During my months with Ann, I’ve had time to see the professional writing life up close. Here are a few of her tips:

First, have a master plan. Make sure to write down all your tasks and deadlines. If you don’t write them down, you’re liable to forget!

Once you have everything written down, make a plan to accomplish it. Allow for more time than you think you’ll need. Those last-minute technological problems or tea spills over that critical document you needed are bound to appear if you’re working on a too-tight schedule. By having a weekly or monthly master plan, the daily struggles won’t be as stressful.

Secondly, be fluid in your plans. As a professional writer, your schedule changes on a weekly (sometimes daily) basis. Accept these changes and allow both yourself and your plans to be flexible. If you’re unable to accomplish something on the day you wanted it done due to scheduling conflicts or some other issue, allow for that and get something else done instead.

Third, complete small tasks on a daily basis. Make sure you’re finishing at least one small task on your project (or projects) every day. If you try to tackle all the huge tasks, you’ll burn yourself out, so try instead to take a certain amount of time or a certain number of small tasks to complete daily. Start with just half an hour to work on one project and move forward from there.

For example, send three emails, research for 15 minutes, make one phone call and write for half an hour. That’s maybe an hour of work, but you’ve made substantial progress on several on-going projects. If you do this a few times a day, every weekday your projects will quickly be completed.

Fourth, be open to new possibilities. Keep an open mind towards new ideas, new writing projects, and new connections. You’d be surprised how many new opportunities appear because you asked others for advice or information. Connections come where you least expect them!

Fifth, make time for your writing. Life can get busy, but make time to write during your day. If writing every day is too much, try three times a week for a set amount of time instead. Or write every day for two weeks and take a week off. To succeed as a professional writer, you must make sure you are making time for writing as often as you can.

Finally, Ann’s favorite tip: be nuts! To be a freelance writer, you have to be a little crazy. But that’s what makes it so much fun.