freightertonowhere asked:

Hi! If you don’t mind, could you share a bit about the daily writing habit you mentioned? Like, what does daily writing look like for you, how did you get the habit to stick, etc etc. I’m always so interested in other people’s daily practices (partially to see how I can improve my own, partially because they’re always so interestingly varied from person to person!)

I’m happy to! and wow this got long. I hope it’s helpful.

so I majored in creative writing in college, and after graduating I was pretty burnt out and didn’t write much for a while. I gradually started writing more as the years went by, and kept wanting to make it more of a habit but couldn’t figure out how. so finally I made it my resolution to write just 3 sentences a day. I decided it could be for any project, or even just a wisp of an idea that would never become an actual story; the only rule was it had to be at least 3 sentences (of any length) and it had to be original fiction.

at first the only gesture toward routine was that I made a recurring, daily calendar event titled “3+ sentences.” I still have this set up and I love it. it’s a 15-minute block of time set at 9pm (I’m a night owl) but often I’ll move it around in advance if I know I’m going to block off more time on a particular day. or if I do something different unexpectedly I move the event afterwards to reflect when I actually wrote. I’ll also put in a location if I’m not writing at home.

this means I can glance at my calendar at the end of any given week and see when I wrote, and where, and for how long. that information helps me decide if I want to do less or more in the coming days, and also helps me identify any patterns (e.g. “wow when I wrote at the library I only did 30 minutes but when I wrote at the coffee shop I did 2.5 hours, I should prioritizing having food and comfy seating” or “I wrote way more at the library than at the coffee shop this week, I guess I’m at a part of the drafting process where I really need quiet”).

anyway, to start with I had no routine other than that 15-minute calendar event that didn’t even stay at the same time or place each day. I would write in the notes app on my phone, or in a notebook, or in google docs; I would write 60 seconds before bedtime, or during my commute, or at a coffee shop, etc.

at the time I was frustrated I wasn’t writing more each day, but in retrospect I think this super casual approach was helpful for the stage I was at: emerging from burnout, toying around with several story ideas, trying to figure out whether and how they fit together and what to pursue.

once I finally did have a cohesive project I was excited about, I levelled up a bit. something about having a story with structure helped me build a routine with structure. I started blocking off longer periods of time to write. I found a cafe I loved to write at and picked a favorite chair. using trial and error I got more strategic about when I scheduled writing time: I found that having a long session right after swimming always works great, writing in the early morning never works at all, and I’m more productive and creative in the days after I have some kind of creative outing like going to a play or a museum. I keep my writing time short on days when I knew work will be really stressful, or when I have other activities I wanted to focus on.

this means I always know roughly in advance which days will be most productive and which days will be 3-sentence days. I try to manage the ebb and flow of my creative energy accordingly. if there’s a week where I have a ton of work deadlines and I know I’ll be fried, I keep the work days at 15 minutes, try to do something both restful and creative on Saturday to recharge, and schedule a long block on Sunday knowing that I’ll have both pent-up writing thoughts to get down and (hopefully) the creative energy to do so.

so I figured all that out and it was great. but where I really levelled up was when I created my beautiful beautiful spreadsheet, my beloved spreadsheet. I did nanowrimo in 2023 and learned that having a set word count goal really works for me. plus I am a big spreadsheet lover!! so YMMV on whether this is helpful for you or just stressful, but I find it INTENSELY motivating.

here’s what I do: a couple days before the start of each month, I duplicate the template of my spreadsheet and label it with that month. then I go through my calendar and write down what I’m doing each day that could impact writing time (e.g. family dinner, cleaning apartment, going to a writing group). I try to get at least one day a week that has a whole afternoon or evening dedicated to writing.

then I assign a word count goal to each day, and an overall word count goal for the full month. each day I input how much I actually wrote and I watch the numbers add up and it fills me with a deep sense of satisfaction. if I find myself falling behind, often looking at the spreadsheet gives me the kick in the pants I need to Get Off That Damn Phone and write. or if I realize I have too many other commitments going on that month to hit my goal, I just adjust the numbers accordingly while still trying to keep it ambitious.

(you can get the spreadsheet here if you want)

all of this is to say I don’t have a strict routine where I sit down at the same time and place every day, or write the same number of words per day, etc. what works really well for me is to:

• set specific daily goals that align with the other varying routines in my life
• generally know what settings and contexts and support structures work to sustain my creativity
• be ready to adapt and do more or less on any given day, week, or month depending on external factors
• remain extremely disciplined about writing every single day no matter what. like, I wrote on my wedding day! only a few words, but it was important to me. I am now a person who Writes Every Day and that alone builds a lot of confidence and steadiness.

some other helpful things:

