Author: Clara D Munro

Don’t quit your day job – not in the mean way older generations like to use this phrase to squash our ability to create but by making sure you keep the lights on so that you can be creative.

I could not have written my book if I didn’t have my day job. That’s a fact. Not that the job helped to write the book but it did give me the financial security to pursue my dream of being an author.

The fact of the matter is, we all have bills to pay. We have credit cards, loans, home expenses, and other things that pop up to surprise us. Gods forbid that you have a medical emergency or other such things occur.

If you think that you need to quit your job in order to write a book, you are very much mistaken. Look at every other writer that came before you in the last sixty to seventy years – everyone of them will tell the tale of needing to carve out time to write between shifts and likely also tending to their families.

Someone once pointed out to me that I had the perfect conditions for being able to write. I had a steady job, no children to mind, and no major responsibilities. He called it being in the ultimate flow state and that the only thing stopping me was me. While I hated how he put it at the time, he was right.

You need to find your own state of flow. Find the time that works for you to write. You might need to make shifts to your routine in order to make it happen. I can tell you this, if you do not make it a priority in your life, then you will not be able to write. Energy flows to where energy goes – which means, that which you put your energy into, that’s where your energy will go.

So if you spend all your free time watching Tictok videos or Instagram Reels, then that’s where all of your time and energy are going to disappear into. Social media has been designed to keep you locked into their platforms and they are black holes that your life will disappear into.

If you want to see where your time is being spent – spend just one week recording everything you do from the moment you wake up to when you shut off the lights to sleep. Note how long you spend on each action. This is a sobering experiment and one that will likely make you want to change your habits pretty fast. After the week is done, look at all those times when you allowed yourself to just dissociated into the your devices and see if maybe you could try something else.

If your addiction is really bad – use the digital health apps that are built into your device to help you limit the time you use social media apps. Or better yet, uninstall the apps for a month. You might find that you never want to go back.

One final note – if you are not currently working or going to school, don’t have children to mind, or any other major responsibilities and you are not writing or being creative with your time – ask yourself – why and what is stopping you? You’re probably not going to like your answer and that’s good. Use that to motivate you.

Your time is the most valuable thing you have. Do not let something else monopolize it.