Embracing the Fiction Author Journey

68. Prioritizing your passion: Writing while parenting

• Erin P.T. Canning

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Do you ever feel like you're drowning under the pressure to be a perfect parent, spouse, and—on top of that—a creative writer? 

In today’s episode, host Erin P.T. Canning and fellow Fantasy Author Michelle Summers share their experiences and strategies for balancing writing with family life. 

Through this conversation, listeners will discover how Michelle and Erin combat the pressure to do it all, how to prioritize tasks in a way that refills your creative cup, and how to jump start the creative writing process. 

Bonus: Listeners will learn about the concept of a discovery draft, a technique between outlining and a first draft that allows for flexibility and exploration.

Get Michelle’s books:


Connect with Michelle: 


Books discussed during the show: 

  • How to Keep House While Drowning by K.C. Davis
  • Ruins and Redemption by Erin P.T. Canning 
  • Author Liane Moriarty
  • Author Phoebe Ravencraft

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Erin:

Ever feel like your writing dreams are buried under a mountain of laundry? Juggling family life and creative pursuits can be tough, especially when you feel pressured to do it all. Let's be honest, just thinking about keeping the house running can be overwhelming. But what if you could ditch the guilt and find a way to balance both your passions and your parenting duties? This episode explores how authors, especially mothers, can overcome those feelings and prioritize their writing dreams. Listen in as Michelle and I share our personal experiences and how we became authors while raising kids. We also answer questions like, how do you ditch the guilt? How do you set boundaries so you're not always sidelining your writing dreams? When you always have limited time to sit down and write, how can you jumpstart your creativity so you're ready to go? At the end of the episode, you'll also hear me coach Michelle through her current writing dilemma and how a discovery draft can help you capture your entire story faster and with less pressure. If you'd like personalized support, then stick around after the episode to find out how you can work with me too. Now, let's dive into the show so you can learn how to finally carve out time for your writing and become the thriving author you are meant to be.

Erin P.T. Canning:

You're listening to Parents Who Write, the podcast that helps you pursue your writing dreams. I'm your host, Erin P. T. Canning. I'm an author, editor, writing coach, and mom of two young boys. And my mission is to help you prioritize your writing, strengthen your voice, and gain confidence and direction so that you can own your identity as a writer and thrive as an author.

Erin:

Hey, friend. Thank you for joining me for another episode of Parents Who Write. Today I have with me my dear friend and fellow fantasy author, Michelle Summers. Thank you for coming back on the show.

Michelle:

Thanks for inviting me, Erin.

Erin:

You are my first guest after a long hiatus, and this was the first time that I took a break from the podcast since I released it in July 2021, I think it was. And I had to take a break, because I created way too tight of a deadline for releasing my third book, and it got to the point where it was like, if I am going to get this done and hold fast to this, you know, it's that if I'm saying yes to this, what do I have to say no to in order for it to happen? It was a tough choice, but that's why what we're talking about today, is that pressure to do it all. Do you feel that pressure, Michelle?

Michelle:

Well, let's see, I'm coming off of one term as PTA president, moving into a second, and then I have one more after that, that I've already committed to for the year after. So yeah, I get it. I totally understand that feeling.

Erin:

Every time I talk to you and I'm like, Oh, what are you working on with your writing? And you're like, well, I do have this idea and I'm jotting down notes, but I'm also baking cupcakes and using my fine arts degree to create puzzles for my children. By the way, those puzzles were awesome. Was that another PTA's fundraising event?

Michelle:

So that was something called TREPS that we do for our fifth graders. They actually do a six week course where they, they have to write out a business plan, like any money that I put out for the product, like the blank puzzles, they had to pay me back and like incorporate that into their, so they learned, Oh, this is what it actually means to make a profit. And it's this amazing program.

Erin:

Talk about teaching your kid how to be a little entrepreneur.

Michelle:

Unfortunately, my own author business has kind of fallen off the wayside while I was painting puzzles and baking cupcakes this year.

Erin:

Because of the pressure to do it all. I hear you. Where do you feel, for you personally, the pressure to do it all comes from?

