Well that didn't last long did it? I thought 15 minutes a day was going to be easy. I was wrong. But just so you understand, I have been doing a lot of work too, despite it being my official “holiday” time.
As any indie author will tell you, trying to balance your time, particularly when you are just starting out, is hard work. Throw in the added factor of a family and the small matter of occasionally wanting time to yourself and you can find yourself a bit stuck. So how do I do it? Well the truth is, I don’t.
I am not going to tell you some hidden secrets of work life balance, because I do struggle. I have methods to help organise myself - I am a massive fan of the Happiness Planner for that by the way, although there will be a post coming up in the next couple of weeks about that - but that’s all I can do. Be organised and try to stay on top of everything.
The thing with self-publishing is that you are essentially running your own business and, like any business, there is always another job you could be doing. Last week we went on a family holiday road trip with the added bonus of being joined by one of my oldest friends. I was so fortunate that she knows me – she and I were also on holiday when I was writing my first novel, Amendments – and therefore she didn’t feel put out when I said that I couldn’t come to the pool as I needed to do some work, or asked if we could wait half an hour before we put a film on because I really needed to finish the chapter I was editing.
With my daughter it’s trickier. She wants mummy time, and quite frankly, I want Elsie time too, so all I can do is try and make sure that the time we spend together is the best it can be, whether that’s making our own game of snap, swimming in the lake, or heading to the climbing wall if the weather’s bad.
Am I doing it right? Honestly, I have no idea. But it’s life, so I’ll just keep plugging away at it the best I can.
I’m afraid I’ve gone way over my fifteen minutes today, which means I’m going to stop it there. But I promise you will not have to wait so long for the next one.
Much love,
Hannah