007 – Time Management for Writers with Katie Forrest

Hello and welcome back to the Rebel Author Podcast episode 7. Today I’m talking to Katie Forrest all about Time Management for Writers. But first…

I’ve been keeping a log of the lessons I’ve learned on my journey through full-time writing and I’ve just posted up (albeit slightly late) my lessons learned from being 6 months employed. You can find it here.

Next up, I’ve been a long time fan of the YouTube star Jenna Moreci, she’s absolutely hilarious, has a potty mouth worse than mine and is one of the nicest authors ever, so I was honoured to be on her YouTube channel talking all about how to go full-time as a writer. You can find the episode here.

Listener rebel this week is David Tapara. I’m almost at the end of the initial tranche rebel stories, I haven’t received any more so I’m not sure if I should continue these listener rebels. If I don’t get any more then I may well close this segment of the show. If you’d like to be a listener rebel, then email your rebel story to rebelauthorpodcast@gmail.com or tweet me @rebelauthorpod

Two new Patrons this month, welcome to Kelly and Arriane, thank you so much for your support, it means the world to me and ensures the podcast continues. I’ve just posted November’s exclusive Patreon post which is all about perfectionism, it’s destructive nature and what you can do about it. I also get a whole lot more personal and share how it’s impacted my life too. Don’t forget you get access to the backlog of posts when you join up, you get to determine the topics and themes I talk about in the patreon-only posts and much more. Support the show here.

Just before we start the show, I wanted to let you know that as part of her launch, Katie will be running a live Q&A in my facebook group all about time management on the 11^th December at 1pm. If you want to watch, you can join my Facebook group here.

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Time Management for Writers with Katie Forrest

About Katie Forrest

Katie Forrest is an indie author, time management geek, director of a boutique law firm and mom to a daughter with complex additional needs. She loves reading, listening to the rain and is quite obsessed with cacti.

To join her Facebook group, click here.

To get her free time log and time hacks visit her website here.

Follow her on instagram here.

Get her book from Amazon USA

or Amazon UK

Please note these are affiliate links and I will earn a small commission if you choose to purchase the book.

TRANSCRIPT

Sacha Black
Hello and welcome back to the rebel author podcast. Today I am with Katie Forrest. Katie is an indie author, time management geek and director of a boutique law firm and mom to a daughter with complex additional needs. She loves reading listening to the rain [me too] and is quite obsessed with cacti. Welcome.

Katie Forrest
Hi, thanks for having me.

Sacha Black
So first of all, just tell me about the cacti.

Katie Forrest
So, okay, here’s the thing I loved cacti before everybody else in the world did so I’m quite annoyed that cacti is really cool now and everybody pretends they’re a cacti fanboy. I went to Arizona years ago and the holiday was really special to me and I just fell in love with cacti came home got a tattoo.

Sacha Black
That’s dedication.

Katie Forrest
I buy as many characters as I can I only wear socks with cacti on for example. Yeah,

Sacha Black
How many are there in your house across real and fake cacti? How many are there? Could you even count?

Katie Forrest
Oh probably hundreds by my bed sheets I’ve got cacti on just yeah my cups have everything yeah everybody obsessed.

Sacha Black
Do you know random facts about them as well? I like

Katie Forrest
No I know nothing. They just look pretty.

Sacha Black
Yeah, there are like some seriously bizarre looking cacti there is a really cool of. Okay, random tangent aside, we are here to talk about time management and you self-professed time management geek and you are also writing a book about time management. So tell me tell me about your writing. Tell me about your journey. Tell me how you got to where you are.

Katie Forrest
Sure. Okay. So I’m one of those typical people always wanted to be a writer. As a kid I was up in my bedroom writing, not going outside playing. So always been a complete geek and then life got busy. And so I didn’t write for years and years and years. And then at the end of 2017, I realized this is crazy. I have got to just make the commitment because my life is never going to calm down. So I need to just make it a priority. And so I made that decision and to 2017 published 11 books in 2018. And just kind of short books, little.

Sacha Black
It was 11 I’m trying to pick myself up off the floor anybody that can can publish at that rate. I just I bow at your feet. I feel so unbelievably slowing in comparison but yeah, tell me all the secrets.

