kind of you know when you wake up and you kind of do the dozy thing kind of dreamy thing which I really enjoy. But um, yeah, feeling sleepy this morning and then. Like forgetting to put on the makeup. Don’t know how that happened the coffee is definitely pricking me up. We have a big winter storm coming in. It’s like this is we’ve had more winter in the last couple of weeks and we have all winter. Um, ah my bath is also kind of stiff I might have a little bug That’s what I get for doing things like going into movie theaters and being around people here. We are like figuring out the whole being around people thing again. Without masks because New Mexico lifted the mask mandate a couple weeks ago I don’t know if I mentioned that so yeah, everybody’s running around exchanging germs again of all varieties now. So. So it goes. Um I I don’t feel terrible just um, clearly not all together with it today. So yeah, we’re supposed to start getting snow around five o’clock tonight and it’s already pretty overcast I thought we were gonna have a kind of a nice day until then. But.
02:44.67
jeffekennedy
Yeah, the storm’s really coming in and they’re saying we’re going to get 4 to eight inches of snow which will be lovely and David is cooking cooking us vegetables. He’s playing with the the new. Food processor that we were gifted. It’s um I don’t know if I mention it’s this very fancy breel food processor and so like 1 of things has has on. It is an adjustable slicing blade. David’s been watching Youtube videos and making all kinds of great things. He make chicken pot pie. So now he’s slicing like cauliflower and broccoli and sweet potatoes very thin and roasting them so that we have healthy snacks to have around what a good man huh. So he’s been busy doing that and it smells good in here. So but I don’t mind the snow but I wonder if it’s making me a little bit. Um hibernatory that my friend Kelly Robson asked me the other day if I was hibernating. Ah, because I said I’d slept a long time like over the weekend and she said are you hibernating and I so I don’t think so because it actually feels like spring here. But now I’m having to walk it back because yeah, maybe hibernating. So. I did not have a very productive day yesterday writing wise I kind of tapped out early on. Um, it could be just still the ramp up because I’ve already written twice as much. Um, so far this week in the first 3 days this week then I wrote all of last week or the week before I mean you could see it’s like doubling each because I was editing and so forth. So you know like the I had um, 1392 and then. 33 17 and so far this week I have 65 16 so I suspect I’m in that phase of building up my writing flow again. That’s a thing about taking time off. I I recognize that it’s good for me to take that time off and refill the well and all of that kind of thing. But um, it sure does break up that flow.
05:30.64
jeffekennedy
I should like look at some of the athletic stuff some of the exercise physiology stuff when I was in grad school I there were a couple of people in our department one in particular who was very interested in exercise physiology it Was a zoology and physiology department was one of the great things about the department was that there were people working on all kinds of different stuff and so you learned the smatterings of things so I know a lot about like reintroducing endangered species and like managing wildlife populations. And so you know evolution of kidneys and also exercise physiology and this one grad student worked a lot with the olympic athletes down in Colorado springs and I learned a lot. From that you know this whole you know how do you deliver peak performance at the time that you want to? how do you manage the training and I think that there’s a lot of metaphors that are adaptable to that I think it works in the same way. I think that the creative flow works very much in the same way as the as the physical stuff. It’s never clear to me how much of what we do as writers or creators. Is directly linked into the physical but there’s definitely parallels. So so I know that I really pushed hard to finish gray magic. Broke some of my own rules and you know like rode over the weekend and did all of those things and got it done and maybe I didn’t take enough time off between because you know I’m definitely feeling this week like I had I thought okay I’m coming back this week and I’m coming back strong and I did come back strong Monday I got over three thousand words Tuesday I only got 24 23 but I still met my milestone goal so I was still on track for the date I wanted to do. And I’d had to stop early on Tuesday and then yesterday I don’t know yesterday I was distractible I did not have the focus again and I only got five seventy six so I’m just kind of wondering do I need to like take more days off just and not do stuff.
08:15.88
jeffekennedy
Or do I need to like maybe maybe I just need to start doing little bits. You know, um, like today go for a thousand words maybe I’ll try that. That’s something that I often recommend to people doing something like nanorimo national novel writing month. Instead of going immediately for like that 16 67 per day that you need to make it for all thirty days of the month start slow and ramp up and then go to more than the 66 16 67 I don’t know if anyone’s ever taken in my advice so I don’t know if that actually works we need to do a study. We really need to do some actual controlled studies. That’s the scientist in me wouldn’t that be fun just to see and and it’s hard to tell because everyone’s so individual. You know like my mantra find out what your process is and own it. Um yet I feel like I’m constantly reworking what works for me while finding out what my process is and so forth. So but clearly I’m not back to my. 3000 words per day schedule and I’m kind of revisiting and I’m sorry if I do blather on about this a lot because I think I do talk about it. You know how often do I really sustain 3000 words a day well de kuiller here. Bunch of them out there blue scaled coils what we have here 1 2 3 4 5 six seven and there’s the lookout coil. There’s always one that’s gets up on something high and plays lookout. We just bought a coil block but we haven’t put it out there yet. David picked that up yesterday. It’s like a block of compressed seed that we put out on the ground for them so need to get that out there for them. So anyway, um, I’m wondering how often do I really do I’ve been talking about that a lot this year how often do I really do 3000 words a day and maybe I need to revisit that that maybe I thought that that was a sustainable productivity for me 3000 words a day five days a week but I’m I think I’m actually not sustaining that level very well. And maybe I need to ratchet it down which um, nobody wants to decrease their productivity. But if my productivity decreases itself then I’m in the same place right.