Michelle:

Mine's definitely like a trauma response. I kind of always had to do it all. So it just stuck with me, and so when I was president, PTA president this past year, I actually started trying to remember, I think six or seven new events.

Erin:

Oh.

Michelle:

Because.

Erin:

Wow.

Michelle:

Everything we wanted to do, I was like, I'll do it. I'll do it. I'll do it. And I'm the kind of person who I wanted to bring this to the school, so I felt like I couldn't ask for help.

Erin:

I had another conversation with Charlotte Chipperfield, who is going to be the episode after you. And we talked about imposter syndrome and how one of the responses of that is perfectionism. And I'm just hearing some overlap here. I'm a perfectionist myself, but when I also think about the pressure to do it all, I think it's part of that fear of not wanting to let people down in my family, or I need to prove myself, or maybe it's actually a combination of, of both of that. But I've collected some healthy voices in my head over the years also, joining groups that have helped in terms of parenting courses and the writers community, etc. And all of them combined, and I know where the healthy messages are now. One of the things that I learned in my mentor class that I took back before I started the podcast, was the idea that we need to move our priorities up to be equal with that of our families. And so we're not saying that our family's needs and wants aren't important. We're saying that ours are just as important as theirs are. And once I learned to level the field in that way, the next thing that I learned with trying to figure out how to prioritize, I needed to acknowledge that my to do list is never ending and I don't have to get it all done in a day. So how do you make time to write, Ms. Summers?

Michelle:

Heh. Well, I need to do it again because I haven't had time lately. But, uh, ignoring my kids is a good one. I mean, I made three of them. They can go keep themselves busy. But I have 18 laundry baskets. You can buy laundry baskets in a six pack on Amazon. But with three kids, and they all have huge wardrobes that wouldn't fit in their drawers, even if it was all clean. So, I just always have like six baskets of laundry unfolded stacked up in my dining room. It's clean. It's sorted by child. But it just sits there. There's this book called How to Keep House While Drowning.

Erin:

I was thinking about that when you mentioned the the baskets, and I was like, oh, that reminds me of that book. Yes.

Michelle:

That book like saved my life.

Erin:

Mhm.

Michelle:

And it was like, there's no moral obligation to keep your house clean, and you do not exist to serve your space. Your space exists to serve you. And I may have taken that a little too to heart as far as letting my spaces go a little too much before it's like, okay, this is, uh, outrun it's useful cycle and I need to reset it, but looking at it that way, instead of like, oh my gosh, I need to keep the house clean. So, so much healthier for me.

Erin:

It really it really is. I came to a spot where I, I love my mom friends that I've made over the years where I would go to their house and I would see that their houses weren't clean to perfection. And I was like, I love you. And thank you. Thank you for letting me see your reality and not making me then feel pressured that I have to make sure my house is perfect before you and your children come over. It's just, it was so liberating. But I noticed that my husband also has the pressure to do it all. And I had to give him permission to be like, dude, go play your baseball game and leave the laundry baskets over in the corner. The kids know where to find their clothes. It's sorted. Go. You've done enough today. And, um, in Fire and Fortitude in the acknowledgements, I wrote that, like, I would help start helping my husband with the laundry again now that book three is out the door. So I did help him.

Michelle:

I may have, I think I put that in my acknowledgements in book two, because that definitely when I'm writing or especially in that like last month when I'm getting the last revisions done, it barely gets washed at that point.

Erin:

Oh my gosh, that was such a tight deadline with Fire and Fortitude. Um.

Michelle:

Yeah, I'm afraid of pre orders now.

Erin:

I am too.

Michelle:

No

Erin:

both. I was like, I don't want to do this again. I also have stuck in my head Sir Mix a Lot song, but I write big books and I cannot lie. You readers better get in line, like, I just, and every time, I'm like, man, 120 plus, and the, yeah, Fire and Fortitude was even longer. So,

Michelle:

You do write long books. Mine. And meanwhile, mine, I'm like, this is a fantasy and it's only like 65, 000. It's supposed to be longer.

Erin:

You had it. I mean, I am your line editor, but still, you got it done with revisions, so kudos to you. And you managed to finish The Guardian series, man!

