Yeh Dil Maange More or Sometimes Less Is Only More!

I have recently got a wonderful opportunity to attend some writing retreat workshops. In the first one, I happened to be there more by chance then by choice. But all the opportunities that followed suit, I did not miss! As a participant, we were only told to write for two and a half hours in a day.it did surprise man, including me. For that matter, I even offered to write skipping other activities which I thought were unimportant. It frustrated me and surprised me at the same time, thinking why I can’t spend more time at a task and finish it faster when I want to. I understood, rather experienced that the same logic does not apply to writing. Writing is depletion of the intellectual energy and it needs to replenish by giving sufficient gaps and breaks that add as fuel to the same.

After having attended the retreat, when I looked back in retrospect, I could recollect instances where I had pushed myself to write for the entire day only to find me struggling to move forward even an inch the next day. It so happens when we exhaust our intellectual energy. It’s your threshold and you need time to recover.

The approach to write only for a limited span of time each day, even when you can afford to spend longer is a way to increase productivity, ironically. This is so because we give opportunity to the energy to renew on daily basis. On these parameters, it can be recommended that not more than 1 to 4 hours should be spent on writing.

For the time span that you allocate to your writing, write completely with focus and concentration. Keep all distractions at bay. By which I mean, phone, social media and mail should be out of access. In fact, early morning, before having checked your mail or phone writing comes out to be the most productive.

By finishing your writing target in the morning itself and then not writing for the rest of the day, the mind gets ample time to process related information to give my better ideas the next morning. To add further, try to take an evening walk, all by yourself. Process your ideas in your mind. Plan your agenda for the next day and you will be surprised how little planning could give your phenomenal results.

There are various writing retreats organised in India from time to time. You could check these destinations as ideal places for writing retreat workshops in India from time to time.

• Mussoorie
• NrityaGram
• Kangra Valley
• Lake Pulicat
• Saputara