This post is part of a series on Optimizing Focus. Finding it hard to focus is normal. Self-flagellation does not work to improve your focus. Furthermore it takes time and energy that takes you away from your writing; it is another distraction. I firmly believe that you can approach your work compassionately rather than violently. You do not have to go into battle in order to write. The first one, 3 elements to consider, covers the basics. Links to other posts in the series are in the Optimizing Focus Spotlight. This is also the first of 2 posts about prioritizing your work in progress. In this post, I explain why you need to limit the number of things you are working on at any given time and share a free workbook to help you make those decisions. In How to choose which project to work on I talk about what to do with your list of projects.
Most of my clients have more than one writing project they are working on. And by “more than one”, it’s not usually 2, either.
They might come to me because they need help “finishing this book” or “getting things published”. And part of the problem is managing the teaching and admin and what do you do when your kids are sick and all of that…
But there are usually a lot of other writing projects, too. In various stages of completion.
Between the general pressure to publish more, the tendency of research to produce more interesting questions, and how difficult it is to say no when someone invites you to contribute to a volume they are editing, you can accumulate a lot more projects than you can reasonably work on at one time.
Fragmenting your writing time.
The time you have available for writing is limited.
Dividing your time between multiple projects means that each of them is going to progress more slowly than if you’d given all of the time to one of them.
There is a real danger that the amount of progress you make on each one in any given time period is so small that you begin to wonder if you are doing anything productive at all.
It’s not just the total amount of time, either.
Many people complain, quite rightly, that it is particularly difficult to find the kind of time that allows you to really immerse yourself in a project so you can do the deep intellectual work it requires.
I talk a lot about making good use of smaller chunks of time. But I would never argue that you can do all the writing you need to do in just 15-minutes a day.
When you have long periods of time in which you can make writing a priority, do you really want to divide that time between 6 different projects?
You need to find the sweet spot where your projects move forward at a pace that feels satisfying.
Cognitive capacity is limited.
Your frustration about the kind of time available is a recognition that even when you have time you could devote to writing, you don’t always have the cognitive capacity necessary for the particular kind of work your project needs.
Each of the writing projects you have on the go are complex. All of them need deep intellectual work at some point.
- Reading.
- Thinking.
- Struggling to articulate what you really want to say as a result of all that thinking.
That part of the work can’t be rushed, either.
“Sleeping on it” is an actual cognitive process. Your brain needs time to process what you’ve put in there. That’s happening in the background, but there needs to be capacity for it.
This is also why overwork doesn’t work. Fatigue reduces your cognitive capacity and impairs cognitive function. But that’s a whole other thing.
Task switching is like an extra project.
The act of switching between tasks or projects has its own time and cognitive capacity requirements.
The more frequently you switch tasks, the more often you spend the first part of your writing session “getting back into the project”.
Yes, you can develop practices that make that a bit easier. But the feeling you crave of being in the project and just moving forward without having to consciously think about the next step is not available.
You can only hold so many details in your head at a time. All the extra energy and thinking you spend switching between projects, remembering where you are, and getting back into a project, and panicking about forgetting things, is energy and thinking that you are not devoting to your writing projects.
Second guessing your plans, worrying about being behind and not meeting deadlines, and beating yourself up for not being able to focus take even more cognitive resources away from the projects on your list.
Don’t forget that a certain amount of task switching is inevitable: between teaching and writing, or life stuff and writing, or whatever. Adding more switching between your writing projects compounds the problem.
If you spend a significant amount of your writing time engaged in task switching, it will feel like you need even more time. Time you are already struggling to find and dividing between too many projects.
That’s not motivating.
You must reduce the number of active projects.
Note the word “active”.
It will be helpful in the short term to declare a moratorium on accepting new projects.
However, you don’t have to give up on anything on your list completely.
You need to set some things aside for now to free up time and cognitive capacity for the one(s) you will be working on.
You have to make some difficult decisions and you may need to engage in some tricky negotiations about deadlines.
