Finding Time

I just did twelve minutes of cardio. Not even high intensity. Just enough to elevate my heart rate a little. I did twelve minutes because… well, a couple of reasons actually, and I swear this actually has relevancy to writing comics (or anything) which is the point of Death Or Comics.

But first, a word from our sponsor:

It’s me! Well, kinda. I’m doing a comic called Zero Ghost with 24/7 Comics, and the first three issues are being kickstarted in a collected edition right now.

It’s very dope and I had a lot of fun doing it with Brian, Wil, and Micah. The mini series is complete, workwise, and we’re already past our funding goal for this, so it’s low risk for you to participate. Anyway, back to our regular programming.

The first reason I did twelve minutes, which is honestly just an excuse for the second reason, is that I am feeling kind of beat up. I had a hard weight workout yesterday, followed by a longer than usual day (I went to cat yoga) so I was feeling it. Look, I’m old.

But like I said, that was mostly an excuse for the second reason, which is that I find cardio mentally difficult and I didn’t wanna. I have some strategies for powering through this: I do it in the morning when I have more energy and willpower, I do it on a couple different machines, I have meaningful goals, I have a television and a Kindle and an iPad.

And yet, some days, I just don’t wanna.

Those days, I try to do something, and that’s where I wind back around to comics. Look, twelve minutes - five on the treadmill, five on the recumbent bike, two on the air bike - isn’t, I’m sure, optimum. And not being able to power through isn’t very David Goggins of me.

It IS, though, a damn sight better than doing 0 minutes of cardio. Making a little progress, no matter how small, is better than none. I have days where I get one page written, or less even. But some progress is better than none.

Look, creating one page a day, five days a week, for even half the year (26 weeks), is still 130 pages. That’s still a trade per year. If you did it every week, it’d be two trades a year. I know, you’re astounded by my mathematical brilliance.

I know that a lot of people struggle with finding time to make comics, but a lot of the… er… time the issue isn’t the availability of hours in their day. It’s a lack of mental energy and, honestly, the feeling that if they only do five minutes of writing (or drawing) it’s not worth it because they won’t get much done.

But, one more time: any progress is better than none. You can carve a hole in a mountain one drop at a time. If you’re struggling to find time, try to get five minutes (or twelve minutes, to loop it back) to write as much as you can. Maybe it won’t be a page. Maybe not even a panel.

But it will be something.

We do have a bunch of instructional articles coming, and we also have the free pitch workshop on April 19, but I thought I’d keep in the habit of this mailing list by writing something, in a rare example of following my own advice

-Justin