4 Steps to Capture Time to Do Your Creative Work

“One definition of maturity is learning to delay pleasure. Children do what feels good; adults devise a plan and follow it.” —Dave Ramsey

Image courtesy of coward_lion at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of coward_lion at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Your book, painting, or speech is important. You want to have peace in progressing on your project. But there’s no time anymore.

Here are 4 steps to capture peace in this hectic world. Don’t worry. I won’t tell you to work faster. We have our own paces that can be improved only so much.

Image courtesy of Gualberto107 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of Gualberto107 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

1.   Outlooks

I’m taking Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University class. He teaches us to view money, our needs, and our wants in a new light. Under God’s principles, we can be debt-free and have money to save, spend, and give. Ramsey says we, not banks, ads, or credit cards, need to tell our money where to go. This is a new outlook.

The same is true for our time. We, not other people or things,  need to tell our time what it should go to. Under God’s principles, we can be rush-free and have time to work, play, and help others.

Image courtesy of worradmu at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of worradmu at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

2.   Behaviors

In Ramsey’s class, he tells us we can’t be debt-free and have money to save, spend, and give if we don’t change our behavior. He says we must have a budget we live by that tells every cent of our income where we want it to go. For most of us, this is new behavior.

The same is true for our time. We must change our behavior. We need to have a budget we live by that tells every minute what we decide it’ll go to. If we need help, we can join an accountability group.

For example, I divide my weekdays into 5 blocks of time and assign the work, play, and help I’ll do in each.

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

3.    Trade-Offs

From Ramsey’s class, he tells us in creating our monthly budget we’ll have trade-offs. Our actual or estimated income is fixed in our budgets. If we decide to do one thing with our money, it means we can’t do something else with it. What we tell our money to do is about making wise trade-offs.

The same is true for our time. Our time is fixed. We need to make wise trade-offs of our time.

If we decide to shop with a friend, spend hours on social media, and sleep in an extra hour on workdays, that’s fine. We get to decide. But what will we trade-off so we can do these things? Time with the kids? Making progress on our creative work? Read a book? We decide.

Image courtesy of anankkml at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of anankkml at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

4.   Emergencies

In Ramsey’s class, we learn to set up an emergency fund so our budgets aren’t attacked when crises arise.

The same is true for our time. We need to build in emergency time into our time budgets. With one to two hours built into your weekly budget for true emergencies, you’ll protect your planned goals.

Tweetable

  • We can complete our creative work in rush-free peace.
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How do you fit your creative work into a week’s time?

How Waiting Brings You Success in Your Creative Work

“When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.” —Exodus 13:17

By Richard Eisermann (1853-1927) (Bonhams) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

By Richard Eisermann (1853-1927) (Bonhams) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Do you ever feel like you’re filled with a creative spirit, and it’s time for you to succeed? So, you work furiously and send your baby out. But ouch! Others don’t see it your way. They give you 5s on a 1-10 scale.

We can embrace a little-accepted but powerful tool that will bring us success. I’ll call it the W-A-I-T tool.

1.  W is for Wonder

file0002075254789We need to ferment.

I want to watch my grandchildren go though all the wonderful steps to becoming fine adults. I don’t want them to miss their time to wonder and to learn how to overcome challenges. I want them to succeed.

God led the Israelites in a roundabout route to the Red Sea. He led them from a life of slavery into a new life. Why the roundabout route? Because He didn’t want them to face war. In their fear and discouragement, He knew they’d give up and turn back.

If we charge forward, the first sign indicating we aren’t ready may cause us to give up and turn back.

Whether we enter into a creative field at fifteen or fifty, we need to be led in a roundabout journey, learning how to wonder, to develop our craft, and to overcome challenges.

2. A is for Act

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAOur individual creativity needs to ferment.

You must develop and discover your individual stamp by working on it. Try different ideas and methods. Through persevering and production, allow yourself to discover what uniqueness you are called to deliver.

This is usually a good time to enter contests on a regular basis. Then watch scores and comments improve as you learn what in your work delights experts as unique and good.

3. I is for Idle

Our work needs to ferment.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERALet the work sit. Overnight, a week, or if necessary, a month, depending on how long it takes you to return to it unbiased.

Much reverberates in our creative minds. Often, the good stuff we see in our imagination fails to make it into the work. Or it gets in but sits there in an awkward manner. Or the good stuff never has a chance to enter our overactive minds.

So, let the work idle. Hours after I’ve finished a scene, a word pops into my mind. Unaware I needed a better word, I find the interjected word is perfect for the scene.

Also, when I return to my work after days, I’ll ask myself, “What did I mean by that sentence?” If I don’t know, then my readers won’t.

Let your work visit a trusted critique partner. They’ll often catch problems that you don’t.

4.   T is for Trust

file9961246654490Our confidence needs to ferment.

Our roundabout journey has grown us. We’ve discovered and developed our individual flare. We’ve let our work stew, and then we honed it. Now, we need to let our baby go to find the right place for it to do the work it was created to do.

The first place we send it might be the wrong place. So, don’t get discouraged. Send it elsewhere. Or find a good agent.

Tweetables

  • Waiting is an excellent tool at several levels in your creative work.
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When has waiting been a boon in your creative work?

12 Ways You Know Your Creative Work Is Your Gift

“Your talent is God’s gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God..” —Leo Buscaglia

Image courtesy of -Marcus- at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of -Marcus- at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

When we learn a new technique or have a success in our creative work, it’s easy to believe it’s what we were called to do.

We need to stand just as confident when our work seems inferior or we’ve received a rejection.

12 Ways to Know Your Creative Work Is Your Gift

Image courtesy of adamr at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of adamr at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Talent from birth. Not necessarily good talent, but you’ve got passion. You never understood why you were punished for drawing on the wall.

Habit-forming. Highly effective or not, you resort to this creative gift when you handle problems.

Asked God, at least once, to take the frustrating passion away. And you were shocked when He did. For a season.

Noticed other people noticing your penchant for it. Your father demanded you become a math major to cure you of it. So you’d amount to something.

Keep on keeping on. It’s the one thing you persevere in. The one thing you quit your job for. Or almost quit your job for.

Sealed with it. If you listen to the small whispers, you’ll know God bestowed you with it to use for His service.

Gush to others about it. You talk about it with anyone who listens—or doesn’t. That’s why you go to conferences and bask in the wonderfulness that others want to talk about it too.

Interrupts everything. Your sleep, your dinner, your housework. Blast it all. You’d love to live in a clean house.

Voracious appetite for it. You feed on it. That’s why you often miss dinner.

Itch to get back to it. When the ideas are humming. Otherwise check your backyard for poison ivy.

No number of rejections can stop you. The toothpaste-spattered note on your bathroom mirror says, “Gone With the Wind was rejected 38 times, for Pete’s sake.”

Gifted in in your creative work makes sense when you look back over your life. It stuck with you in bad and good times. So, you might as well go forward and seek excellence in it.

Image courtesy of njaj at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of njaj at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Teaching, art, encouragement, writing, administration, speaking, giving, dancing, helping, drama… We use creativity in them all.

What gift are you grateful for this Thanksgiving Day?

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American Christian Fiction Writers

American Christian Fiction Writers

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