So, I was talking with KelseyDragon17 last week and she was like, “I WANT TO WRITE BUT I NEED TO FORCE MYSELF TO AND I KEEP GETTING DISTRACTED BY THE INTERNET”. Will she say those were her exact words were you ever to ask her? No. 😛 But it was pretty darn close. So, I proposed a “Writing Lock-In”. What is that? Well, basically, it’s an event where you lock yourself in a room, confiscate all pieces of technology and but them in a box NOT in the room you’re locking yourself up in, turn off your wifi, and make yourself write a certain amount of words. You’re not allowed to leave the room unless you are a) hungry/thirsty b) need to use the restroom and/or c) injured/bleeding. KD17 and I had settled on writing 2 chapters. (2 chapters for me is about 10-11 pages each.) It started off alright…I never realized how much I rely on the internet. I was five minutes in and already trying to get on Pinterest. I decided to start off by typing up about 4 scenes I had previously written in a notebook into my Word Document. After that, I wrote about 2 small paragraphs that I deemed worthy of being scenes. KD17 and I quickly decreased the limit from 2 chapters to 1, to 1000 words, to 500 words, to “hey, we are hungry. Let’s drop everything and get some food then watch a movie.” Was it good in theory? You bet. But in real life, well, it’s a work in progress. On the bright side, I got to type up some material I had put off transferring to my computer and even thought of some more scenes to include in my story. I even wrote some new stuff. So, the day wasn’t a total loss and I got to spend the day with my bestie! 🙂 If you want to write and need to write, try a Writing Lock-In with a friend sometime! It’s a great way to motivate yourselves to write. (See what I did there?)

And now, here’s KD17’s view on how the Writing Lock-In went…

It’s KD17. Here’s a little snippet of how I thought the lock-in went.

IT WAS FREAKING AWFUL. Okay, I guess it wasn’t so bad. But it showed me just how distracted I am when I try to write. I only wrote about 400 words, which I guess is progress, but I was hoping for a bit more. It didn’t help that I forgot my laptop’s power chord when I went over to YW’s house. My battery didn’t last too long. So I had to go old fashioned and actually *gasp* write in pencil. I know that’s perfectly normal for some people, but it’s pretty abnormal for me 😉 (but its awesome that some people still write books in journals and stuff! Props to you!) My advice if you’re gonna do this with a friend:

1. Be committed.
2. Make sure you have the supplies you need. Then double check. *bring power cord like seriously*
3. Make sure you have an idea of what part you’re going to write beforehand (this is optional, but it would have helped me).