I’ve been working on my first book off and on for years, and finally set it aside to start fresh on a new idea, as I don’t think I’ll ever finish that other one.

I know you’ve written several books, and I heard that you wrote one of them in just one day? How does that happen, that’s nuts.

Any advice for someone who’s an enthusiastic writer, but can’t seem to get a book out the door?

Ben

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Hey Ben-

Writing a book is one of those seemingly Herculean tasks that is both truly, remarkably difficult, and a whole lot easier than we often make it out to be.

Don’t let the romanticization of the book writing process fool you into thinking it’s some immense and magical thing that some people can do and some can’t. If you want to do it, it’ll probably be worth the time and effort invested, and you can absolutely make it happen.

That said, if you’re just kind of sort of thinking it might be interesting, or a cool thing to be able to say you’ve done, it may not be worth your time, and you may be better served opting for some other pursuit, instead. Writing a book is almost always a marathon rather than a sprint, can be immensely mentally and psychologically and physically taxing, and requires quite a bit more commitment than most people suspect, from the outside looking in.

The popular saying that many people want to have written a book, but very few want to write a book, is dead on for that very reason.

If you do decide that this path is indeed right for you, though, the specifics of the path you take may vary greatly from mine, because there’s no right or wrong way to write a book.

I know people who set a very different pace and have a wildly different method than I utilize, and they produce great work. Every single person will approach this somewhat differently, and that’s okay: try a lot of methods, figure out which works best for you—in terms of what you produce and in terms of lifestyle and enjoyment—and then double-down on that, improving your skill over time.

I personally tend to prefer outlining everything up front, figuring out precisely what I want in every single chapter, and in what order those chapters should be presented, before I type a single word.

In practice, this means I’ve got all the research done, I’ve got the main points I want to make mapped out, and I know, generally, in what order I want to say what. By the time I sit down to write, all I really need to worry about is the words I use: I can focus on how I say all these things rather than spending tons of time figuring out what I want to say.

That, by the way, is how I was able to write one of my books (a short one) in a day, and how I wrote a few others over the course of a few different weekends. The writing part was only really limited by the speed at which I could type, which is pretty fast. The outlining component of the process, though, took quite a bit longer—so if we’re including the entire process in this estimation, a single day or weekend isn’t accurate.

These days, for lifestyle balance reasons, primarily, I tend to spread my writing out, so that I maybe, at most, write a chapter a day and then move on to other projects and/or go out and do non-book things. I don’t think there’s anything inherently right or wrong with any pace you might set, just keep in mind that there are pros and cons to all approaches.

Several author friends of mine like to more or less just wing it, figuring out what they’re going to write as they write, starting with perhaps a loose outline of what each chapter will be about, or, if they’re writing fiction, a rough blueprint showing which plot points happen in what order, to ensure there’s a good character arc. But beyond that, they like to get into the flow of things and let their writing take them wherever it will take them.

I also know quite a few people who prefer to edit as they write, and who will, as a result, often produce a sentence or two a day, spending literal hours manicuring a single block of text until it’s perfect, before moving on.

I tend to opt for a different approach, finding it easier and more productive to produce a rough first draft as quickly as possible, before going back in with my hammer and chisel to carve something far better and more publication-ready from that coarse block of stone, honing it over the course of several editing rounds.

Both of these extreme approaches are perfectly reasonable, as is any more moderate approach you might come across. Again, I suggest you try out a few different methods, and then choose one to focus on for a while. You can try out others, later, but having having at least one very sharp tool in your writing tool belt is a good idea before you go buck-wild and decide to master every method you encounter.

On a tactical level, I find the book- and script-focused writing software Scrivener to be immensely useful, as it allows me to outline like crazy, focus on my writing, and then export the result as just about any file type you can imagine—including directly to printable PDF, or as a variety of different ebook formats.

Other people swear by the traditional Microsoft Word (which is favored by most editors, by the way—though Scrivener can also export your work as Word .doc files), while still others prefer the cloud-based Google Docs, handwriting, typewriter-using, or thumbing an entire book into their smartphone.

If you’ve had trouble sticking with a book in the past, I would suggest doing at least a little bit of outlining, and then giving yourself a writing goal each day—a set number of words, or a set period of time. After that, stop. But during that period, set aside everything else and focus completely on what you’re writing.

Such limitations can be constraining, but that’s kind of the point. The idea is to force yourself to get some deep writing work done each day so that you get into the habit of being productive with your craft.

A few other quick bits of advice:

Get your work out into the world, both so you can get past treating every word you write as precious—you’ll need to kill off a lot of your favorite turns-of-phrase for the betterment of your projects, along the way—and so you can get feedback on what you’re producing. Not all feedback will be correct or valuable, but the act of putting yourself out there is worthwhile unto itself, so a blog, newsletter, or similar project may be worth your while.

As you write more, your style will become more defined. Don’t be afraid to deviate from your style, and don’t be afraid to try out different voices. Also, don’t worry that learning more about how formal, “correct” writing is done will ruin what makes you, you. The goal is to sand down a lot of your rough edges as you grow, but to carefully choose a few of those edges to sharpen, instead. If everything you do is jagged and disfigured, though, no one will be able to tell which parts are you doing something intentional and unique, and which parts are you simply not knowing how to write.

Finally, consider that books are just one of many possible delivery vehicles for your words. Every possible medium has distinct advantages and disadvantages, but they can also inform each other in interesting ways. I’ve personally found that writing for my podcast, for instance, has changed the way I write the talks I present publicly, and the voice I use when writing my books.

Ideally, we come to perceive each opportunity to communicate as an opportunity to hone our craft. So whether you’re writing an email or a tweet, think about how you, as a writer, can best communicate via that medium. This’ll help you flex your writing muscles more frequently, but it can also make the act of answering emails and writing texts a lot more interesting and fulfilling.