How to be a Completely Unproductive Writer

Somewhere inside your mind, there is a writer clawing to get out. This terrifying truth cannot be avoided, and if left unchecked this facet of your psyche will overflow with ideas until you find yourself regularly engaged in that most heinous of tasks, writing. Without immediate action to stem the tide, you may even find yourself with an unwanted and unexpected finished work. Avoiding this fate requires a great deal of determination, and some unfortunate individuals succumb fully, their lives taken over by endless composition. However, by following the steps described below, you can have a strong chance of overcoming your creative tendencies and living a normal life.

Step One: Time Mismanagement

The easiest way to be unproductive is to not write. This takes planning, as if one is inclined to write then it tends to seep out at the edges. Ideally, you should leave yourself with no time to even think about writing. If you hold a full time job, this is a wonderful place to start. Plan your day so that you will inevitably be exhausted during the only hours when you might otherwise have free time to write. Under these circumstances, you are bound to find other, less challenging activities to fill the hours. Sleep is also important. Determine if you are more productive in the mornings or nights, and then adjust your sleep schedule to overlap with this time period. In many cases, these steps will be sufficient to keep an individual from writing for months at a time, making further countermeasures unnecessary.

Step Two: Procrastinate, Procrastinate, Procrastinate!

Even the strictest schedule can only hold for so long. Sooner or later you will likely find yourself with free time to write, and possibly an idea or two. This is a dangero...

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... still writing? Don't you understand what you're inviting into your life? True, you may experience a momentary sense of achievement upon completing a piece, and your work might even be well received at first. But these feelings only lead to more writing, until the task fully consumes every waking hour of your life. And before you dive headfirst into the lifestyle, consider this: how many happy writers do you know of? If history has shown us anything, it's that prolonged writing is a gateway to isolation, poverty, depression, alcoholism and a host of other unfortunate circumstances. Prolonged writing has also been linked to cancer. Perhaps if procrastination and perfectionism cannot prevent you from putting pen to paper, simple self-preservation will suffice. The next time you sit down to write, remember that your life is on the line. And that line is best left blank.