Michelle:

I did. And I put out The Chosen One's Legacy 364 days after The Chosen One, My Ass.

Erin:

One year, three books.

Michelle:

All three books came out in one year. And while being PTA president.

Erin:

And your reader magnet.

Michelle:

Yes, and my reader magnet, and The Predecessor. So three books and a novella in one year.

Erin:

Yeah, I released Ruins and Redemption in September, and then I released Treachery and Truths in February. And then Fire and Fortitude came out end of July.

Michelle:

And they're so long.

Erin:

They're 120k each! Like.

Michelle:

That's a lot of writing.

Erin:

It really was! I'm like, no wonder why I went bonkers at the end!

Michelle:

Seriously.

Erin:

Ooh, side note, this is so not related, but, I sent out in my newsletter asking people if they wanted me to work on book four or to tell Magnus's story. And I have completely outlined Magnus's story.

Michelle:

Nice.

Erin:

And so that's supposed. It is! And that's only supposed to be a novella. And it's

Michelle:

And it's gonna end up 60, 000 words.

Erin:

It probably is because I outlined it in its entirety and it's 21 chapters. I

Michelle:

Oh,

Erin:

make books and I cannot lie.

Michelle:

You make big books.

Erin:

But, it's like half, it's half of what I normally do. So you know what, for me, that counts as a novella.

Michelle:

Yeah. And I was just, I mean, that was part of my, you know, needing to get it all done was to help read your book. Which is good because like with everything else I do, my reading doesn't keep up. So I'm always happy to read for you cause at least I'm reading.

Erin:

Which is.

Michelle:

Of course.

Erin:

So helpful. So I have this cool thing now where when I'm working, I realize that reading is part of my work and I have to carve time into my day to include reading. And I'm like, this is work time.

Michelle:

Yeah. My problem is I need to go back to reading more comedy books because I've, I've been reading a lot of, um, I'm going to pronounce her name wrong. Liane Moriarty.

Erin:

I don't know that.

Michelle:

She did, um, Big Little Lies, the show.

Erin:

Yes. Okay.

Michelle:

Yeah, and so that's kind of why Legacy became so much more serious because I was so into her books and I'm like, ah, she's turning me into like a suspense writer instead of a comedy writer. I can't read these anymore.

Erin:

You need to check out women's fiction, subgenre fantasy, because women's fiction subgenre fantasy, has really taken on this, uh, idea of women who are 40 and older, who usually have experienced some sort of life crisis, like a divorce or whatever, and then also discovers magic or abilities that they did not know that they possessed.

Michelle:

Oh, sounds familiar.

Erin:

They're also usually very snarky. So out of those categories, the only one you were missing was the life crisis at the beginning of The Chosen One, My Ass. Yes. So, but otherwise you hit all those points with your writing. I highly recommend that you go to that genre. I think you'd find major inspiration for you there. And check out Phoebe, Phoebe Ravencraft. I've also had the opportunity to talk with her personally and she is

Michelle:

Oh, wow.

Erin:

Yeah. Okay. Coming back to topic, pressure to do it all. So your methods of not doing it all is giving yourself permission to leave your laundry in baskets and let your children actually entertain themselves. Why is that so hard these days? Like, my nine year old came up to me today. He only had half day camp today. And he just kept wandering like a ping pong ball between me and his father who are trying to work. So they actually went for a really nice walk together. Um, because I get it. You know, play with me is fleeting. We don't get that often. And I think that's part of that tug of war of wanting to do it all, to keep the clean house, to make sure our family is fed and clothed properly, and that we are meeting the expectations that society has put in place for being the mother and the caregiver, and also wanting to not lose those opportunities of play with me. So I built dinosaur Legos with my six year old while my husband went for a walk with the older one. But if we just constantly do that, we're not going to make time for us and our dreams. And I love being a mom. I love being a wife. I enjoy having a roof. I should say I love having a roof over my head. That's not down on my priority list, right? I am very fortunate with everything that I have. But, I need to fulfill more within me, that is just for me, that gives me that space to just be me, for me, and for no one else. Well, okay, except for my readers because I love them too. But you know what I mean? Like, writing, writing starts off with fulfilling my passion and my need and creating that space for me to breathe. And so, here is how I finally got over the whole, I have to do everything. One, I mentioned it was that idea of realizing that my wants and my needs are just as important as the rest of my family. So putting that all at equal priority level. And then my mentor taught me the rock, paper. Nope. It's not rock, paper, scissors, although that could work too. It's the rock, pebble, sand theory. Have you heard that one, Michelle?

