We've all done it; sat down at our desks, opened our laptops, made a cup of coffee, with all the good intentions in the world for a good, solid writing session. And then it's the dreaded F-word: Facebook. Or Twitter. Or YouTube, or whatever your particular distraction of choice is.
The only online distraction that I can get away with mooching around guilt-free is Blogger because I can convince myself it's writing-related, or research, or as long as I'm blogging I'm still actually writing. But, let's face it, really what we need is to be locked into a lead-lined bomb shelter - no internet, no phone, no distractions.
But if you don't have a World War 2 bunker in your back garden, there are still options for distractionless writing. I've recently started using Dark Room and I love it. Dark Room is a word processing programme which takes up the entire screen; so no start menu, no easy flicking to your internet browser, no distractions (except Tweetdeck, nothing can stop the power of that distraction!)
Dark Room is no frills word processing; you can change the colours to whatever you like, adjust the margins and you have the vital word count, but you won't be wasting time around playing with layout, or fonts, or other formatting distractions. It uses all the usual keyboard shortcuts (including CTRL / to bring up your word count) so there's no excuse for hitting that ESC button to escape from the full screen view.
Overall, this is a great little product for writers. It's no frills, no distractions and, best of all, completely free. Download it here: download.cnet.com/Dark-Room/3000-2079_4-10562359.html
I use Scrivener--which has a similar full screen option that blocks everything else from view. I love it!
ReplyDeleteOh gosh. I could use a program like that. My big distraction is the news. I can sort of convince myself it's productive to read it, but really I should be writing!
ReplyDeleteI think us writers can convince ourselves of a lot of things - "but it's character research" is my excuse for watching tv when I should be writing!
ReplyDeleteWhat a great idea! Believe it or not, I've become pretty disciplined when it's "writing time." I don't check my phone or emails or social media during that time. Now revisions, however, are a different story.... lol
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