What would your daily/weekly schedule look like if you were a professional author?

[minacia]

"Professional" meaning -- you can make a decent salary off of writing your stories and you don't need another job.

What time would you wake up?

What would your typical day look like?

Where would you write?

What other things would you do?

 

[Deleted member 84247]

I can actually answer this question. The answer is that it's not much different. I did basically the same stuff I did when not making money from writing. Wake up at whatever time, depending on when my mind let me sleep. Work out. Write at my computer and going for a walk. As for other things, I would just play games or read books.

 

[JayMark]

I would just not have to write on my free time. I'd set aside the eight to nine hours a day I work to write instead.

 

[Corty]

I would probably turn into a night owl and sleep while the sun out, write while its dark.

 

[PancakesWitch]

Wake up, go to bathroom, have breakfast while publishing daily chapters of my novels, work out, shower, write for 2 to 3 hours, then eat lunch, then write some more, then have dinner and write some more before going to bed... that's it, only the first three days of the week. The last four I dont write until after dinner, and only a few chapters at most. As for my free time in these four days? I spend it playing games, reading, or going out, or taking short naps. But I rarely go out because I'm a hard shut-in. Sometimes there's months where I dont step out of my house. I buy groceries online and do everything through delivery.

 

[RandomReviewer]

The only different would be I could finally revert back to the days of going to sleep at every hour of day, and eventually have to get a job because I'd get procrastinate too much.

I would probably turn into a night owl and sleep while the sun out, write while its dark.

I'm actually surprised you're still not in this boat yet with how popular some of your stories are.

 

[Corty]

I'm actually surprised you're still not in this boat yet with how popular some of your stories are.

Reading for free and being willing to support an author has a bigger chasm between them than the Grand Canyon.

 

[gaylolis]

play games all day, sleep, enjoy life

not write at all

already made enough money from royalties

happy

 

[Fakeminsk]

I'd probably take a page from Stephen King's On Writing: get up as I would for any normal job (6 or 7 am), shower, eat, write. Write 2000 words. Done by noon? Great: read, do real-world stuff. Not done by 5pm? Keep at it, until 2k is done.

10k/week every week until the novel's done.

 

[AmbreaTaddy]

I am an overall artist (author, comic artist, illustrator) and I am also an insomniac so my life goes like this :

Wake up 3am
Breakfeast while watching videos
Checking social media accounts, emails, business contacts
Writing 1,500k to 2k words
Shower and hygiene
Studies (languages mostly)
Eat
Drawing warm ups and exercises
Drawing (professional)
Real life stuff, cleaning, groceries, etc...
(insert nap if I finally get tired)
Working on social media content, videos, etc...
2nd round of emails and contacts
Planning for projects
More writing if I'm not tired
Eat
Relaxation (or personal drawings if I feel like it)
And by that time it must be around 10pm to midnight so I try to sleep if I can

I also go to events and try to go to the gym once a week

 

[Tyranomaster]

I'd write from 9AM to Noon, then 1PM to 4PM M-F. Right now, I generally write 9-AM to Noon M, W, F, though sometimes other responsibilities displace this time. If I was making like 30k a year doing it, then I'd expand out that time to two 3 hour stints each day instead. I write best under a time crunch though, and not everyone does.

Most real pro authors (not all, as there is no one size fits all solution to any of this) recommend having a fixed time each day where you'll write even if you don't feel like it. It trains your body to get into the writing mindset at that time. Brandon Sanderson's writing time is like 9PM to 3AM or something like that. He then plays like 1 hour of video games, then gets up at noon and eats lunch, then spends time with his family until 9PM again.

Once we have kids, I doubt the 9 to Noon time will work either, so I'd probably have to trim it back to just a few hours during kid's naptimes.