Katie Forrest
There’s lots of hacks and things and I am a quick writer, but that is just a strength I’ve got I’m not saying any of the words are any good.

Sacha Black
So you’re writing a time management book. How did how did that happen?

Katie Forrest
Lots of people were asking how I was managing to write and publish fairly quickly, while working a full time job and raising my daughter, so I kind of just started thinking there is an interest out there. And I’ve always been obsessed with time management. So if you look at my bookshelf, they are just full of time management books, but I don’t necessarily think those ideas are meant for creatives, very often it’s kind of management speak. So I wanted to do something with creatives in mind.

Sacha Black
That’s it. So, so tell me then what does good time management look like?

Katie Forrest
Okay, and so to me, there are three components really. So living a life that’s in line with your areas of focus. I don’t say priorities because priority is singular. That’s a mistake that we make quite often we can only have one priority, but we can have several areas of focus and time management will let you live a life that is actually in alignment with it.

Sacha Black
Let’s just stop. Hang on one second because my brain is exploding already. Wow, that’s a new way of thinking about it. Yeah, wow my I just need a minute because my head is erupting. Nobody has ever said that to me and nobody has ever talked about focus or priority in that way I think that is fascinating. So is that the crux of your of kind of the shape of your book because because I yeah I mean what we are told to prioritize always constantly prioritize prioritize prioritize and but but but just yet no sorry carry on. I’m just waffling because I might I’m having a like a an epiphany right now live on this podcast. Thank you. Thank you so much.

Katie Forrest
Yeah, but priority thing is big for me. We just can’t have so many we just can’t have 10 priorities how on earth do you then decide what to do with everything as a priority? So I prefer to look at it as areas of focus.

Sacha Black
How many are we allowed?

Katie Forrest
How many areas of focus as many as you want, things are going to get more complicated the more you’ve got, but very often the areas of focus would be your writing career, your day job if you’ve got one, your family life, your self care, and probably some kind of community involvement, maybe religious activity or something. I think they tend to be the core groups that people have bought. Yeah, you can have as many as you want.

Sacha Black
I feel like you’ve just given me permission to do all the things I’m sorry, yes. do carry on. Sorry. I know I interrupted but it was it was worth it.

Katie Forrest
No, it’s fine. I was I was saying that time management has got three kind of core elements to me. The second is clarity around what to do and why you’re doing it? And the third is boundaries, boundaries in place for yourself and for other people.

Sacha Black
Okay, and so I think the second one is probably self-explanatory in terms of having clarity on your goals.

Katie Forrest
Yeah, pretty much. So you’ve got 24 hours in a day, how can you attempt to manage them if you don’t know what you’re trying to achieve with them?

Sacha Black
Yeah, yeah. So talk to me about boundaries, because you know that I’m raising all my eyebrows because I feel like I’m about to get scolded for my behavior now.

Katie Forrest
Set boundaries, I think there’s two senses, two boundaries, boundaries that you have for yourself and boundaries that you have towards other people. So a boundary for yourself very often is something like Facebook. Do you have boundaries in place in terms of how much you’re accessing social media, how much you’re allowing yourself to do that? And maybe that’s not your particular distraction thing. Maybe that’s just mine. But you will probably Have your own whatever it might be. So have you set up some boundaries around that? And then boundaries around other people is how often are you allowing yourself to be interrupted? Are you letting people take up your days to run them around and take their calls and do things that they wouldn’t expect you to do? If you were working in a typical job, they wouldn’t call you out for half a day to counsel them or run from around or just go for coffee. So have you made those boundaries clear, in terms of this is my work time and sometimes I’m going to need to say no to you.

Sacha Black
So I nodded along to everything you just said because I am terrible for this. You are right. I think there’s something really key that you said that I allow myself to be interrupted. And how do I stop that? How does anybody stop that? Because obviously we have… and I don’t know if this is because I’m a mother or perhaps it’s augmented because I’m a mother, but I have guilt if I don’t respond, or if I don’t pick up the phone, or if I put my phone on Do Not Disturb or if I, you know, I don’t help or I don’t go and look at the new car that somebody wants to buy or whatever. And I feel bad and it’s distracting it invades my brain. So how do we stop allowing ourselves to be interrupted?

