Jennine Capó Crucet 1

JENNINE CAPÓ CRUCET: Well, I used to write at a little tiny desk in the corner of my apartment, next to the kitchen. So one of my writing habits was just being used to working anywhere and in a confined space, which was not a problem, because writing was my favorite thing to do, so it kind of didn't matter where I was. How that's changed over time is now that I've gotten a little older and am making a little bit of a salary, I can do things like buy a proper desk and maybe have a whole side of my apartment that I use just for writing. So that's one small thing that's changed.

And I used to try to write in the mornings, because I kept hearing from very important writer people that your best writing happens in the morning. And I tried for a long time to make that work. But what I actually found was that the best thing you could do for yourself as a writer is figure out what time of the day you feel the most creative and you feel the most energy and just protect that time from anything else.

And so what I actually found was that I'm my most creative and my most engaged with writing in my brain from about 10:00 at night to 1:30 in the morning. And so I had no problem-- once I just sort of embraced that and decided, well, I'm not going to be one of those go-getter early morning types. I'm going to be one of those late into the night with the sweaty armpits writer. That helped a lot and helped me sort of be more productive and write every day rather than forcing myself to write in the mornings and not really embrace my natural biorhythms, if that makes sense.