tips for getting back to writing after time away

We all know the really loud idea that “real writers” write every day no matter what. But we also know that human beings take breaks from our jobs and our hobbies because we have complicated, interesting, difficult, beautiful, embodied, messy, and hopefully long lives.

Writers—and here’s a big important secret—are in fact human beings.

The writers I know have days, weeks, months, sometimes even years of not writing (or not writing regularly, or not writing in our core genres) for lots of reasons. For example:

• We have bodies and they don’t always work great.
• We have caregiving responsibilities that are sometimes all-encompassing.
• Our other work doesn’t always leave time and energy for writing, especially in combination with body challenges and/or caregiving responsibilities.
• Grief bowls us over.
• We run into fun opportunities and decide to embrace them, even if that means setting aside our writing for a while.

Life happens! It is okay to take a break from a creative practice.
 
The problem is that, although most people want to go back to writing, it can feel really hard after time away. If that’s you, here are some strategies that will help.

Plan ahead if you can.

In some situations, you can plan for the break and for the return. In those cases, it’s smart to do two things:
 
1) Set yourself up for success in whatever project you want to return to, whether it’s a work in progress or something new you’ll be starting to draft after the break.
 
Leave yourself notes instead of assuming you’ll remember what you want to do (and why) when you get back. Come up with and write down a few very concrete next steps. Think about what starting point is likely to feel best to you, given whatever’s going on in your life, and try to give future you the gift of that!
 
2) Set yourself up to remember to return in the first place.
 
If you don’t write professionally, you may literally forget to go back to your writing practice for a long time once you’re out of the habit. Or you may remember but feel no urgency or motivation to start again, having lost momentum. If you value your writing practice and want a way back when the time comes, it’s a good idea to create some scaffolding for future you.
 
How can you remember to circle back to writing once a crisis has passed, or reevaluate and reinvent your writing practice if life changes longer term? Here are a few possibilities:

• Schedule a meeting with yourself to check back in about writing. Put it on your calendar, in your date book, or in whatever digital reminder system organizes your life. Try thinking of this as a meeting about your writing, not as a writing session; use it to revisit your writing life, decide whether you’re ready to start again, and plan how you’d like to do that. If it’s not time yet, schedule another meeting with yourself a bit into the future.
• Ask a friend to check in with you once a month, to keep the possibility of writing again alive.
• Enroll in a class, group, retreat, coaching arrangement, or other writing-related event with other people that’s scheduled close to when you plan to restart your writing practice.
  

Be on break while you're on break.

Sometimes people need or want to step away from writing but also spend a lot of time and energy feeling guilty for not writing.
 
Instead, let yourself be in the moment with whatever it is you need to attend to in your big human life. Whatever it is, you are having experiences that will shape you and your work in future. Often, the experiences you’re having when you’re not writing turn out to be important parts of the process too. And even if that’s not the case, the rest of your life—taking care of your body, your mind, your family, your friends; experiencing your world—is important in and of itself. This is enough.

Be real once you're back.

If you need to take a long break from writing, whether it’s planned or sudden, positive or devastating, I encourage you to entertain the idea that your life may have changed during that time. You may have changed. If you’ve stepped away from writing because you had a baby or someone important to you died or you started a new career or traveled the world or went through cancer treatments, just jumping back into your old writing routine without a thought may not serve you well.
 
Instead, pause to take an honest look at your schedule and routines, the non-writing demands you’re juggling, the resources and support you can access now, and how your brain works these days. What motivates, excites, and energizes you? What do you have to give your writing practice right now, realistically and sustainably?
 
Try to set goals you’ll succeed at, because that’s motivating and builds into good things, even if the goals seem “too small” or too different from what you were doing before.
 
In other words, you may be getting back to writing, but you’re not really going “back.”
 
So start where you really are, right now.
 
You may find that may need a new approach or new type of writing practice and routine—or even a new project, genre, or form—now, and that is okay.

other ideas to try

Read in your genre. Surround yourself with your favorite parts of it. Audiobook rereads while you wash the dishes may help your brain get into that excited-to-write space. Maybe you’ve been reading this whole time but you can lean into reading as a writer—noticing and enjoying the particular decisions that someone made in this text, the way it creates meaning and experiences—more now.
 
If you’re struggling (or just not excited) to start with an actual project, try exercises, prompts, or games. You can find approximately eleventy bajillion writing prompts on various websites and in books. Physical storytelling prompt cards like the sets Storymatic makes are also great. Have fun! Write some silly, low-stakes stuff just for you!
 
If you’re not a fan fiction writer, maybe give that a try. Again, have fun!
 
Why do you want to write? Set a timer for 5 minutes and freewrite about the value of a writing practice and your beliefs about writing. Then boil that down to something honest and encouraging that you can post on a sticky note in your workspace.
 
Reread your favorite stuff you’ve written.
 
If you are having trouble finding internal motivation, but you really do want to write, try creating external motivation or positive pressure. Sign up for a class that involves writing assignments, find a writing group or partner, or use Habitica or whatever gamefied habit-tracking app works best for you.

Transitions are hard, but you can do it!