Katie Forrest
Sure. So I’m, I’m sure what this does affect both genders. Various research to show that this is particularly something that females feel quite keenly, but we are nurturers and we want to put everybody’s needs before ours so that there definitely is truth in what you’re saying in your experience. And that isn’t to say that men don’t feel the same as well. I’m sure they do. Honestly, in a situation that you’re describing where people are, presumably on your side and want you to achieve and want to help you. I think sometimes it’s about a really candid conversation with them saying these blocks at time need to be work, focus, please don’t invite me somewhere, please don’t call me because I will feel as though I’ve got to answer your call to go out with you. So ask for their support. That assumes that they are supportive influences in your life. And if they’re not, if they’re people who are trying to take more of your time than they really deserve or entitled to, then it’s going to be a little bit more hardball. And I’m a huge fan of Oprah saying that and there was a complete sentence I probably quote every day to somebody very often myself. So just saying no is absolutely fine.

Sacha Black
I’ve never heard that before. No is a complete sentence. I love that. That’s amazing. And, yeah, I think it’s, I think that’s really interesting. And one of the things that really hit home with what you said there was saying, please don’t call me because I will feel like I have to pick up. And that is so true that that really is the crux of it and actually just communicating that now and explaining that when you text me or when you call me, even if I have, you know, the Do Not Disturb on or whatever. If you have if you have Macs and iPhones, everything’s connected, it all populates across. It’s true. I do feel like that, and actually just having that being truthful and saying I, you know, I feel like I have to pick up an answer that places the onus of the problem on yourself and not to the other person. And I think that’s probably quite key in not letting your family feel like they are the problem, I suppose.

Katie Forrest
Yeah, sure. I think for most of us writing is taking time away from our loved ones. Yeah. So we always need to be respectful of that and make sure we’re balancing giving them the time that they need. Yeah, yeah, definitely.

Sacha Black
Absolutely. Okay. Yep. So, Tell, tell. Tell me about the phrase busy work, because I’ve heard you say this. I say this all the time. I am busy. I’m really busy. I’m too busy. I can’t, you know, blah, blah, blah. And, and I think that we all fall prey to this. So can you can you explain what busy work is? What “busy” work is in air quotes? versus what productive work is?

Katie Forrest
Yes. Yeah. The challenge here is that busy work is genuine work. so busy work is something that needs to get done. So if you need to unload the dishwasher, of course that’s Yeah, you’ve got to do it. These are all they’re not imaginary jobs. And that’s what is so difficult about them. Ultimately busy work is not your priority work, it’s not work that is directly going to move you forward. And when you’re looking at what you’re doing and whether it is productive work or busy work, one of the questions I asked myself is, is this something that only I can do? And if the answer is no, it’s probably closer to being busy work. And that isn’t to suggest that you need to be outsourcing everything apart from your core areas of focus, which for a writer are probably going to be writing and not much else. Pretty much everything else could be outsourced. I’m not saying go out and do that. But that question will help you stay on track in terms of is this productive, or busy work?

Sacha Black
Yeah, and I think it also helps you to understand what is urgent because I know I really struggle with my inbox. My inbox is the bane of all of my problems because I use it a bit like a to do list. You have that horrible red notification that’s like danger to do list. And obviously it’s psychological that’s why Facebook use it as a red notification because it’s, you know, alert, you must go and do it. And it’s it’s color psychology, I suppose. But nine times out of 10 the things in there are not urgent, but they feel urgent. So I definitely think there is truth and logic and I have to cling to what you’re saying. Yes, absolutely. And if someone wants to evaluate and change how they’re using their time, with a view to being more productive, what where the hell do they start?

Katie Forrest
So I think it comes down to being totally honest with yourself about how you’re currently spending time. So you can look back over your last week or your last few weeks and you can ask yourself questions of how productive have I been? How much progress Have I made? The difficulty with that is that relies on your memory. And all of us are working with memories that aren’t perfect, more flawed for numbers, mine is pretty rubbish. So the way that I suggest is to keep a time log for a period of seven days and actually record your time as you’re spending it. And then at the end of those seven days, look back and have a much more accurate log of, wow, I spent three hours that day on Instagram, and that was not an area of my focus right now. So I would suggest diving in with a time log. Some people will have a real kind of, I don’t want to do that sounds really hard. That sounds really boring or whatever. So the questions are certainly a start questioning how will you have spend your time but you will get more of an accurate answer if you’re prepared to keep a time log for a few days.

