There must be something in the air. I started drafting this post two weeks ago as part of the 250 words a day challenge and then, on April 12, Iain Broome put up this blog post on Write For Your Life. In it he encourages writers to look at their writing patterns. Do they write for long periods of time, or in short bursts of creativity? He doesn’t push one scenario over another, but rather asks writers to figure out what works for them. Be aware of your patterns, he says, and make the proper adjustments so that you are working to your full potential.
It’s good advice. I’ve been writing for almost thirty years now, and I’ve never stopped to figure out what the best way for me to write is. I’ve always been a full-tilt kind of person, either sitting still or running full speed, usually with a deadline looming. I don’t know if that’s genetics or environment, nature or nurture, and I guess it doesn’t really matter. I am what I am. But just because in the past I’ve tended to write big chunks of stories by staying up until two in the morning, usually during finals week, does that mean it’s the best strategy for me? Maybe my overall creativity would increase if I kept up a steady trickle of writing. Maybe I wouldn’t waste so much time at the beginning of a writing session trying to get in gear if I was already rolling from whatever small amount I of writing I did the day before.
This isn’t to say that I forget about my story when I’m not writing. I’m usually thinking about it all the time. But the difference between thinking about and writing about is the difference between standing on a track and jumping the hurdles. There is nothing like getting in the flow and losing yourself in a world, your fingers flying to keep up with the scenes unspooling in your mind. I haven’t been able to that feeling from fifteen minutes of writing, but maybe that’s because I haven’t tried hard enough. In his book One Minute Meditation, Martin Boroson claims you can get the benefits of meditating in, you guessed it, one minute. He doesn’t say that meditating for an hour or longer is bad or wrong or not worthwhile. He just puts forth the argument that meditation is a good thing and you should do it for as much time as you can, even if all you have is a minute, because maybe that’s all you need to get to that place that you are seeking. It might take some practice, but it can be done. So should I sit around waiting to have five uninterrupted hours to write, or keep myself up until 2:00 a.m., or should I practice writing 250 words a day, and see if maybe I can find a way to go for a quick dip in that creative flow? If nothing else, writing a little bit a day might get all the gunk out of my system so that when I do have a large chunk of time on my hands, I’ll be primed to create something worth keeping.
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I like the idea of leaving a “rough edge” which is something I read somewhere (perhaps an article by Cory Doctorow?). I do that by leaving a scene unfinished, or by writing a quick note about where I see the next paragraph going.
I’ve found this invaluable when I only have time to do a brief writing spell each day. It makes it much easier to jump straight in and get writing.
Great advice, Jonathan. I will definitely give this a shot. Anything that can keep me (and any other writer) moving forward is a good thing!