How You’re Going to Do More Things
It’s our second guest post! C. Scott Frank, TL;DR Press writer, self-published author (though that seems too simple a title for the myriad of work he puts into his works) of Frosthammer, Venison: Season 1, Frequency, and Echo, music producer, and owner of Fox Press (and seemingly a million other things), shares his method for getting the ton of projects he’s got out the door.
I am often asked how I get so much done. It’s a great question, especially since I often feel like I don’t get as much done as I’d like. But, one of the most annoying things in the world is when you’re about to get in someone’s car, and they warn you that it’s filthy. You brace yourself, ready to fend off any innocuous diseases, because you know what filth is, only to step into a car that may as well be off the lot and you realize you’re terrible at everything you do and you’ll never amount to anything.
So, in the spirit of not being that guy, let’s just talk about how I get things done.
A day in the life
No, this isn’t the Gilmore Girls reboot. This is how I approach the average day of trying to accomplish something, anything.
I’ve learned that I’m at my most creative from about 8 pm to midnight. I’m at my most analytical and administrative from about 8 am to noon. So, I force myself into those boxes.
I’m a morning person by nature, so I try and wake up early. I usually have an alarm set for about 6:30 am, and let myself wake up over the course of 30 minutes or so. I need some time to wind up and mentally prepare. I spend the first part of my morning reading, eating breakfast, some time in prayer, and taking care of my son so my wife can sleep in (she takes the evening shifts because she is definitely not a morning person).
I try to settle in around 8:00 am and knock out whatever technical and administrative stuff I have going on. I’ll do this for about an hour on workdays (so I can head to work) and I’ll spend an extra few hours on days off.
These are the times I go through emails (which I’m super behind on, sorry, if you’re reading this!), catch up on some communication, schedule my social media, or otherwise manage my marketing efforts.
I try to make sure I have tasks divided into bite-size chunks with a plan so I can be sure to knock ’em out. It works. Sometimes.
Then I save all the fun stuff for evenings. I find my creativity waxes through the night, so I try and channel all of that for being productive.
Cerberus
My creativity is a many-headed monster, however. I have a lot of interests. I write, I design, I compose and record music, I do video, etc. I was talking to a friend about this the other day, and I told him:
“It’s 2018. There’s no longer a reason to sit idle and say, ‘I’d love to do ______.’ You can do it. The internet has no less than fourteen gajillion FREE tutorials about how to do it. You can learn to do just about anything. You just have to find the gumption to do it.”
Case study? Me:
I’m a college dropout. In my 6 months of college, I bounced all over because I didn’t know what to do. Despite that, in the last four years I’ve:
- Released a game on the Apple app store,
- Successfully Kickstarted and published a tabletop game,
- Published three books, and
- Released an original album on Spotify, iTunes, Google, and other major music retailers.
All while maintaining a job and fostering kids and having one of my own (well, my wife did all the hard work on that last one. She’s awesome).
I don’t say that to point to myself and show you how awesome I am. I share that for this point: I’m a nobody with no reason to find success. Imagine what you can do. All you have to do is try. And the great thing? I’ve pretty much broken even on every endeavor. So not only is it accessible, it’s cheap. Man, the future is awesome. There’s a whole other blog post I could write about entertaining multiple interests and why I love to work that way. Maybe if I’m super nice, Sarah will let me write that one. 😉 (Editor’s note: Bring it on! – Sarah)
The question that isn’t asked (but really should be)
As often as I’m asked how I do so much, there’s one question that is never asked, but is arguably more important: What are you not doing?
There are two answers to that question. For one, you’ll notice I didn’t mention much in the way of hobbies. For me, creativity is my hobby. I don’t play many video games. Honestly, I feel like I play more to stay relevant than because I actually enjoy it (says the guy who still plays almost exclusively Skyrim).
I don’t watch TV much or spend a ton of time on social media. I wrote a whole blog post about video games and other time-wasters on my site (I’m not sure if I’m allowed to say that) and how they distract from our purposes, but suffice to say: you can be as productive as you want—just guard your time wisely.
The other answer is that for every project you see me finish, there’s another half-dozen in limbo that I’m stuck on. Per my last point, there are no limitations to what I can/want to do. As a byproduct, I throw way too much at the wall, and only some of it sticks. That’s what you see. I’m always recycling and refining and redefining to see what I can use and make something from. It’s an odd chaos, but I make it work. Sometimes. Hopefully.
The point is, I’m not special. There are millions of people out there who are way better than me at pretty much everything I do. I can’t even pretend to stay in the same plane with them. Even more specific: most of you reading this are better writers and far more creative than me. But you have to go and actually do the thing.
It’s 2018, it’s not only possible, it’s in your hand already. Just grab it.
If you loved this guest post, give Cameron some love over at @C_ScottFrank! You can check out his short story, Rest Stop, in the first TL;DR Press anthology, TL;DR: A Redditwriters Mixtape Vol. 1.
Interested in writing a future guest post? Send a query to tldr-press@googlegroups.com with the subject “Guest Post Inquiry” or send a direct message to @TLDRpress.