Sacha Black
And so what do what should they look for in that what what patterns should they try and spot in order to be able to then think about how to do things differently?

Katie Forrest
So for the person who has kept a time log, yeah, need to analyze that. They need to know what their goals are. So I asked people, what is your milestone goal? And very often, that is, I want to become a full-time writer. And in order to do that, I think I need to release three books in the next year or whatever it might be. And once they’ve got those goals set out, they can look back at the time log and see did my activity actually represent what my goals are? Did it move me closer to them an end just being brutally honest with and I think a lot of us know if we look at a time log and it’s very black and white. A lot of us can see I spent too much time on social media. I spent too much time doing errands that I didn’t need to do and whatever it might be.

Sacha Black
So I will confess to having done this prior to the podcast, because I’m nothing if not an experiment us and Katie was brutally honest with me. But I know it’s fine. I needed it. I needed the slap bump. No. So what what did it show? Okay, so the the time log that I used had 15 minutes slots, which does sound scary, but actually, it ended up being quite easy, and I didn’t have to fill it in every 15 minutes. If, for example, I was doing deep work and I worked for two hours editing. Then at the end of those two hours, I just filled in editing. Now the interesting thing was that I put in what I achieved. So I would write down how many words I’d got done in that section or whatever. And that has also helped me to understand how long tasks will take. And that little things like my mornings were always ruined by my inbox, there’s a theme here guys. So I’ve done something small, as small as taking my mail app off of my home screen and putting it onto a different home screen. And it’s a tiny, tiny, tiny tip, but it has made the world a difference because I no longer see it when I pick up my phone in the morning to check how late I’m going to be for the school rub. And, and my I don’t check it now until I come back and I can choose to do it. So it’s, it’s little things like that. You can see patterns in your behavior. Oh, every morning, the first thing I do is check my site every morning. The first thing I do is look at Facebook or you know, whatever. So yeah, I think this is an amazing task for everybody to do. So let’s let’s talk about mindset and productivity. Do you think that there’s a shift a person needs to make in order to be genuinely more productive?

Katie Forrest
Yes, definitely. This might be quite controversial. But I,

Sacha Black
We like controversial.

Katie Forrest
I think the idea of us as tortured artists do need to drink whiskey and smoke cigars and wait for the Muse to turn up. I think that is one of the biggest disservice that we have kind of done to ourselves as creatives. So, the mindset shift really is realizing that this is a business and whatever your day job is, or used to be, you probably didn’t get the option of saying I really don’t feel like writing these reports today. I really don’t feel like driving this truck today. Whatever you have to go you have to turn off and I think the mindset shift is realizing you have to do the same for your writing. If it’s a business to you not just a hobby

Sacha Black
Yeah, there’s a there’s a reoccurring theme on this podcast where I tend to say suck it up Princess, but it’s kind of true because that was one of the shocking revelations. I now work write full time. Well, I say write. I worked myself full-time. And one of the things the shocking realizations is that when you are employed by the man, you if you have an off day you are still going to get paid the same amount of money at the end of the day. That’s not going to happen anymore. And and so there is an element of suck it up baby You know, I don’t feel well today. I’ve turned up I’ve still done editing, I’m still doing a podcast. Because if I don’t, you know, we we don’t earn. And I think the other thing that you’ve you’ve mentioned is honesty. With yourself?

Katie Forrest
Yes.

Sacha Black
Because I think that’s a real mindset shift. Because if you really want to change your habits and be more productive, the only way you can do that is by being brutally honest with yourself. And I think that is a huge, huge shift in in somebody’s mindset. And hit me with some easy wins. For somebody who wants to be more productive, what can they do?

Katie Forrest
Okay, so the most common piece of advice I would give to a writer is get your words done first. This is going to be life changing for the majority of people listening, if they will just give it a try and get up and get your writing done first. I am not saying sleep less people hear about and they imagine that they’ve got to get up at three o’clock in the morning and they’re going to be exhausted. I’m not suggesting that but if you could maybe get up half an hour earlier, and go to bed half an hour earlier. So you’re losing those sleep, but you’ve got 30 minutes quiet time to get those words done. That’s an incredible feeling to take through the rest of the day. Other easy tips.. People focus quite often on technology and smartphones and oh my goodness, we’re so distracted because of all of this stuff. Actually, I think they’re some of the easiest things to tackle. So as you have said, move your distracting up away from your home screen, or on install them from your phone. Two thirds of people have never changed the notification settings on their smartphone.

