Here’s how I wrote 2 bestselling books without taking time off work

I published my first bestselling book when I was 23 years old. I’d written it during nights and weekends while working in Hong Kong initially as an English teacher, and subsequently as an editor at a newspaper.

My second bestseller, Life Between Moments: New York Stories, I wrote in less than a year while working as a full-time reporter at a global media publication.

I did not take time off work to complete either book. I knew that it was up to me to get these projects to the finish line, and my managers at work shouldn’t be responsible for my personal endeavors. Thinking otherwise, to me, seemed entitled and narcissistic.

In those years of writing, rarely did I complete any one remarkable day of output. Most often, I’d write for about 30 minutes after work. On weekends my sessions were longer, but never anything extreme.

The key to completing my books, however, was that I never failed to show up to those writing sessions. I had no one telling me what to do or reminding me to keep going, but I had convinced myself long ago that I was the type of person who didn’t need external motivation.

I had something far more powerful — discipline.

I had made a promise to myself that I would commit to writing every day, and that was that. I refused to negotiate with myself, and my priority became putting in consistent effort. Rather than focusing on what I wanted to do, or how I felt, I simply did what I was supposed to do (including show up to my day job).

How I made discipline a habit

As a 7th grader, I developed an obsession with physical fitness. I was bent on becoming the best version of myself, and that started with the physical gains in the gym. Working hard became my standard before I left middle school. I made progress quickly, and that progress made me want more.

Even more apparent, I saw what happened when I’d miss days in the gym. I’d feel sluggish the next day and my mood faltered, as if I’d loss far more than a single day of exercise.

The most critical component to progress, I learned, was consistency. A single, ultra-hard workout wouldn’t make or break you. There’s little to celebrate from one day’s outsized exertion if it means you fail to show up the next morning.

The gym taught me that lasting progress comes from consistency. My daily exercise became non-negotiable, and an integral piece to my identity: I am the type of person who doesn’t miss days at the gym.

That mindset sharpened through high school, when I would go to the gym at 5:00AM before class, and still attend my sports practices after school. I knew that the extra hour every single morning would compound over time, just as I knew that sticking to a clean diet while my classmates ate junk food would push me further as well.

Eventually, all those early morning training sessions translated to an unwavering diligence in my studies in university. My obsession with improving my physical fitness led to an obsession with overall personal growth, which fueled my curiosity and work ethic in the classroom.

I studied hard, read voraciously, and earned excellent academic results and those, too, became integral to my identity: I am the type of person who gets A’s because I study and read everyday.

Had I never developed the discipline of taking care of my health, I know that my study habits and school approach would have remained average at best. I was never gifted or clever, let alone uniquely athletic. Those attributes came later after many, many quiet hours spent on my own developing myself and raising the ceiling of what was possible.

‘Maximizing minimum potential’

In his 2022 book Never Finished, retired Navy Seal and ultramarathon runner David Goggins describes the idea of “maximizing minimum potential.”

When a half-assed job doesn’t bother you, it speaks volumes about the kind of person you are. And until you start feeling a sense of pride and self-respect in the work you do, no matter how small or overlooked those jobs might be, you will continue to half-ass your life.

Goggins, who has broken Guinness world records and run 240-mile races, touts discipline as the path to freedom, and calls it the great equalizer when competing with others who are more talented or those who have more potential.

When effort is your top priority, Goggins writes, then you stop looking for excuses as to why you haven’t achieved what you want.

A drive for self-optimization and daily repetition will build your capacity for work and give you confidence that you can take on more. With discipline as your engine, your workload and output will double, then triple.

What you won’t see, at least not at first, is the fact that your own personal evolution has begun to bear fruit. You won’t see it because you’ll be too busy taking action.

Make hard work your responsibility

One of the driving themes Goggins conveys in his work is the idea that how you do one thing is how you do everything.

It’s clear in the book, but early on I’d stumbled upon this idea accidentally and gradually.

I took the mentality I developed in years of training in the gym and applied it to school, then my writing career. Showing up everyday became not just something I did, but the part of me that I became most proud of. It was an ongoing commitment to myself and the person I aspired to be.

Eventually, when it was time to put pen to paper for my books, I knew that showing up everyday for writing couldn’t happen separately from showing up everyday to work. I had no desire to take vacation days to have more time for my books, because by that point, that simply wasn’t who I was as a person.

It didn’t occur to me to ask for the time off because, ultimately, I knew it was my responsibility to allocate enough time — via discipline — for both pursuits. Remaining diligent outside normal work hours to write while still completing all my duties at my day job made crossing the finish line for each book that much sweeter.

Complement this reading with Ernest Hemingway’s best writing advice, how to improve your focus as a creative, and how to reach goals without thinking about them.

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