Michelle:

Yes, I, but I'd love to hear it again. I love that. I love that. I don't think about it enough. That's a really good point.

Erin:

So the idea behind the rock, pebble, sand theory, I'm trying so hard to not say rock, paper, scissors, is that we have so much sand in our lives. And here's where I quote Anakin Skywalker that I hate sand and it gets everywhere. But if you fill a jar with sand, you cannot fit the rocks inside. But if you put your three big rocks in the jar first, the sand filters all around it. So, laundry, doing the dishes, calling the doctor's office, setting up your grocery list, all of that stuff is sand. It always somehow manages to get done, maybe not at the time or the day that you wanted, but it, it filters in and somehow does get done eventually. But if you do only that, you're never going to get your three big rocks in. So instead, at the beginning of my day, I try to just identify what are my three biggest things that have to get done today, that are my biggest priority. And I try to make sure that at least one or two of those are for me. Now, I work from home, and I run my own business, so a lot of time my three rocks are all for me. But you know, for other people who don't work from home or don't have their own businesses, then that's where I come back to the at least one or two of those big rocks are for you. And so, your house is not going to explode if your dishes sat there for an extra day. I don't like my dishes to pile up to the point where it feels overwhelming. But they kind of pile up toward mid end of day and then finally we tackle it right before dinner and then tackle the rest of it right after dinner. Um, so I'm not doing every dish right away. And I remember distinctly when my kids were little and I had just started adopting this philosophy. I'd put on the TV for my kids and I went into the kitchen and I was like, Oh, time to finally tackle the lunch and the breakfast dishes. And I rolled up my sleeves, and my kids were having fun watching TV. And I was like, gosh, darn it. No, I am not allowed to do those dishes until I sit down and I write. And so I did, just by swapping that idea around. We tell ourselves, it's a good thing to learn when you're a kid, right? I'm not allowed to go play with my friends until I do my chores. When you're a kid, you only have a couple chores. Get them done, and then you get to go play for hours and hours. With grown ups, our chores are never ending, and so we actually have to teach ourselves the opposite, I feel, to say to ourselves, Okay, look, my big three things today are, you know, maybe, maybe the laundry has piled up now to the point where it's overflowing. Okay, fine. Now it's a rock at that point. Or if you have a PTA thing and it's like, all right, well, I got to bake these 24 cupcakes or in your case, probably a million cupcakes, so that's my rock. Fine. I have to do the cupcakes today. But then the other thing would be like, I get to write for 30 minutes. And then everything else, it just, it just filters in like sand. But if you prioritize that first, those are the things that get done.

Michelle:

That's true. For me, a lot of it is just reminding myself that I want my girls to see that I can have my own stuff.

Erin:

Yes. That's a good one too.

Michelle:

Because so often, especially because I'm a stay at home mama. So I mean, now I no longer say I'm a stay at home mom. When people now ask me, what do you do? I say, I'm an author, which just comes natural now for the first time. It's just pretty cool. But until this, I was a stay at home mom, and that's so hard. That was never my plan. That was something when I was dating my husband and he said he wanted to be a teacher and he was like, well, but I'm not gonna be able to support our family on one teacher salary. And I'm never planning on not working. And then I had a really horrible job situation with a really terrible narcissistic, awful boss that I ended up leaving and becoming a housewife at that point. And it's so easy to lose yourself and just be a mom. When, you know, my oldest was getting to be almost three, I was getting antsy to get back outta the house. And then I got pregnant again..And when that one was getting to the point where I was like getting antsy again, I got pregnant again. And so it was like, I need to do something now, so it's so important for me that they see I'm allowed to prioritize me too. I don't want them growing up and feeling like they have to do everything for everyone else.