Sacha Black
No way.

Katie Forrest
So if you’re one of those two thirds of people, that would be a great first go in there. And if you’re getting notifications for Etsy, and eBay and Amazon and a gazillion other apps, you probably don’t need all of them ping ping pinging you all day long. So that would be a really great first actionable tip.

Sacha Black
Yeah, that’s fantastic. And I can’t believe that I turned mine off or probably two years ago, and it does make a radical difference. Although you do still have to be conscious of your app usage, because you can very easily revert back to. Well, I’ll just have a quick click and then an hours gone by in a black hole of Instagram stories.

Katie Forrest
And the other thing you can do with that becomes the problem is you can set up limit. I’m an iPhone user. So I don’t know about all the phones, but I would imagine all smartphones have similar functions. You can limit particular apps or categories of apps. So I have a 45 minutes a day limit on my social media apps. And that’s enough time like if I’m on there longer than 45 minutes. I know I’m wasting time let’s be honest.

Sacha Black
Yeah, but there you go. They’re being honest because I’d like to know what if miss something, I’m like freaking out but I’m like, No, come on. Come on Saxha. Because let’s be realistic, 45 minutes is nearly an hour. What can you do in an hour? You know, you’re so right. But it is these embedded habits that we need to break. Let’s do Just explored the distraction thing a bit because there’s kind of two things but there are some apps that you can use I use one on my Mac called self control, sort of a spade shape with a skull on it. But there’s also other software called Freedom software, I think, and that you can use which basically puts a time lock it stops you accessing social media sites, or whatever sites you choose, that are distracting. And on your computers, but lets, you know, distractions are our distraction. So what about things like the Freewrite so for those that don’t know about the free, right, it’s a very expensive piece of analog technology, essentially. It’s a… It’s a modern typewriter, essentially and modern keyboard with no internet, more or less and then so you will have to complete distraction free writing, but it’s like $600 or something. Do you think that people should get another computer with no Wi Fi or is it pointless? I mean, is it just a matter of training ourselves?

Katie Forrest
It’s going to be different for each person. My personal opinion is, there’s a level of destruction that we all kind of get into through the day. But if you feel like distraction is a bigger issue for you than it might be for the average person, then I would ask you why. So what what are you trying to avoid? So if you’re getting distracted, you’re trying to avoid some kind of pain or discomfort. What is that? And if there is a deeper root, I personally don’t imagine that any particular device is going to solve that for you because maybe then you’ll just start hoovering or something like there’s there’s a million ways to be distracted. I’m sure you’d find others.

Sacha Black
yeah. And again, it’s about it’s we’re cycling back. We are cycling back, everybody. Come to the fact of being honest with yourself and saying, honestly, what is the priority? Content is king when you’re a writer, and if you are not producing words, you ain’t gonna be earning money at the end of the day. And but actually, that’s quite an interesting point about other problems and deeper issues. Are there any people who shouldn’t focus on time management and productivity hacks?

Katie Forrest
Yes, certainly. So people in what I call crisis mode, and very often a person in crisis mode does start looking at time management because I feel as if life is out of control. But it isn’t the right time. Again, just in my opinion, I don’t think it’s the right time. And I would define a crisis as being something that is short term, and unexpected. So the example I tend to use is having a baby if you’re pregnant and you’ll know you’re going to have a baby. Having a newborn baby will be so life changing as we both know. But it isn’t a crisis, it was expected you knew it was going to happen if there are any complications with mom’s health or baby’s health, including things like postnatal depression, but absolutely, that new baby becomes a crisis period. And when you’re in a crisis mode, you need to just look after yourself.

Sacha Black
Yeah. And I think that is a really good point. Because we, well, I say, when I say we, you probably don’t do this, but I constantly beat myself up for not achieving what I wanted to achieve, or only doing 2000 words instead of editing 3000 words or you know, and actually, it’s wildly unhelpful, being unkind to yourself.

