FRODO: I wish the Ring had never come to me… I wish none of this had happened.

GANDALF: So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.

What a great reminder for all of us… we must make good use of the time that is given to us by focusing on what we can control.

Question: How much time and energy do you spend on things you can control versus things you can’t?

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In your life as a writer, there are many things you get to choose: how and when you write, what kind of material you create, the type of platform you want to build, and so much more.

But there is one thing none of us gets to decide: the times in which we live.

Right now is a period of civil unrest, religious conflict, an uncertain economy, political leaders people don’t trust, and a pace of change that is far too fast than most of us are comfortable with. However, you could say the same for any period of history.

Don’t spend your time and emotional energy worrying about things you can’t change. Instead, focus on setting and achieving your goals, being productive, and adding value to the world through your writing. After all, it’s the only thing you really have any control over.

Daily Question: How much time and energy do you spend on things you can control versus things you can’t?

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When you begin studying the lives of the great writers, one of the most surprising things you’ll learn is how well aware most of them were regarding their limitations and the role that luck played in their success.

For example, Ernest Hemingway once said, “I have tried simply to write the best I can; sometimes I have good luck and write better than I can.” We don’t think of Ernest Hemingway as a writer who needed any sort of luck. We think of him as immensely gifted and one of the 20^th century’s most important writers.

But the truth is that luck plays a role in every writer’s career… including yours. That’s why you can forge ahead with confidence. Sure, we all need to work on our skills and craft. There’s a place for that. However, getting around the right people is also a critical part of your success. And sometimes, we just get a stroke of luck and happen to write something that jives with the public’s consciousness at just the right time.

The best part, though, is that you have a large measure of control over how much “luck” comes your way. Spend time around the right people, work on your craft, be persistent, and don’t take yourself too seriously. Then you’ll just happen to get lucky a lot more often.

Daily Question: What are the habits or practices that help you become more “lucky” in your writing success?

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Your writing time is like a medieval castle that is constantly under siege from the enemy. Sometimes those “enemies,” as it were, are friends and family who want our time. But we must be decisive, maybe even at times a bit ruthless, about making and guarding that writing time.

If you don’t, you’ll never reach your writing goals. The dreams out there in the distance start with the writing minutes right in front of you today.

Daily Question: Are you willing to fight for control over your writing time?

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There is a constant push and pull to the writer’s life. On the one hand, we want to have control over every aspect of our writing and creativity. We want to share our voices. We want to publish in the way that suits our goals. We want control over distribution and marketing. We want to avoid being under the thumb of any entity or force that would limit our options.

On the other hand, there is something to be said for giving up control, isn’t there? When we try to maintain too much control, it hampers the creative process. We lose the ability to get into a state of flow. After all, creativity is not a force that wants to be tightly controlled. It’s a little bit wild, which is a key part of the mystery of creativity.

This is why dealing with writer’s block is such an important concern for writers. When we try to exert too much control, the creative force stalls out. Natalie Goldberg said, “Our ideas and intentions can mask and cover up a story; there is a life force that will declare itself if you let it. Get out of the way.”

Are you standing in the way of the life force that wants to express itself in your writing? Is it possible, even a tiny bit, that your own best efforts to control the outcome are actually counterproductive?

If so, don’t feel bad. We are all prone to do this. All writers are control freaks to some extent. It’s part of our identity. But if we can manage to step aside and let creativity do its work, we will find many treasures that would otherwise be lost.

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That’s why we must stay emotionally healthy. One of the things that sucks your emotional energy, almost more than anything else, is worrying about things you cannot control.

Corrie ten Boom was a Dutch watchmaker who worked with her family to help Jews escape from the Nazis in World War II. Along with her family, she was later arrested and sent to a concentration camp for a time.

She said, “Worrying is carrying tomorrow’s load with today’s strength—carrying two days at once. It is moving into tomorrow ahead of time. Worrying doesn’t empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength.”

That is great advice, but almost impossible to follow, isn’t it? We are worried about getting our work done, worried about how many people will read it, worried about that client paying us on time, worried about what the next year, or five, or ten years holds for us in our writing careers.

But when you look at the struggles and difficulties of someone like Corrie ten Boom, or anyone who has literally fought for their lives, our struggles and worries as writers seem to pale by comparison.

There is very little we control in this life. In fact, the only thing we truly control is what we do on a daily basis. So whenever you feel worried or stressed, take a deep breath, go for a walk, count your blessings, and invest your emotional energy in the things you can control.

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