Write Like Someone is Waiting

We’ve all heard the term “Dance like no one is watching.”

It’s about letting go, feeling joy in the moment, and moving without worrying how you look or who might be judging you.

Lovely sentiment.

But when it comes to writing (especially writing on deadline) I’ve found that’s…well, utterly useless advice.

Deadlines are Hard When No One’s Looking

Deadlines, for me, are tough when no one’s watching them. Or waiting on them.

If it’s just me, alone in my office, there’s no real consequence for missing the date I scribbled in my planner. It’s far too easy to think, Eh, there’s a show I could binge-watch instead.

Maybe you’re one of those self-disciplined writers who powers through exhaustion, bad days, and words that feel like pulling teeth because, by sheer force of will, you’re determined to hit your self-imposed deadline.

If you are, congratulations, and I might avoid meeting you out of pure jealousy.

But if you’re not? Pull up a chair and let’s chat. (Virtually, of course.)

Why I Need Someone Waiting for my Words

See, I’ve realized something about myself: I need an emotional connection to a deadline.

I need a person who’s waiting for the book. Someone who wants it, needs it, or is depending on it. An editor ready to chase me down for my manuscript. (For the record, my editors have never yelled. They’re lovely. But the mental threat is useful motivation.)

If there isn’t an agent or editor imposing a date on me, or another author waiting for my pages for a boxed set, I’ve learned I still crave an external reason to show up, sit down, and write the words.

The ability to let go and just feel your way through, feel the joy of the action, of the movement without a care about how you look, what anyone sees or thinks of you.

Writing Brings Me Joy, So Why is it Still So Hard?

It’s odd, though, because writing itself makes me happy. I love getting lost in a story, or finding the perfect rhythm for an article, shaping words until they feel right.

So why, even when we love writing, is it sometimes so hard to stay motivated?

My New Rule: Write Like Someone Is Waiting

Here’s the answer I’ve landed on for myself: I’m going to write like someone is waiting.

But not just anyone.

I’m writing for one specific person—someone who will connect to the book I’m writing as deeply as I do.

For me, that reader is always a woman. I picture her browsing the bookstore, searching for something that speaks to her. She might not be looking for my name or title, but she’s looking for what’s inside the book—what it says, how it might make her feel, and the way it could linger in her mind afterward.

The Readers Who Remind Me Why I Write

I’ve been lucky to hear from readers who found pieces of themselves in my stories. A few stand out vividly:

With Something About Her, a reader sent me an email after she read the book and told me that a scene in that book, where my hero Michael believes he’s lost his daughter, resonated deeply with her. She’d been in those shoes and her comment was that the feelings were spot on, connected with her and made her connect to the characters.

With Cloaked in Danger, another reader wrote to me and said that I had captured her experience with PTSD perfectly. (Given that I couldn’t actually call it PTSD in my regency-era set romantic suspense, it meant the world that she recognized it and that I honored her experience.

With A Rogue’s Deadly Redemption, the reader told me that she identified with my books because my characters were real. Lily, my heroine, is a bundle of insecurities, and so many of us women can relate to her in that way.

With each book, I was fortunate that a reader told me how they connected, how much it meant to them…and it helped me write the next book.

So the next book? It’s a psychological thriller. And I’m writing about how this all goes over on Substack, if you’d like to join me.