I want to start this off with some personal facts so that you know where I'm coming from. I know I may seem a little overly passionate about this topic without any kind of understanding or leniency. That is because I am passionate about this topic, and I don't have the time for leniency. I am writing this for you mothers, trying to juggle motherhood and house hold duties with your writing, and I am writing this for you fathers who juggle your jobs and then come home to try to spend time with your family as well as write. I am here for both because I do both. I am a mother in charge of laundry, meals, dishes, mopping and homework and I have a full time job.

But it doesn't end there. I also own a grocery store where I spend at least twenty hours a week working. I also go to book signings and other promotional events. I also go to trade shows at least ten times a year to keep current on the retailer's market. And I foolishly sign my kids up for activities like volleyball, piano, and dance so I'm always going to games and recitals and other things like that.

I'm not going to try to convince you that I'm superwoman, or impress you with my spidey powers and x-ray vision. I am not the mighty Oz--great and powerful. I am just like you. I am a regular person trying to make everything work.

This is why it amuses me when people use the terrible excuse that they don't have enough time to write that novel they've dreamed of their whole lives.

Time is MADE not FOUND.

I've had my fair share of excuses for not completing my novel.

First it was I was in high school and no high schooler has time for extra homework and writing assignments, next it was college and finals and too many credits along with too many hours spent at work paying for my parking tickets and then it was marriage and I needed to make sure my husband knew I loved him by being the super-wife. There were the excuses of, "Well, I'll wait til the baby's room gets painted." Or "I'll wait til the car is paid off." Or, "when the kids go to school." Or, "When the kids leave home."
We spend our lives procrastinating LIFE.

If you have a dream, a vision, an idea, that you want desperately to see on paper, then stop waiting. You have to start somewhere. You have to start sometime. Make that sometime now.

People don't write that want to write for a lot of reasons, but lack of time should never be one of them. I really have found that the time excuse translates better to "I'm afraid nothing will come of what I write and therefore it will not be WORTH my time." Or, "What I fail?" or, "What if what I write is so dumb, publishers laugh at me?"

They're afraid of going in uncharted territory where things might be uncomfortable, where critics loom like monsters in the dark waiting to rip apart their work. They're afraid of finding out about themselves, those deep personal things that writers seem to always discover. They are afraid of turning off the comfortable familiar television and learning what they are really made of. "What if what I write isn't worth my time?"

I want to dispel those fears right now by saying anything you write will be worth your time. Developing your talents develops the person you are. You become more well-rounded. You become more interesting.

Don't say "I'll do it later" What happens if you get slammed by a bus next week and later never comes? Believe you have something to say that is worth saying, and you will learn to make time to write.

So with working at a regular job 40 hours a week and working another 20 hours a week at the job I bought (meaning my little store) and making meals, and cleaning, and homework, and being a good wife and a good mommy of three little kids and everything else, how do I MAKE the time to write?

One word at a time.

In the beginning, it started with a spiral notebook. I got spiral because the pages don't tear out very easy, which makes it easier to stuff in a purse or backpack or a briefcase, without worrying over losing what you wrote. This was my magic. A fifteen cent purchase at Target during their back to school sale was my x-ray vision and ability to leap small publishing houses in a single bound. It enabled me to multitask and write wherever I was whenever a spare two minutes popped into existance. I learned to tune out everything around me and just write. It doesn't matter what's going on in the background. This is a learned skill. Sometimes if I was standing in line at the store, I only wrote five words. Some days I'm lucky to get to five words at all. But a book a year comes from the effort of taking any spare second presented to me and using it to write.

I didn't say I wrote a good book a year. Because once it's written sometimes it takes me another four months to revise it, and polish, and make it pretty. While I am revising one I am writing another. It keeps it fresh and new for me and keeps me from obsessing.

I confess to upgrading my spiral notebook for a QuickPad as a reward foir finishing a new book. I got a cheap one because I am cheap. That's a terrible thing to admit, but it's true! So I spent 70 bucks and bought a QuickPad from some guy on eBay.

I bought this because it got to be a real pain to have to enter in everything from my spiral notepad into my computer. It was back to the time thing. I didn't have time to do that.

What I love about my QuickPad is that it's as portable as my spiral notebook. It starts up as soon as I hit the on button so I don't have to waste time waiting for it to boot up, and I don't have to deal with a mouse.

I upgraded again last year to a laptop. I love my laptop and wondered how I ever managed without one. Everything is right there, reference material, notes on research, the internet to do more research, tetris for when I'm stumped on a chapter . . ..

Anyway . . . I write in snatches of ten minutes here, five minutes there. Sometimes less. I set a goal to write at least fifteen minutes a day which equates to about 500 words. 500 words in a snatch of time. Everybody has snatches of idle time. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard would be writers say, "Oh, but Julie, you don't understand, I really don't have time. I am just soooooooooo busy!"

They're right about one thing . . . I don't understand. I have a full time job, a full time store, church callings, publicity, booksignings and I haven't even started to make dinner yet or do the dishes, let alone help with homework and make my husband and children feel loved. And even with all this--I have snatches of time. I really do. Everyone has snatches of time every day.

