Cynthia Morris

Writing a book is messy, even for seasoned authors. Wrangling your material into cohesive shape is real work. There will be times when you sag with despair and cry out “This is a mess!” Rest assured. This is normal. This is not a function of your ineptitude, the lameness of your book or your inability to pull it all together. It’s part of the process of writing a book. Take a deep breath and trust yourself. Let’s look at how to sort this mess out. Be patient; it might take some time.

Depending on where you are with the process, it might be helpful to print the book up. Many of us are writing in one long on-screen document. Scrolling can be a nightmare, and rolling back and forth can contribute to your feeling of chaos. If you have a draft, even a shaggy draft, print the whole thing. Make sure that the pages are 1.5- or double-spaced, with page numbers at the bottom. Reviewing a printed copy makes it so much easier to see the whole. When I went through my printed draft, it was clear that the table of contents needed to be reordered.

With your printed manuscript in hand, step away from the computer. Take your notebook and pen with you. Your plan is to make a “punch list” of things to work on next. This is a term borrowed from the construction industry, where there’s a walk-through of a house before it’s finished or before a sale. The punch list includes things to fix or work on. Make a punch list for your book. You want one list that you can work through methodically later.

Now, back to the messy draft. Read through everything you have written. This read-through is for the purpose of seeing the whole, for distinguishing what’s working and what’s missing. Read like a teacher who wants to help the student make this paper as good as possible. Put check marks, smiley faces or stars next to things that are working. Add to your punch list as needed. Avoid getting caught up in wordsmithing: if you see sentences that you want to revise, underline them or circle words you want to change, but don’t get caught in the details now. Include the bigger things to work on, not the details. These could include:

• Revise chapter two.
• Add examples for chapter ten.
• Research for chapter four.
• Brainstorm ideas for images in the book.
• Identify passages that need to be fleshed out.

Your punch list will likely be long. Don’t despair. It’s good to have an objective list of things you can work on. The draft will still be messy, but now you have marching orders of what to improve. This kind of list serves as a project manager.

Once you’ve made the list, you can organize items into categories. My recent punch list includes:

• to write
• to do
• weave throughout
• to consider
• plan of action

For each writing session, go to the list and do some of the tasks. Check them off the list to feel a sense of progress. Address as many items on your punch list as you can in each sitting, but know your limits. Notice when you feel “done” writing—you might be getting impatient, rushing and lowering your standards to make progress. The list can also keep you from feeling ambushed by emotions that may arise when you sit down to write. You are just working your way through the list. You might go through this process many times, at least once for each draft. It’s okay—it helps you to know what to do and when.

Excerpted from The Busy Woman’s Guide to Writing a World-Changing Book.

Here’s a punch list I made in Notion for my novel-in-progress. I have whited out the details to avoid spoilers.

Thirty years ago, a mile from where I type now in Denver, I began my writing life in earnest. I wanted so badly to write, but I had no idea how or what! In a class called Writing the Wild Woman, I learned how to free-write, scribbling alongside other women. Afterward, we howled. Because, wild women and all.

It’s hard for me to believe I’ve dedicated 30 years to writing. As a girl, I spent most of my free time reading. I wanted to be a writer. And so, with lots of ink and angst, I have fulfilled a childhood dream. Despite the baby-blue typewriter my parents gifted me, I didn’t have the courage to start writing until my mid-20s.

In my garage are boxes filled with hundreds of journals. I haven’t kept everything but have files full of poems, articles, and essays. All the unseen words speak to the invisible labor that is the writing life. What is visible are the words I managed to bravely put into the world. If we want to have an impact, we have to overcome our fears and insecurities.

I like to say that if you want to know yourself deeply, take up an art form or start a business. All your demons will rise up to meet you. By continuing to show up, you learn that you are more than a handful of insecurities and hopes. Writing is a most splendid way to meet yourself in ink and hopefully, come out loving yourself a bit more.

Writing has offered me a powerful path to personal growth and empowerment. This is what I want for my clients. Not that they become writers, but that by becoming writers they become a stronger version of themselves.

My version of success

My writing life does not resemble what I dreamed of in my Ohio bedroom. I have not been ‘discovered’ by a publisher. I am not a best-selling author and my novel has not been adapted to a film starring Amy Adams. Dang! But how often do our actual lives match up to our imagined lives? I didn’t get married until I was 50, and my husband doesn’t look anything like I’d imagined. And yet, he’s perfect for me. As is my writing life.

If I look back and tally the wins, I’m proud of my writing life. I’ve written and self-published eight books and am working away at my ninth, a novel. I’ve published countless articles, mostly about writing and the creative process, productivity, and a few about yoga. I’ve learned how to write sales copy, because as a solopreneur, being able to promote my services was vital to survival. I don’t earn a living from writing. I have earned over $100,000 from writing – a glorious $3,333 per year!

You may know that I’m into a lot of things. I’m a writer, artist, gardener, traveler. Through my business, it seems like I’ve done a million different things, from retreats to online classes to monthly writing challenges. People call this ‘all over the place.’ Maybe so. When I look over the landscape of my writing life, I see a map of my abundant curiosity and creativity.

Aside from any outcome, my biggest success is that I kept writing. Even as my creativity has led me all over, writing persists. I’ve savored a lot of little writing victories. I have learned so much about myself and the art of writing things people (hopefully) want to read. I have the freedom to write what I want. My days involve a lot of writing. From commenting on clients’ writing to writing my novel to writing this essay, I see my values threaded through all my words: honesty, integrity, purpose, creativity, love of language and humor. Showing up to write means showing up to be me. 

Thirty years in, I am astonished to discover that even though I wander freely among all the creative outlets I love, I have become a person of tenacity and commitment. I am willing to keep at it even when writing feels like an emotional tsunami. The rampant rejections and disappointments have fostered a healthy sense of humility in me.

We want to write because we have something to say, and we want to be heard. There’s no way to measure how my writing has impacted the world. I only know that by showing up despite all the fears and doubts*, I have cultivated a healthy sense of self-respect. Whatever the outcome, I have honored this life-long impulse to write. I plan to keep writing, and friends, I hope you do, too.

*Spell-correct changed that to donuts. If ONLY my writing were fueled by donuts!