Erin:

It is amazing how easy it is to lose yourself. in the family that you build. And they're beautiful and we love them and these are people that we would do anything for.

Michelle:

Hmm.

Erin:

But I also can't do stuff for them if I am now empty inside.

Michelle:

Put on your own oxygen mask first.

Erin:

Yeah, exactly. And I didn't do that for years, and that was part of the anxiety and the depression that I was dealing with, the anger issues that started to take over Oh my goodness.

Michelle:

When I first started writing The Chosen One, My Ass, it was so cathartic to me. And then if I went and didn't write for a couple of days, my oldest would be like, please go write. Because she could sense the difference in me, and I would be so much snappier and shorter and less patient because I wasn't doing that for me. And she'd be like, you need to write tonight because you're getting out of control. She's like, I can tell you need to go write.

Erin:

Kudos to the eldest there, man. My nine year old, when he was eight, and he was like, Mama, you're an author. Like, to just hear that awe in his voice. I love seeing that he's proud of me for that. Cause you know, it's hard. Like the last two months with Fire and Fortitude, every single waking moment had to go to meet that deadline, which I will never make so hard again. I'm reiterating that. But I did it. But every single moment had to go to it, and toward the end of that, my son said to me, Mama, you like writing more than us, and I nearly broke down in tears. And my husband, bless his heart, said I know it looks like that right now, but someday you'll really understand the pressure of deadlines and Mama's almost done. She's, she's almost there, and we're going to celebrate when she's done. So I'm, I'm really lucky that I, I do have a very supportive partner in that. It was really hard.

Michelle:

I just loved that when you were helping me with Legacy and you were like, didn't you build an extra time when you set this pre order? And I'm like, I did. And I'm still that short.

Erin:

Oh, that, yeah. So everybody's probably like, what's going on with this whole pre order thing? I'm just going to clarify. There is a very useful marketing strategy where when you are finished with your book, you set up the pre order for the following books. So this way at the end of the current book, you can say, Hey, the story continues. Click to pre order the next book. And so the link is right there. It is a very savvy marketing strategy that works for authors, but I think in order for it to work, you also need to be further along in your author career. You need to know how long it actually takes you to write 120, 000 words. Trying to cram that into four months was not so wise for me. I was like, I'm going to try this marketing strategy. Oh my God, it nearly killed me. I will not do that again. I think it is something that I would apply in the future when I have, maybe a couple more books under my belt. And also with the series that I'm planning after The Aerytol Saga, I'm praying to go to like 60 to 80, 000 words instead of 120. I say that, you know, I'm a liar. Yeah.

Michelle:

With mine, it was like The Chosen One, My Ass, I drafted in a month. When I put out Chosen Two, I was like, sure, I can, I can set the pre order now. It should only take me, and then it took me like forever and it was wrapped up in all the other stuff.

Erin:

So you, you set the pre order for three based on the time it took you to write one and two?

Michelle:

Yeah, that was,

Erin:

And you were like, sure, I've already done it twice. Why wouldn't it work for the third time? And then the third time you got hit with massive quantities of sand.

Michelle:

Yes. Massive sand.

Erin:

sand. Okay. But you got the book done. It just, it just, it challenged you. I, okay, I'm going to say this and I don't want to cut you off, but I can see the positive side of that also where it's like, now I've got a deadline and I have to stick with it rather than being like, Oh, another month and another month and another month. And I'm

Michelle:

Right. Which is what's going on right now with my next book. I mean, I don't know. I've never done this before. I don't know if this is normal when an author goes to write their second series that it's like, I love my characters and I love the idea of it. And it's so hard for me to dive into it like I did The Chosen One.

Erin:

Interesting.

Michelle:

Cause The Chosen One, My Ass, I wanted to do that for like a year and a half before I finally sat down to write it. And it was like, all I could think about. And I was like this story is so cool. And I can't wait to get this down. And I'm very excited about this next one, but it's just, I haven't been sitting with it for a year and a half.

Erin:

Don't sit on it for a year and a half. I'm going to say that, please.

Michelle:

I have to do more of the daydreaming faster.

Erin:

what I was going to ask you if you've been daydreaming your

Michelle:

No, I need to do that. I need to daydream it.

