Co-working

Quote from my co-working writing partner: "It's amazing how I know what to say when someone is listening."

Co-working is something I started doing when I was an undergrad. I was an electrical engineering student, and the chemical engineering students were the ones who were permanent fixtures at the library who I could always find there. So, I did my work alongside them as they did theirs.

When I was working on writing my dissertation, there was a group of us that would do this together at the library. We called it "Writing Camp" and it involved timed sessions of writing with timed breaks in between them.

My partner and I had come up with the structure of Writing Camp when we took a vacation with a friend who we were helping with writing a book. So, again, each person can be working on very different things while everyone is working together.

Then there was a period of time that I called "The Death of Writing Camp" where I sorely missed the support of Writing Camp. One benefit of Writing Camp is that you come to have a better sense for time and how long things take and how long of a session you tend to benefit more from. I need sessions that are 20 minutes or less. My partner needs sessions that are 40 minutes or more. So, doing Writing Camp together no longer worked for us.

Abbreviations you can use when proposing calls on the Teddy Bear Signup for these sessions

Co-workingInPairs

Calls where you intersperse doing work independently (usually for 15 minutes or 20 minutes at a time) with taking turns serving as teddy bears (usually for 3 minutes each).

Co-workingInBreakoutRooms

Co-working session where you will be putting pairs and triples in breakout rooms