Updated: Apr 7
Aside from copywriters, few people enter the world of business because they like business writing. I get it. And we are all time poor. I get that too.
15 minutes is a trick I have used often. It helps me overcome the hurdle of beginning something I don’t want to do. Is business writing that task for you? Read on my friend.
Problem – business writing is not your wheelhouse
Life is busy, we’re parents, children, employees, hobbyists and a million other hats. It’s hard to find the time to shower some days, let alone catch up with friends or read a book, so the task we least want to do (business writing), or best feel we can get away with delaying, is the one that falls to the back of the pile.
When we do get a minute, we’re tired. It’s been a long week, a long month, a long 2020 and now a long 2021, who are we kidding? We are tired of the news, our job, the endless school permission forms (or is that just me?). So we put off writing until tomorrow optimistically hoping that after a good nights sleep it will be easier and we will get it done.
The catch is that the longer we put it off the harder the writing (or any other big or challenging task) becomes. We feel the pressure more which makes some of us want to put if off more. Or maybe it was hard to get inspired, hard to just begin. I know many of our excuses. Sitting in a café writing this, I have even felt a few of them for this blog task. But I had 15 minutes.
Solution – Start writing for just 15 minutes
15 minutes isn’t long. I’ve waited 15 minutes for a coffee before. We’ve all wasted 15 minutes scrolling Facebook or Instagram, playing mindless time wasting games on our phones or staring into space when we should be doing something else. What if you told yourself you only had to write for 15 minutes?
15 minutes worth of dot points, email drafting, social media post writing, updating your LinkedIn profile, or researching for your website. Can you handle just 15 minutes of it? Promise yourself that you can stop after 15 minutes. This is an important part.
If 15 minutes is literally all you have then you are now 15 minutes closer to finishing. It doesn’t matter what the task is – writing for business or cleaning out the pantry! And if you have more than 15 minutes you may find that you are on a roll now and want to continue. Maybe you will finish the writing today after all!
The important thing is that by giving yourself permission to stop after 15 minutes, even the most enormous writing task seems less daunting. After all, you are only having a look, dipping a toe. You don’t have to finish, or even commit a day. It’s like the Chinese Proverb, ‘The journey of 1000 miles begins with a single step’. The longest task begins with 15 minutes.
Perhaps your 15 minutes would be best spent talking with me? Book a free 15 min chat to see if we are a good fit today!