Write on Schedule! Writing with Deadlines, and How Not to Feel Over Encumbered

There is nothing scarier than a blank screen to a writer, especially if they’ve been staring at it for over an hour, and seeing nothing magical jump out from that blank fading white. If you stare long enough, the grey around it begins to turn dark, almost a joking fade to black on your writing career. Deadlines are the greatest named instruments of writing, they demand you be inspired, but fail to retain a bit of dignity by saying when the hand on the clock strikes at that time, you’re supposed to jump and be, and have it finished then! If you fail to meet that set time, and the conjecture of your piece is far from satisfactory, you may be writing yourself into a hole. Papers tend to have a bit of fear, a little notation of rushed worry in their pace. Most essays are written by sweaty palms, and sweating brows. They aren’t inspired writing, unless of course the said person writing that piece is up-in-arms over the subject. Then they become a clucking hen that doesn’t think twice before they press ctrl P. Writing on a deadline is life. Even if you never ever write anything professionally, and have to deal with the struggles of actually printing on a budget, and a timestamp, you’re about to learn that life is more about setting up technical writing (which I personally hate!) where you are always going to have to make citations, works cited, faxes, memos, and reports for your said company. Maybe you will have to write news making articles on the fly, where the inspiration is more I’m a robot, this is what’s going on in the world, I’m just the vector for this sour-coated gumdrop of news you’re about to ingest. Writing on a schedule is something that can be fun, although it can be a hassle. Most people hate deadlines, no one more than I, who writes every single Monday now for several months straight. I hate having that deadline, but I always pull myself up by my hipster Velcro sneakers (I’m kidding, a grown man should never wear Velcro sneakers. Ladies, if your boyfriend is past the age of thirteen, let-alone eighteen, and he’s wearing Velcro shoes, it’s time to drop him, okay? Same goes for you fellas, if your girlfriend thinks flip-flops with flowers and teddy bears are appropriate everyday footwear….any season, it’s time to leave the playground behind, you’re adults now…your shoes should reflect it!) and I write. Monday Blogs has become an obsession, and its lead to less than part posts, but that will reflect on how many reads I get that week. Sometimes I just go with my gut, and post trash, even if it hurts, so long as I fit my quota. Sometimes it best to give junk, instead of leaving a big fat blank. Scheduled writing, which sounds nicer than “deadline” is a nice euphemism for such a morbid term, but I am not for politically correct language, I’m more interested in taking away the fear of timed writing. Deadlines are manageable, I’ve done one for years when I wrote for local newspapers, and I was never off my game, because it came natural to get the work done as fast as possible, and as well as possible, so I didn’t have much editing to do. A short piece like a newspaper article shouldn’t be hard to go over with a fine-tooth comb, it’s not a voluminous encyclopedia, it’s barely a short story length work. Always remember to write as if you mean it the first time through, and then edit yourself. Spelling and Grammar check do most of the work, reading it over does the rest. Granted, I don’t always edit larger work, because I’m initially lazier with blog posts than I am with crucial writing. I am not going to slave over a short three paragraphs as much as I am three pages, and the same should be said for a three-hundred page, 200,000 worded novel. I’m going to put the right amount of effort where its best needed, because the sad fact of life is no work is ever perfect, and choices need to me made on the fly that would never be compromised in most upper echelons of writing. If you’re writing for Monday Blogs, or something even more perilous: the New York Times, you’ll discover that most of what’s printed is about as accurate as what you see on here. The NYT is not necessarily about accuracy, or proper grammar usage, it’s about initiating proper space for the proper context of how long you’ll keep someone’s attention. Most people tend to believe they are reading high level writing in newspapers, sad-to-say, that is a farce, as with most books written today. You want “higher reading”, pick up a Gray’s Anatomy, I guarantee your favorable reading quality of Chuck Palahniuk will diminish when you’re left with terms like Process of Maxilla. Yeah, that’s my favorite part of all, and the one I actually remember from Anatomy and Physiology, so if I’ve used that before in prior discussion, I sincerely apologize, please don’t hit me in the duodenum. Writing is held to