Don't you ever stand in a line every now and again? Don't you ever sit in a waiting room for a doctor or an appointment for business? Don't you ever get stuck in traffic sometimes? Everyone at one time or another does these things. Snatches folks, baby steps. This is not rocket science. If it were, I couldn't do it because I failed math 100 in college.

Remember the superhuman role is over rated! Believe me I know, I've tried it. I tried being superwoman and failed . I gave up some things to make my snatches. I used to be a volunteer for our local fire department. I liked putting out fires and I really liked carrying an axe around and wearing the turn out. It was a rush, but guess what? The fire department didn't wither and die when I decided to let that go (they're probably better off without me). Don't feel like you have to do EVERYTHING. It isn't going to kill your kids if you aren't on the PTA. It will not damage your neighborhood if you decide not to volunteer for the pennies by the inch drive or the march of dimes drive. Are these things important? Sure they are! So make sure to donate to them when someone else comes knocking for donations. Give up some things. Let yourself relax a little. Try ordering a pizza once a week instead of cooking dinner or try cooking like a madwoman for a day to do the months worth of meals that you can freeze and reheat. And for those of you men and women with full time jobs . . . guess what I know about you?

I know that you all get breaks. Yep. It's true. Your little secret's out. I know you get two short breaks and one longer one for lunch. What do you do with that time? I'm certain some of you are highly organized obsessive multitaskers who already use this time wisely, but most of us aren't. Use it to write. Quit socializing around the water cooler and get something, anything, down on paper. And don't tell me you spent your whole ten to fifteen minute break in the bathroom. If you do, take your notepad with you! And if you do this, don't tell me the details. I don't want to know.

For you mothers and fathers. Teach your children to be competent. The rule at my house is that it is not an emergency unless someone is bleeding or not breathing. Give your children chores. In General Conference April 2005, (I can't remember who said it) one of the apostles said to give your kids chores! Oh wow and raptuous wonder! What a great idea! Teach them to do for themselves. And it will surprise you what they are capable of!

I don't want anyone feeling sorry for my children. These are not neglected children. They are the coolest kids in the world (honest, all prejudice aside) They are funny, smart, and we spend a lot of time together. They are loved and they feel my love by my very presence as their mother. They know they can depend on me and that I will come through for them.

On the same token, my husband is a cherished part of my life. We hold ladders for eachother. Our lives are crazy, but we make sure we support eachother in any fool notion we come up with. I did not sacrifice or give up my family to write. My writing has enhanced my life with my family; it did not take away from it. One thing I found that did take away from both my family and my writing was the TV. Do you watch TV?

"Well yeah, but-"

No. No. No yeah-buts. It's a simple question, yes or no. Do you watch TV? Do you need to? If you need to "just escape for a little while" may I make a suggestion? Escape into a world you created, not one written for syndication. Turn your TV off. I have never seen an episode of Friends. I have never seen American Idle and I still manage to make it through my day without a break down. We have access to TV, I just don't allow myself to be sucked in. TV can be awesome. It's a good way to unwind. It can be great for research (Discovery Channel, history Channel, and if you write for YA, disney teen sit coms). TV is not a priority and we don't keep it on at our house all day long. My kids don't feel abused because of it. Child services had not been knocking on my door demanding to see me flip through 500 stations to prove I'm a good mom.

Did you know that the average American spends 7 years at 24 hours a day accumulated time watching TV? Imagine how many books they could have written! If you are addicted to Gilligan island reruns on Nick at Night, I've got news for you. I hate to be the spoiler, but I think you all deserve to know, they ain't never getting off that island!

Cut out your TV, And I'm not saying cut it out entirely. When I started drinking water for health reasons, I didn't stop drinking Dr. Pepper. I drank the water first and rewarded myself with the Dr. Pepper after. Use that same method with your TV. Write your one page first and then watch whatever program you need to make it through the day, and you will be thrilled with the pages you have done at the end of the year.

I remember sitting in a classroom in high school and some author with a whole bunch of published books was talking and he was looking at all of us and he said, "Any one of you here can be a writer. You all have the ability to sit in one place and write one word at a time until you get to the words "the end", but not all of you will. In fact most of you won't. And you won't because you chose not to." While he said this he added after a minute of just looking at me, this little girl nobody with the lowest self image in the world, and he said, "But I am certain that ONE of you will. And I want to say right now, congratulations. You're a writer." He was looking at me when he said it and I knew to my very bones he was right. I knew I was that one. I knew I would be a writer.

It wasn't easy to transition from telling people I was an investigator at eBay when they asked what I did for a living to telling them, "I'm a writer." Because it took some time for me to believe it. I was busy waiting for it to magically happen. Even after I had written my first book and had it published, I didn't feel like a real writer. But one day I made a goal to write something every day. At the time I made that goal I became the writer, because I didn't lie to myself. I made a goal and I kept my word and wrote every day. At that moment I believed I was the author . . . the writer.

So write on guys, write on and write well. And to that one or two or more out there right now who knows in their bones that they are that writer. I just want to say congratulations! You are a writer.

"TIME IS MADE NOT FOUND" --Julie Wright