New Beginnings

A move to a new format, my current word count, and more

Each day technically has the same amount of hours, but when you don’t fill them, they move at lightspeed. I know this all too well from the time I spent before moving from Boston. I had left my job as a video producer, and I hoped to work on personal projects. I wanted to get better at mountain biking, to work on my short stories, to improve my language skills.

But none of those things happened. For three months my empty days seemed to pass without notice.

By the time I boarded the plane to my next destination, I had nothing to show for all of the hours I’d had free.

Someone once told me that time wasn’t consistent—that it stretched or contracted according to what filled it.

I went back to work after the move, and my days once again filled—but I worked remote, and I still had the flexibility that I’d enjoyed before leaving. I began to work on more projects outside of work, and my days were productive yet again.

When I left my remote job for an in-person one a few years later, I was afraid that I would lose time to work on my fiction. A part of me dreaded the potential end of writing my own stories.

But on the way to work my first day, I took out a pen and notebook. When I got into the office, I still had half an hour before work, so I kept the pen and paper out. I ended my day with 1,000 words—more than I had in weeks.

I decided to continue my streak. My mornings were filled with my writing, and I found other moments in the day to take to my pen as well. While some days I went out to get lunch with colleagues, other days I crept away to the break room and took out the pen and paper over lunch.

And to my surprise, my weekly word count went up. It was higher than before I started at my new job.

I came home most days satisfied with the work I was doing in the office and even more satisfied with the work I was completing on my book.

In no time, I completed a first draft and had to move on to bringing my laptop in for editing.

What was it about a new routine that propelled my writing forward?

It was having less time.

I knew that those minutes I had were the only minutes I would have to write that day. So I focused on nothing but my writing. I didn’t fold the laundry, or watch a Netflix show, or read the news on my phone.

I just wrote. And I realized that by using the little time I had in a focused way, I was able to get more done than when I had an expanse of free time in front of me.

Have you noticed having less time makes you more productive?

Don't be shy. Send me your answers to rivka.begun@gmail.com. I'd love to feature your story in next month's newsletter. 

Riv
                                                                               
P.S I'm always looking to improve! I'd love to hear your thoughts (or a quick hello) in my  Feedback Form     

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What to Read this Month

My mother told me to read this book almost a year ago, and I finally got to it a few days ago.

When I say a few days ago, what I mean is that I finished this in a matter of days. I could not put it down. I declined social invitations, ignored everyone in my life, and curled up in any reading nook I could find—whether that be a seat on a tram or a towel by the lake—to finish this.

From Bookshop.org:

From the author of the Oprah's Book Club Selection An American Marriage, here is a beautifully evocative novel that proves why Tayari Jones is "one of the most important voices of her generation" (Essence). It was the end of summer, a summer during the two-year nightmare in which Atlanta's African-American children were vanishing and twenty-nine would be found murdered by 1982. Here fifth-grade classmates Tasha Baxter, Rodney Green, and Octavia Harrison will discover back-to-school means facing everyday challenges in a new world of safety lessons, terrified parents, and constant fear.

The moving story of their struggle to grow up-and survive- shimmers with the piercing, ineffable quality of childhood, as it captures all the hurts and little wins, the all-too-sudden changes, and the merciless, outside forces that can sweep the young into adulthood and forever shape their lives.

You can buy the book from bookshop.org here

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Responses from last month's newsletter

To read the newsletter on spaces, click here

Love your newsletters. Always so thought provoking. As an Occupational Therapist, we look at how our environments help or hinder us from doing the activities we need to do, and want to do. You are right in that the environments of our home, work, community and beyond impact our daily lives. Do you have to drive everywhere, or is their access to safe streets and public transportation; Do you have spaces to move around in, good lighting, access to nature, etc. I aways found it very important when I saw a client in their home, to get a sense of where they spend most of their time and what activities are most important to them and how to rearrange them, if needed, so the person could continue to participate in the activities that were important to them. When we can’t do them anymore, then we either need to find new ones, or we will feel useless. 
 
Anyway, in our own personal environment, we have never had a TV in our bedroom and have never missed it. We save that space for intimacy and reading. 
 
Nancy Lowenstein Boston, Massachusetts