the same standards: those who write like robots, and use twenty-five dollar words are more aptly going to write user manuals, not the pretentious-usages found in most modern papers. I use papers as a prime example outside college essays, because I feel college essays are given too much slack, where newspapers tend to be far more anal on punctuality. I’ve written for about three papers in my lifetime, and most people on newspaper staffs think they are the bee’s knees. Guess what? They’re just as much lackeys as any other boss, and double the smug remarks. Although newspapers have fallen out of favor these past decades, and the real news is found on….well, blogs, and micro blogging sites like FB, Twitter, Twitch, etc. you’ll notice that the lax mentality of newspapers are now far worst, as printing fluff pieces, and yellow-journalism have come to be the next great movement that really is just a revert to the eighteen hundreds. I know that writing on a deadline seems to be something that should be harder now that news is practically little ticker blurbs underneath our television screens, but I find it’s far more intricate than said loaded sentences. First off, writing news is about quickness, accuracy, and someone standing over your shoulder, fact-checking every single letter you type. It’s about being quick, efficient, and most importantly, not missing a single step. If you are ever going to be writing for pay, and you have to do deadline writing, here’s the best suggestion I can give you: don’t write like the world depends on you finishing in time. Most magazines/newspapers have deadlines that come with a built-in failsafe, although you shouldn’t always rely on that cushion, it’s not always going to be there. However, I once had to tack on an extra day for a news article I was writing, and I was lucky enough to get it, because I was relatively ahead of schedule most other times, and that’s after some brutal editing. Secondly, deadlines are only really serious if its about mainstream publishing, like books, essays, thesis papers, and in-some-cases, blogging. Newspapers can be far more lenient than say book publishers that put stake in you finishing on their time, not your time. Sometimes it’s the opposite, but for most, you’ll discover the continuity of publishing for newspapers is like that of a buzzing bee that goes from flower to flower: an undisturbed, well-oiled machine that cannot be held up by a wandering worker. Big paper publishing really demands respect, where local, meh, hand it in tomorrow. Book publishers are more like snails, that they are willing to speed up in case of a predator attack, but mostly, they are still ridiculously slow at their fastest pace. Thirdly, if you are writing for a timed event, say you have to publish a story about the local elections, and its going to eat up a lot of time waiting around for the votes to come in, and then a rush of frantic writing and editing to be the first to publish the information, then you really have to learn to get on the proper schedule. You can wait days for getting the results on a particular article, and it may force you to write it all out in ten minutes or less, that is hardcore situations, but they can occur. The truth is, most editors will task you with something they know you can pull off in the set amount of time. If you don’t know what they want from you, that’s probably more an error on your part, rather than on theirs. Editors do try to make life a tad easier for you when it comes to projects. Great editors will practically gift wrap you a story like every single day was Christmas. Lastly, deadlines were always made to be more like “guidelines”, but the more proficient you are as a writer, the better off you will be at succeeding at deadlines. Sure, you can try and test out deadline writing before hitting the big leagues, the fact is, you’ll never actually feel the rush unless your job feels critically challenged by your failure. Imagine being able to say that you are writing to stay alive, to be fed, and have the electric stay on another month. That is tough, a lot of added stress already on top a stressful job. I tend to stay stress-free, because I know my own limits, which have set the parameters of my own failures and successes, but writing on a schedule is not always boring, or stress-filled, it can be fun too! Make sure you tell your editor what your hobbies and interests are, and where you area of expertise outside of writing lay. Figure out what you’re willing to look up, so that doesn’t feel like uninhibited learning. Make sure you’re willing to be diversified in so many areas, try to keep an open mind. An example of this would be to think outside the box, and see how you can bring more readers to whatever medium you’re writing for, like suggestion a new section, or perhaps a new style for reshaping an old hack idea. Writing is a gift, most people tend