Whenever I listen to writers talking about their process the main thing I want to know is what their day looks like. What time do they wake up? Do they start writing straight away? Take the dog for a walk? Do they exercise? What do they have for breakfast? And so on.
It’s quite creepy when you think about it. But still… I want to know.
So I thought, if there are any other ‘what does your daily routine look like’ lurkers out there, here’s mine!

I work at my day job three days a week and then have two days at my writing job so the days can look quite different.

Work day
6.00am – This is my ideal wake up time. It certainly doesn’t happen everyday though. I find by the end of the week I’m staying in bed until 7.00am even though I know I will feel better if I get up early and have some space in the morning to myself. I try and do some form of exercise at this time, sometimes a run when the weather is good or some yoga or stretching. If I’m pushing for something in my writing though, like finishing edits or a certain number of words a day, I will get that done in the early morning quiet.
8.00am – I’m out the door to my day job.
2.30pm – By time I finish work, run some errands, and get home I’m really needing to take a break. I generally make a coffee then sit and watch a TV show for about half an hour. I’m quite dogged about this rest time because my job requires me to be on my feet the whole time and I know from 3.00pm I will be on the go again with family stuff so I make sure I take this thirty minutes as a rest and reset.
3.00pm – From here until the evening I try to focus on just family stuff. I take the dog for a walk, we go to sport training (I do work really well in the car at sport training and will always use this opportunity to get a bit done) and making dinner. If the kids are watching TV or having a computer turn I will definitely jump on my laptop and try to get some writing admin done. But a lot of the time I find the time is not focused and it can be wasteful. I’m sometimes better off doing a load of washing and saving the time until later in the evening when I can switch onto writing mode.
8.00pm – My husband and I have a night each during the week where we can get some work done while the other one is ‘on’ for getting kids to bed, helping with homework etc. We have done this for many years and it works really well to both be able to have some work time without feeling guilty. I generally do admin work in the evenings as my brain is a bit fried by this time. This is where I will schedule social media posts or make sure my goal setting is on track.
10.00pm – I am not one of those people that gets a second wind at night, I’m more often than not nodding off while at my laptop at night. I like to make sure I’m in bed by 10.00pm so then it doesn’t throw the next day’s routine out of whack. If I’m pushing to get something done though I will stay up but my latest is probably still 11.30pm. Total lightweight here!

Writing Day
6.00am – Same as a work day.
8.30am – Kids are out the door and I take my dog for a walk first thing otherwise I will get caught up and he will be a pain. I generally listen to a podcast as I walk but I am trying out using this time as work time and thinking through my characters and plot development so I’m ready to get it down as soon as I walk in the door. It’s a work in progress though!
10.00am – I aim to be back home, laptop on, coffee made and ready to work at 10.00am. Any later than this and my time starts to bleed out for the rest of the day. I will set a Pomodoro timer (https://todoist.com/productivity-methods/pomodoro-technique) and will aim to do at least three rounds (about an hour and a half) before I stop. I use this time to do really focused work like actual writing and plotting. It’s my favourite work time and I love when I feel a bit drained by the end of the day because I know I’ve done a lot.
12.00pm – I’ll have a small break here usually to hang out some washing or make some phone calls but I generally want to get another two hours in before school pick up at 3pm so I will set another timer and away I go.
3.00pm – By this time I should have had 3-4 hours of really solid, focused work and if that’s the case, I’ll happily finish for the day, perhaps doing some more in the evening if it’s my night. If I’ve had a distracted day or have procrastinated by not turning off my phone or not using the pomodoro technique I tend to feel like I haven’t ‘finished’ yet and can then find myself sitting at the kitchen table, trying to do more work. Madness lies this way however as I start to get irritated at interruptions and generally get nothing of quality done anyway.
Evening – Very much the same as above.

The key thing for me on any day is that when I’m with my family I’m ‘with’ my family and when I have the opportunity to work I focus on work. I’m never good at blending the two. I can’t always achieve this because… life is what it is but I’m always working on it!
So that is very much me. What about you? I would love to know!

If you want to know about other writers routines James Clear has a great article here.