Freelancer Focus: 7 Strategies for a More Productive Daily Writing Habit

Developing a daily writing habit has great benefits whether it’s for your job, as a creative outlet or for personal growth. If you want to work on your wordsmithing, maximize your chance for success with these science-backed strategies:

1. Start small and steady. Habits forge stronger neural connections over time with repetition, so consistency is critical in their formation. And you’re more likely to stay on track if the target behavior is easier, so don’t aim for a two-hour writing block or 10,000 words straight out of the gate. Instead, start small — as little as 5-10 minutes a day can begin to consolidate the new habit as long as it’s regular. Over time, you can slowly extend your sessions as needed to increase your rate of production.

2. Don’t overtax your willpower muscle. Research indicates that willpower is like a muscle that can be strengthened with regular use — but it’s also possible to overtax it. So the best time to establish a daily writing habit is probably not the same week you try to quit smoking or start a new exercise regimen. And you may want to try to schedule writing sessions in the morning before you find your willpower depleted over the course of the day.

3. Reward effort, not the end result. Leverage the principles of operant conditioning, used by behavioral psychologists, to strengthen your habit. Positive reinforcers that occur after a behavior will increase its frequency, so build in a potent reward system to encourage your new writing habit. Maybe it’s a trip to Starbucks or listening to your favorite podcast. Whatever your pleasure, enjoy that reward even if you feel your output isn’t quite up to snuff. As long as you stay consistent, your quality is likely to improve over time.

4. Stack your habits. Establish a new writing habit by stacking it with other parts of a morning routine, like exercising, getting dressed, walking the dog or brushing your teeth. When coffee time becomes writing time, you’ve created a built-in cue for your new daily habit.

5. Use the buddy system. The accountability of expressing your intentions and reporting results to a group, and the advice and support you receive from them, can help you achieve your goal. So consider joining an in-person or online writing group. But if you’re not a “joiner” then simply telling friends (or even writing down) your objectives can help. You just may stick to your habits to avoid the cognitive dissonance or psychological discomfort that studies show we experience whenever we observe inconsistencies between our attitudes and our own behavior.

6. Set the stage for success. Experiments have shown over and over again just how much our environment influences our behavior. And you can actually design your space for success. While we might like to think that sitting down to write every day mostly comes down to mind over matter, having a place to write that’s comfortable, convenient and free from distraction can tip the scale in your favor. A clutter-free desk with a nice view, ample lighting, a chair with good back support, and a quiet environment can all help. If you’re trying to get yourself to spend an hour a day writing huddled in a dark, cluttered basement, you may be working harder than you have to to get the job done.

Finding the specific settings and systems that work best for you may take a little experimenting of your own. But with a little trial and error, you be writing “the end” before you know it.