Katie Forrest
And I do the same.

Sacha Black
Yeah. But it’s a really hard habit to break, isn’t it? It really is. Yeah. And so any tips for doing the opposite and embedding good habits.

Katie Forrest
Sure, and so research suggests that it takes 21 days to build any habit. So repetition is the key here. So decide what you’re going to do and make it part of your daily routine. But anytime that you can habit stock is going to be really, really helpful. So that is where you choose a new habit that you want to develop, and you link it to something you’re already doing. So if you want to do daily gratitude, you could say, I’m going to do this after I brush my teeth, and then the brushing my teeth will trigger the new habit that you’re trying to build.

Sacha Black
Oh, that’s really interesting. I’ve not heard of that before. Oh, yeah, that’s that is fascinating. And I drink coffee every day. So I’m just thinking about what I can do to connect coffee my life source to new habits. And let’s, let’s talk about burnout because burnout is a real issue, I think for a lot of creatives, and I think a bit like being a crisis and looking at time management when really actually we just need to rest. What good habits or time productive time habits can we embed that will prevent burnout, I suppose or help us through it.

Katie Forrest
I think really the key here is to decide on a pace that is realistic for you and maintainable. So, if you know that you can write 2000 words a day, don’t put yourself into a situation where you’re going to have to write 6000 every day, but that is going to lead to burnout.

Sacha Black
Yeah. Yeah.

Katie Forrest
Recognize your limits and try to avoid comparisonitis Really?

Sacha Black
Ooh yeah, that little bitch and yeah, I and and I suppose if you if you want to push yourself, you could always add 10% to your goal to your daily goal.

Katie Forrest
Yeah, sure. And just it’s just checking in with yourself. Does this feel good? Is this something that Keep doing because we’re all in this for the long game. Hopefully we’re not thinking I’m going to do this one book and I’m going to make my mega gazillions of pounds and retire. So if you’re in it for the long term, you’ve got to be doing something you can get up and do day after day after day after day.

Sacha Black
Yeah. And, and so, how far through your book, are you? Because obviously, you are going to be publishing a book on time management.

Katie Forrest
I am Yes. So I think I’ve got about 20,000 words at the moment. And it just keeps getting longer. So I’m not quite sure how long it’s going to be. But there’s so much stuff to put in it.

Sacha Black
Do you have a target? a target month you’d like to release in? November, November? Okay, so then for listeners, I will make sure we release this podcast around that time so that everybody can purchase the book. Do you have a title?

Katie Forrest
And I think it’s just going to be Time Management for Writers.

Sacha Black
Okay, perfect. So where can listeners find out more about you?

Katie Forrest
Sure. So they can go across to my website, which is Katiefofrest.com. And that’s Katie, Katie, ie and forest with two R’s. And if they go to Katieforrest.com/timelog. Then they can actually get the template time log that I suggest people fill in for a week. And I also have a Facebook group. It’s time management for writers by Katie forest, and it’s super small, but I post a little daily tip in there.

Sacha Black
Okay, perfect. So there is one last question, which is the question we ask all of our guests of our look at me talking about myself as if I’m more than one person. And this is the Rebel Author Podcast. So tell me about a time that you unleashed your inner rebel.

Katie Forrest
I really struggled with this question.

Sacha Black
Everybody does believe me, I get panicked emails stricken authors. Oh my god, I gotta rebel. I’m like, darling, you are you are.

Katie Forrest
So similar thing that kept coming to mind when I was thinking of how I could answer this is it’s just that my whole life has been a rebel. Which sounds ridiculous, but I can’t really think of any specifics. But what I did do was I was brought up by a very working class family where I was pretty smart. And I was told my options leaving school were to work in a factory or work in a shop, because that was just a community that I was raised by no criticism to them at all. And I just kind of pissed all over that really and just made it up as I went along every single day since so I guess. That’s it.

Sacha Black
You are a true, true rebel. Your rebel is in your very soul and I love it. So thank you very much for your time. Thank you to everybody listening and thank you very much to patrons. If you would like to support the show and get early access to all the episodes, you can order it by visiting www.patreon.com/Sachablack. I am Sacha Black. You are listening to Katie Forrest and this was The Rebel Author Podcast.