11:00.80
jeffekennedy
So um, yeah, so we’ll see we’ll see um, it’s hard to tell like how much is refractory period and how much is just needing to build up endurance again. I kind of like this idea of doing maybe just sort of reframing my goals I think I’ll try that and report back see what you guys think because 1 thing that happens like a lot of people can do the 50000 words in in November for Likech. Na no rhymo. Ah, but then they crash and and that’s what I’m looking to avoid is is the crash I want that sustainability. No, so so let’s see what else is going on. Oh I should so back up a little bit and say that I’m also groping a little bit trying to find the threads for this fourth book of the series and that’s another thing too is that writing. The final book of an ark is just always harder. You’re just pulling all the threads together instead of spinning the threads out you’re bringing them together and I’ve heard somebody else’s you’ll use the metaphor of landing the plane you know that like taking off is. A lot of work. But then you’re flying flying and flying and that’s like relatively low of investment of effort. So says we who do not fly airplanes so we don’t really know but landing the airplane. There’s a lot involved in landing landing the airplane and getting everybody safely there. And you know like George R Martin very famously has not finished his series of um, a song of ice on fire and I don’t know if he will. Everyone’s well somebody asks me? Well I’ve talked about this before when I when I see George. Ah, at events here in town. No I do not ask him about it nobody does because we’re his friends and we don’t want to torment him. But when people ask me if I think he’ll finish I have to say I don’t know I mean I I do not know if he will. I think there are a lot of things in the way I think that there are reasons why for instance, some Brandon Sanderson very famously recently put up a kickstarter because he wrote like 4 novels during pandemic and put up this video about it which i’m.
13:43.38
jeffekennedy
I have complained in other places given my thoughts on on how he chose to do that and I will not say it here but I did have problems with it. No what I I am going to say something because he went. At it in this I think well intentiontioned way where he was kind of playing a joke and he was saying you know you know pandemic’s been hard and people have been asking how he’s been doing and that he’s been very close mouthed about it at. That he finally wanted to come clean and he pulls out this big stack of paper and says I wrote 4 novels since pandemic started and he does give some interesting data where he shows like what percentage of his time was devoted to various activities before the pandemic and. How much sense and like well for me, it was certainly true I’ve talked about it here that without traveling to conferences without doing all of that stuff I did not get tired from traveling and I had a lot more. Concentrated time just being here at home and focusing on writing and it did make a difference and and it did for him too. He ended up spending more time with family and you know a miniscule bit on conferences and stuff and he was able to write these novels and fantastic. Great for him and he is so popular that from this you know he said he was doing a kickstarter to publish these 4 novels this entirely new series I didn’t watch the entire video because I did get irritated with him and I’ll tell you why in a moment but you know he’s. Made something like $15000000 from this kickstarter to publish these novels. Ah, he hasn’t made it yet. That’s in pledges so you know with kickstarter you only get the money once you deliver the product. So but I mean he’ll probably deliver. And I wanted to add the caveat that Brandon Sanderson this is how I got there in the first place got his start because he finished Robert Jordan’s fantasies series wheel of time. So Robert Jordan had started the series I don’t remember how many books in he was. He was getting old I don’t remember if he had a chronic disease or whatever. But at any rate Robert Jordan picked Brandon Sanderson to co-author I don’t I’m I’m talking about something I don’t know tons about I don’t know how it worked I don’t know if Jordan had it outlined and Brandon.
16:29.35
jeffekennedy
Wrote it or whatever. But anyway, that’s oh graish bird hit the window ah startled me the cleaning ladies are so good about cleaning the windows. But now the the birds are hitting them It’s always this kind of light this time of year they get so um. The birds are so restless you know, excitable huh sorry about that hope it’s okay, I’m sorry act to check. Well it was alive but it’s really stunned so i. Wrapped it in a towel to keep it warm while it recovers and put it up out of the way. So a predator won’t get it. We’ll see if that makes it I need to get some of those window decals there I put it on my list to buy some I set it up on the. Bench outside the window here see if it’s gonna be okay, it might not I think it’s a Jubi too ha the cycle of life as my mother says the cycle of life is killing me. Okay, so sorry focus. Um, so yeah, that happens where people you know hire someone to finish their series for them and I kind of wonder if George won’t get to that point. Although I kind of don’t see George doing that. So anyway, ah my problem with the way Brandon and Sanderson went about that and I think that it was just not ill intentioned I don’t think it occurred to him how this would come across. I think it was just he was excited to share this thing and he thought it was a funny joke to play this way but it really fell flat for many of us because there are so many creators who have really struggled during the pandemic have struggled with the anxiety and the difficulty. Of dealing with all the things and there are a lot of people who have not been able to create and so for him to very smugly throw down his stack of paper and be like I wrote 4 novels was um, it was a little much. And so so yeah I thought that that displayed a um, a distressing callousness towards other authors. Um you know and that was probably just oh birdie’s gonna be okay.
19:11.92
jeffekennedy
It’s sitting up now. It’s sitting looking out at the little hood of the tall there. So yea. Yeah, all right must’s just been stunned a happy ending. We love happy endings excellent. So yeah, that was probably a lot of different stuff I’m feeling per year now. Coffee helps. Maybe maybe it was just ah, still sleepy. So anyway, I’m going to see about getting some work done I hope you all have a fabulous Thursday if you have interesting. It doesn’t have to be interesting if you have data on like what how you think this works with like getting back into producing and refractory periods and so forth I’m I’m interested send it my way. Yeah. So yeah, have a happy Thursday and I will talk to you all tomorrow take care bye bye.
Our topic at the SFF Seven this week takes a look at the oft-quoted advice for writers: “If you’re bored writing, the reader will be bored reading.” And we’re asking is this true or false? I think it’s wrong, even dangerous advice. Come on over to find out why.