Erin:

So when I finished Fire and Fortitude, I felt burnt out. And I was like, how am I ever going to find the motivation to start outlining four. I have all of the major events for four listed elsewhere. I snorted because this made me laugh so much where I was like, Oh my gosh, what if I don't have enough material for book four? And then I started listing all of the main events that went to happen. I was like, Oh yeah, no, I'm fine. I've got another

Michelle:

Your dad, I would never worry about you not

Erin:

Okay, Never mind. So yeah, I was, I was really burned out by the end of a Fire and Fortitude. So, I, I started thinking about Magnus's novella that I wanted to release and whether or not if I could release it between books 3 and 4 and how that would work. So I started daydreaming it. And it worked, just like it did with Ruins and Redemption, where I started with an idea and I just kept playing with it when I was, you know, driving the kids to and from camp and all the other sand that needed to get done that piled up due to the two months of craziness that had followed. But yeah, I really daydreamed Magnus's story. Once it really became clear to me, I was aching to sit down and just write it down. And then I did a discovery draft. Have you ever done a discovery draft before?

Michelle:

I don't think so. I mean, I don't know. I may have not known what it was.

Erin:

A discovery draft is kind of between an outline and your first draft of your manuscript. It also gave me the freedom where, I'm more of a pantser, right? And I think a discovery outline gives you the freedom to be a pantser. So when I started labeling the chapters, they weren't chapters in my head, they were scenes. And similar to when I do line edits, where I'll put in a chapter title suggestion, just because it's me actually trying to narrow down what it is I think the author is trying to accomplish within this chapter so I can make sure that they're achieving their goal. Um, I do the same thing when I am identifying my scenes and I just put a couple keywords. It starts off with just like an initial three to five sentence summary that explained the purpose of the scene, the challenge that the character would have to overcome, or the choice that they would have to make, or the new piece of information that they would get that would move the plot forward. And then I'll start to flush it out a little bit more with like two to three paragraphs of, oh, he did this and then she said that. It's all telling. It's 100 percent telling she feels this way right now. She told him. Buh, buh, buh, buh. It's like talking to a friend. And then he said, and then she said. It's a lot of that.

Michelle:

That sounds like what I do need to do.

Erin:

Right. And because you have that freedom, it's not like, oh, I'm sitting down to write, you know, a 2 to 5000 word chapter. It's like, no, this is just a couple of paragraphs for me to flesh out the idea that's already in my head. And so I just went through doing that per scene. And then because it was numbered, it was easy for me to be like, Ooh, you know what? Now that I've got these ideas, I actually need a chapter earlier on that's going to foreshadow this thing. So then I can just jump back. And because it's such a short document at that point, it's easy for me to be like, Ooh, insert this scene here, and they're going to discover these things and these challenges. And it's going to reveal this thing that's going to hint at later on. So, um, I have my entire discovery draft done for Magnus, and that's 21 chapters now. And the total of the document I think is like 6, 000 words.

Michelle:

Okay. Definitely not gonna be a novella.

Erin:

I write big books and I cannot lie. Readers better get in line. Yeah, so, um, yeah. So on that note, give that a try. When are you going to make that your rock?

Michelle:

Tomorrow. I'm going to make it my rock tomorrow. That's going to be my focus.

Erin:

I'm glad I helped you identify your rock.

Michelle:

Totally.

Erin:

Well, thank you for joining me on the show again. Congratulations on finishing the Guardian series. Keep us posted about your second series and its progress. You know I'll have you back on the show to talk about books and stuff.

Michelle:

Of course. Can't wait.

Erin:

Peace out, my

Michelle:

Peace out.

Erin:

We should do an episode where we're drinking wine.

Michelle:

How long would that one go?

Erin:

Oh, it'd be so much fun though. All right. And there you have it. Michelle and I both shared several ways that have helped us to balance our passions with our parenting duties. If you want to turn your writing dreams into reality, then reach out to me now so you can become a published author this year. All you have to do is book a free discovery call with me, and I'll help you finally finish and publish your book. Just click the link at the bottom of the show notes.

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Erin P.T. Canning

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