to waste it on boring, monochromatic text that could barely constitute as human emotion, or even prose! Find your niche, but never be afraid to go outside that established parameter, because they were always meant to be stretched to the furthest corners. Remember that writing on a deadline is more about a race to show how good your honed writing skills really are, it should be a thrill, not a scare. It should be about shining, rather than dauntingly wading about in a pool of contemporary wallow. Finally, I’d like to leave you with a bit few tips on writing on a deadline: 1. As you know, I write for Monday Blogs every week now since I discovered that Monday Blogs was a thing some months ago. I’ve been a fan of having the potential audience come to my site, even if it barely doubles my readers from before. I keep in mind that I may have one or two people that actually care about my writing, and I don’t let that added pressure of performing get me down. Instead, I feed on it like a fire, but more importantly, I feed on it, because I don’t want to let myself down, or flounder out. I don’t always write good posts, but I know that I can always improve on a short blurb, or a winded article. Learn to turn those doubts into do. 2. Don’t see it as a challenge: if you write without a deadline, you can surely write with one. Most people mull over the topic or story they are asked to write about, not realizing that they have the world at their finger tips, or at their local libraries with knowledge on that topic. Nothing is new, everything has been done in one shape or form before. Calculators and abaci have been around for years, and just because a new computer algorithm that does the exact same thing has been invented, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a founding somewhere in human history. Use the world’s collective database to your advantage, don’t go in blind! 3. Feel something for your article, despite what most people tend to believe on newspaper writing, it is still an art form, and you should love it like its your grand masterpiece, even if the rest of the world would think you mad for doing so! Writing is your Mona Lisa, it’s your Persistence of Memory, make it stand out, make it your grand-scale work, even if you know at the end of the day, it’ll be used to line bird cages. Feel some empowerment for getting that piece in on time, or else you’ll just see it as another task to a dead-end job. Many people would love to have that job, even if your boss is an ass, or your coworkers are gunning to cut your throat, or overstep your place. Love every minute, and don’t let the negatives get you down. Write! For that is all you need! No distractions, no excuses: write! 4. If an editor doesn’t assign you a piece, which is extremely rare, and you’re stuck having to pull something out of that curmudgeon brain of yours, always remember to find that piece that could be a lead, rather than some secondary backpage story that barely makes it onto the classifieds. Take neglect and mismanagement as an opportunity to outshine your coworkers, perhaps even your editor. Don’t wait for someone to throw you a round top steak, go right at the cow, and cut it out yourself! Use your teeth if you have to, just get that piece to print, and do it better, more proper than anyone else on your team. You can potentially become the best at what you do, even if you manage the Lifestyles section 5. Finally, always remember that tomorrow is another day, and learn to write for yourself, and your audience. You should know your readers, and what they can expect of you, so don’t disappoint! Do homework after work, keep motivated, and never, ever, ever stop writing. The second you make writing out to be your job, is the second your inspiration will die away, and rot like a delicate primrose that bears aspiring seeds. When all else fails, remember that deadlines are not about getting it done on time, it’s about pushing to see how well you can do with how little time you have, it’s a way to develop style, and if you can accentuate style with quality, you will have it made, and be the jealousy of your whole bullpen. Thank you for reading the Malacast Editorial. I hope you find this piece helpful, and I hope you enjoy this blogsite, without you, I would have stopped so long ago. E-mail: mcasteditorial!@yahoo.com Twitter: twitter.com/mcasteditorial for my feed, or @mcasteditorial to send me a message. Follow me, and I promise to follow you back the moment I get online. Thank you again for the adoring support, and also a special thanks to all my international readers, I hope that Google translate has made it easier to read my blog,. I want you to know that I adore all my readers, and am so thankful to be considered an internationally read blogger. I’m very humbled by all anyone taking time out of their day to read my slop, and I hope you all enjoy what I have to offer.