From time to time, I receive questions of one sort or another. They work their way to the bottom of my to do list. In fact, today's question has been sitting in my inbox for nine months. As you can see, I'm trying to discourage you from sending me questions. <grin> At any rate, in between blog series I like to answer one or two, especially if I think they might benefit a wider audience.
Here is today's question: "Could you please send me maybe 4-5 tips you have for organizing your time and ideas with writing and reading when you have a moment? I’d really value your input. A while ago you challenged me to write (maybe you do with everyone I don’t know??) but I’ve taken it to heart."
I do plead guilty to being a writing evangelist. If you have ever spent time around me, and expressed above average intelligence, I have probably urged you to write. Of course, that is relatively easy for me to do. I don't have your schedule, priorities, commitments, or challenges. Then again, you don't have mine either. So what I have learned in relation to writing and ideas and schedule that might be helpful here?
First, I have found it helpful to commit to blogging regularly. Weekly, in my case. My first year writing I blogged daily. That was a mistake. <grin> But a worse mistake is to tell yourself you will write when you have time, or to sit down when you feel the urge. Like with the question that produced this blog, such an attitude will drive writing to the bottom of your to do list. I know men who are at least as good of a writer as I am, if not better, who blog a half dozen times a year about some random thing or other that strikes their fancy. Not only will they never develop momentum in a readership, they will not develop any momentum in writing either. Like soul winning or prayer or a date with your wife, if you put it on your schedule and you are a person of character it will get done. So commit to writing something at least weekly.
Second, I have found it helpful to write in a series. A book is a series, at least the kind I write. I also blog in series.
This has several advantages. You can explore a subject in depth, and I think there is staying power in that kind of study and teaching and writing. Then, too, it protects you from over-reacting to the current zeitgeist, the news of the day, and writing throw away pieces that have little use in months or years to come. It will also help you gather a readership. People who like the subject you are discussing will bring in other people who like it, and your readership will grow. Most of all, though, this allows you to plan ahead what you are going to write. Which is my next point, actually.
Third, I have found it helpful to plan ahead of time what I am going to write for the next year or so. This developed first in my preaching, and I found it to be so beneficial I brought it to my writing as well. This allows you to research/study/outline something well ahead of actually writing it. Why does that matter? Because you will write better what you have thought about longer. Additionally, if you are in the ministry there are some seasons of your calendar that are busier than others. In the slower ones, you can do your immediate writing for that week, and some prep for future weeks. In the busier ones, since your prep is already done, you can limit yourself to just the writing. And everything I am saying here applies to book writing as well.
Fourth, I have found it helpful to take one particular time each year to do nothing but plan ahead, to put everything else on pause while you meditate and pray on the directions the Lord would have you go as you seek to edify His people. What does He want you to emphasize next? What do the people you influence need most in the near term future? How does this fit into your responsibility to preach/teach/write the whole counsel of God? When your life draws to its close, what will you wish you had used your influence to accomplish? Answer those questions, and the questions that spring from them, formulate your plan, work your plan, and don't get sidetracked.
For me, I have found my prayer retreat to be a good week to accomplish this each year. In case you needed another reason to go on a prayer retreat. <grin>
Lastly, I have found it helpful to repackage things I have previously studied and taught. I may take something I taught in Sunday School ten years ago, deepen it and widen it, and turn it into a Bible Institute class. Perhaps a series I did on Wednesday nights some years ago could be repurposed/retailored for a Sunday School class or a blog series. Etc. If your audience in this particular venue has little to no realistic chance of having heard that from you before, and it would benefit them, give it to them. A well produces good water for many years to all who draw from it. You dug a good well back yonder; it is ok to draw from it again.
I am not sure about everything, but I am sure about two things. I do not have all the answers. It is right to ask questions designed to pull wisdom out of people. So good on you for asking, just don't think my answers are the only good ones.
I hope something here may provoke a thought that might help you. And keep writing. Well, if you are of above average intelligence that is. <grin>
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