by Mossy Toes » Tue Sep 29, 2015 6:59 am
Erp. Meant to reply to this well earlier, but my post was via phone and got eaten by the nether when trying to post.
My rhythm while working is/was to get up early, do a quick 5-min workout to make sure my brain gets some blood, make a cup of coffee, then write for an hour. That way, when I'm doing physical stuff that's repetitive, isn't too dangerous/demanding, later... well, I'm free to spend time dwelling on the scenes I was just writing earlier in the day, and where to go from there, and what to edit. It's a lot of subconscious and semi-conscious bandwidth just spent processing jigsaw puzzle pieces so that when I sit down to write the next morning... well, I'm eager to put down the next scene or scenes.
I generally consider myself pretty grounded and centered, so I don't have the issue of feedback loops making dwelling on a thing dangerous or upsetting, but--I can't help but think that it helps that I cram my brain full of story, so I'm not just free-associating based on mood as I keep myself physically occupied. Instead I'm setting my brain specifically to handle a specific task while my body handles another.
Another element of what makes it work for me, I think, is being yoked to somebody else's system and being accountable to them--in a benign, or indeed symbiotic sense, since I've accomplished so little when not under direction these past few years! Being woken up by my father with whom I am working, and being supported by him to write--rather than writing being an arduous chore I need to drag myself to do to check off my mental checklist for the day, it's a way I can harness my skills to make him excited about what I'm doing. I suppose a large factor of that is having a genuinely helpful coach who is interested in me pursuing my passions, and who for that couple week period was working closely with me, in my father. But... well, I do my best to appreciate what I have, and recognize that isn't an option or an opportunity most get. There are other methods of structure, buddy-systeming, and mutual accountability though, among writers, I think.
And additionally, I think, there's some merit to cutting myself off after a set amount of time spent writing. Rather than writing until I'm glutted on writing, spending several hours to get 2-3k words out and ending on a logical stopping point, well, instead I get ~700 words over an hour and have to cut myself off. I mean, it's less words per day, certainly, but the upsides? I am able to drop right back in when I come back the next morning, and I still have more I want to get out and onto the page. Rather than exhausting myself, I'm coming back to the page hungry to get more out. If I'm having a bad day, I know there's a finishing line in sight. And quite importantly, I am regularly getting that 700 words just about every day, rather than the 2-3k words in rare bursts as inspiration strikes.
Honestly, I don't know if there's a secret sauce here I can bottle and repackage. I'm just finding something that seems to work for me, and am going to have to do some testing to see if I can make a self-starting, regular habit of it--can I push for longer sittings at a time? Can I manage to do it myself, rather than under the aegis of a coaching figure? Etc. Because these stories are itching to get out, but while I'm not writing, they just plain can't!
What sphinx of plascrete and adamantium bashed open their skulls and ate up their brains and imagination? Imperator!