I might be a productive Canadian author but I’m a lot of other things besides. I run a business and I’m a widowed mom with three children, two of which still live at home. While I was working on my fourth book, Content Marketing Made Easy, there was one car in my family and an endless list of places three people needed to go – band practice, part-time jobs, volunteer gigs, meetings, friends’ houses and, of course that ever-important Temple of Teenage worship, The Mall. My physically-disabled elderly mother lives 15 minutes away from me. And I would really love more support!

Does that sound like the kind of life that can easily make time for writing a book?

With my first book behind me, I had proven to myself I could write a book and I was also under contract with my publisher to write three more. The novel was followed by Passages to Epiphany a collection of short stories and then by The Write Way, a book about how to write more powerfully; after that my publisher thought it was a good idea for me to write a book about content marketing, which is something my team and I provide through one of the businesses I run. He made that announcement in January and wanted to publish in October that year. He needed the completed manuscript for a 55,000-word book in July.

Why did I need a strategy for writing?

I was highly motivated to write that book – this one would have a direct impact on my life and not only could I serve my audience with it, but it was an investment in marketing that would be a huge benefit to my business. So, I took a deep breath and dove in.

As you can imagine, there was no such thing as “spare time” in my life. I was on the run from 5:30 every day quite often straight through until 10:00 o’clock at night. Weekends were a barrage of errands, driving, mothering duties, daughtering duties, and looking after my house. There was no consistency of schedule in my life at that time and there were a lot of surprises. I needed a great strategy for getting this book written. I didn’t “have time” to write a book, so I needed to “create time.”

What I came up with was a plan to crawl out of bed at 4:30 every morning six days a week and work until 6:00 a.m. on my book. I created a solid structure for what the book was going to cover and then I drew up a writing plan with a schedule to follow, that would guide my writing like the hand of God himself. Some of those mornings were ugly – but I knew I only had to do this for seven months of my life and, in exchange, I was going to see my name on the cover of my fourth book! I was motivated, and I had a strategy, and it worked.

If you’re looking for ideas on how you can create the structure in your life you need to write the book that is going to change your life, please get in touch to find out more about my book coaching and editing services. There are many ways to get the job done and sometimes it just takes a little creative thinking to move forward with the project!