You cannot do your best work with too many things on the active list. You need to make a more realistic plan.
I propose you think like a (successful) circus juggler and limit how many things you are trying to pay attention to at once.
This reduces the amount of energy and cognitive capacity you devote to switching, so you can focus more effectively.
You don’t have to go down to one.
I’m not expecting you to become a different person.
If you know you work most effectively if you can do One Thing At A Time, consider this post permission to organize yourself so you are actually only working on one thing at a time. This section will probably help you figure out how to combine ONE writing project, with the necessary non-writing projects you also need to keep going.
For the rest of you, focusing on only one project at a time can also have drawbacks. Sometimes a change is exactly what you need to help you optimize your focus.
Given the time and cognitive capacity available to you for writing (which varies over the year), you need to limit how many projects you can switch between.
The general consensus is that 3 is the maximum. A lot of my clients tell me that they struggle even with 2.
I want you to think carefully about the specific projects you are combining. Ideally they require different kinds of work.
For example, if one of your projects is at a stage that benefits from time to ruminate and allow your brain to process things in the background, you want tasks you can do while that happens. Another project that is further advanced, and needs you to implement decisions already made, line edit or copy edit a fairly complete draft, or some of the more tedious tasks required before submission would pair well. Especially if you find it hard to focus on those tasks for long periods.
This is also helpful if you are trying to keep that thinky project going when you don’t have a lot of time.
Feeding your brain with things to ruminate on before spending most of your day in meetings or teaching, can make the one morning you can protect for writing more satisfying.
The same thing applies if your main project is emotionally demanding. Allowing yourself to switch to a more straightforward project when you’ve reached your emotional capacity has several benefits. It means you are less likely to avoid the emotionally difficult project. Not exceeding your emotional capacity also reduces the recovery time necessary. And another project is getting attention, so you aren’t falling behind on everything.
The trick is to ensure that the type of work required is sufficiently different that switching counts as a rest from the other project.
For example, the intellectual heavy lifting of one project may be creative rest from the tedium of formatting tables and checking references.
This is also why you need to strictly limit yourself to only 2 or 3 projects. If you have more than 2 or 3 projects in rotation, the restful element of switching will be counteracted by the effort required to keep track of what’s going on.
The benefits of being able to switch to something else when stuck compensate for some of that. You are spending a higher proportion of your writing time moving projects forward and less of it staring at a screen pulling your hair out.
Free resources to help with all of this!
This is difficult.
I’ve created a free workbook to help you make these decisions. You’ll start by making a list of everything currently in progress. (Ideas that you haven’t started working on yet don’t count.)
Then I encourage you to consider a range of factors, including:
- How much and what kind of work each project needs
- How you feel about each project
- Whether other people are involved
- The consequences of finishing or delaying
I’ve written another post helping you choose once you’ve done that reflecting, and what to do about the stuff you are putting on the back burner for now.
You will occasionally panic that you’ve dropped one of the balls you were supposed to be juggling and it’s rolled under the sofa. Keep breathing.
- Panic is not the best state to write in.
- Panicking about a project that isn’t the one you are trying to focus on right now is even less helpful.
The Monthly Review email I send at the end of every month will help prevent the panic.
I remind you to review what you’ve accomplished and adjust your plans for the month ahead. I share specific prompts that focus on your writing, and include a nudge to check whether your priorities have changed.
Subscribe to the newsletter to get the FREE workbook, Finish More by Doing Less, and the Monthly Review emails.
Related Posts:
Overcommitted? Declaring a moratorium
What to do about a stalled book project
Optimizing Focus: 3 elements to consider
Juggling 101: Elements of a good plan
Communication vs Validation: why are you publishing?
This post was rewritten and updated from an earlier 2019 version that was sent to my newsletter and included in the October 2021 Optimizing Focus Spotlight. It was then split into 2 new posts and republished in May/June 2026, the 2nd can be found here: How to choose which project to work on.
