Writing Habits of Famous People

Jerry Seinfeld has become famous not only for his comedy but also for his writing technique. In the book “Comic Insights” by Franklyn Ajaye he said:

“I had to figure out how I was going to create material on a dependable basis. That is the number one problem that a comedian has to confront in the early years[…] An hour a day. That was my first goal. Ten hours a month. That’s not easy for someone starting out. Sometimes I had to trick myself to get myself to write. You wouldn’t believe the things I had to do to get myself to write. Sometimes I’d put the cookies by my notebook.” Comic Insights The Art of Stand-up Comedy by Franklyn Ajaye, Silman-James Press, First Edition, page 197

Years later, an article about Jerry Seinfeld and his “Don’t break the Chain”-technique went viral. There Brad Isaac shared a tip Jerry once gave him:

“He told me to get a big wall calendar that has a whole year on one page and hang it on a prominent wall. The next step was to get a big red magic marker. He said for each day that I do my task of writing, I get to put a big red X over that day. After a few days you’ll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You’ll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job next is to not break the chain.” Source

So is that the solution? Should we all head out and get a red marker and calendar? Yes and no. It might work for you. It might the best thing this book has to offer you. Maybe it will help you meet the love of your life for which I apologize profusely if you are already married.

The thing is: I tried it. And I failed miserably. It turns out an hour of writing everyday was too much for me and my schedule. I gave it a go at several stages of my career. Right at the start. Then two months later.
And about four years in.

It never stuck. I would start full of optimism and enthusiasm: This will solve all my problems. I’m gonna be rich and famous and best of all: Jokes will fall into my lap on a regular basis.

Well, no. “Don’t break the Chain” was more like a New Years Resolution: Something I aspired to. Something that seemed a good idea and everybody else seemed to be doing it. And it worked for them. And if it works for them I figured I must be the problem. I am the failure, the weak link in the chain.

And in a way it’s true: I was the problem. Because I wanted a writing habit and so I copied a technique to achieve a writing habit.

Problem solved, right?

Wrong.

Because I copied a technique that worked for someone else!

I didn’t think about what I needed to achieve a daily writing habit. I just assumed what works for someone else MUST work for me. And I also didn’t look further or tried to adapt the Calendar Method to my needs.

No, I kept thinking: “If I can’t write for an hour every day then I’m a complete failure.” I didn’t even consider writing less because Jerry Seinfeld wrote more. And if I just so happened I actually wrote an hour a day I felt like I had achieved nothing. Because in my head an hour of writing was the bare minimum. The least I could do. And on the days I wrote more than an hour I did feel good.

Until the next day where I felt like a failure if I didn’t write AT LEAST as much as the day before.

Doesn’t sound like fun, does it?

So the question is: How do we assure this won’t happen to you. How do we make it easy, dare I say, even fun to show up and do the work?

How do you create a sustainable writing habit, tailored to your exact needs?