• on days I feel really sluggish and unmotivated and I don’t feel like writing, I ask myself “do you only want to write when you feel like it?” and the answer is always no, I want to write no matter what, so I do (even if it’s just 3 sentences)
• I have a writing buddy who is a dear friend; every few weeks we’ll share a chapter with each other and discuss and give feedback. I am otherwise quite secretive about what I’m writing (I’ve been working on my current project for years and only just started letting my wife read it) but it’s helpful to have someone you can bounce ideas off of and think out loud to.
• I recently started going to a very chill weekly writers’ group where we all sit in silence for 1-2 hours and write, and afterwards you can just leave, or talk to people about your writing, or talk about non-writing things. it’s nice to have body doubling and I’m starting to make friends :)

ok I think that covers it! happy writing!

barbreypilled:

when I tell u I had to scroll a week back in my twitter likes to find this video bc I genuinely couldn’t sleep until I did

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roycohn:

roycohn:

roycohn:

one of the things we’ve gotta start talking about when we talk about the death of media literacy is the concept of the artistic process and how so many people do not understand that a work can be deeply personal to the person writing it without being a diaristic, 1:1 representation of something they have personally gone through; that part of the artistic process involves transmuting some of your emotional experiences into a different setting or narrative, and that “writing what you know” is about emotions, not literal things that happened to you three days ago. sometimes it means combining multiple experiences or people into one, or putting those parts of your life and emotions into a character who doesn’t look anything like you or share your identity. sometimes it means those parts of yourself will show up in the villain (on purpose) or the things you’ve thought and believed will be borne out by the narrative to not be correct. sometimes it means creating situations you’ve never personally experienced as a means of digesting emotions that you have. sometimes you won’t even realize what you’re digesting and working through until it comes out on the page and you look at it with the privilege of distance. none of this makes an artist “a liar,” none of it means those themes and emotional truths aren’t still extremely personal to them, and none of it means that they’re inhabiting a role or a voice they’re not qualified to write from just because it’s not 100% autofiction being presented as such. as a writer myself, i feel like none of this should need to be spelled out, but in just the past couple days i have seen this fundamental misunderstanding of the artistic process applied to artists as diverse as paul thomas anderson, william shakespeare, and taylor swift, and i just want to say: you guys are not as smart as you think you are, and “this can’t be about that because THAT never happened to THEM” is not the checkmate you think it is. someday i will find the person who made that “the curtains are blue” comic and they will die a bloody death by my hands.

i also think the fandomification of book publishing over the past decades and the bad faith co-opting of “own voices,” which was a concept that originally had good intentions but which quickly turned into “no one is allowed to write from an identity perspective other than their own or about an experience that has not personally happened to them or else they will be canceled on YA twitter for being hitler goebbels mcriefenstahl by other bitter YA writers who don’t even really believe this about them, but who are mad that they haven’t gotten a book deal yet,” has a big part to play in this phenomenon. people by and large don’t read anymore, and when they do read, it’s first-person narratives from the POV of characters who look, think, and sound exactly like the author, who are relating experiences that the author has to be able to prove they have personally gone through (or have POTENTIAL to go through), lest they have their reputations permanently smeared and ruined for the crime of literally just writing fiction… or else they’re reading first-person narratives that are just sexual fantasies projected onto a blank-slate main character. the concept that a work can be personal without being representational is kicking a lot of people’s asses because the state of publishing over the last decade has basically done away with books that aren’t just the author’s personal trauma repackaged, because that’s what sells these days. and it fucking sucks. it fucking sucks so bad. it’s horrible for the concept of free expression, it’s horrible for talented young artists and writers who want the freedom to explore stories and themes that aren’t intrinsic to their own personal life circumstances, it’s horrible for readers’ brains and imaginations and sows a real environment of disrespect for the concept of WRITING. FICTION. it’s just miserable altogether. anyway yes this was all brought on by seeing someone on threads smugly assert that hamlet couldn’t possibly have had anything to do with shakespeare processing the death of his son because it was written a few years later and besides, it’s about the death of a FATHER, not a SON, so CHECKMATE. to which i can only say, quoth remy ma: are you dumb????

oh and ONE MORE THING i say as i return to this post 3 hours later – ONE MORE THING is that so often, as a writer, directly committing to paper something you have personally gone through is either too painful, too revealing, too dangerous, or just not something you want to do for artistic reasons. sometimes it’s about not getting sued. sometimes it’s about not wanting everyone in the world to know your business. sometimes it’s just about wanting to tell an emotional truth that is bursting to get out of you without having to confront the literal truth just yet. sometimes you don’t even realize that’s what you’re writing about until you’re finished and reading it back and realizing why your subconscious was leading you in a specific direction. the reason people talk about the creative process in this mystical, unknowable way is because often the act of creating involves gaining access to a mystical and unknowable place and power inside yourself that can only be tapped in certain ways. demanding paint-by-numbers Good Own Voices Representation or identity-based autofiction for the sake of not stepping on anyone’s toes doesn’t just make that process almost impossible to tap into, it means that if we had always applied this standard some really great art never would’ve been made because the people making it would’ve been told they had no right to do so. and i don’t want to live in a world where authorial identity determines what stories get to be told - not only because it cheapens and stifles the entire artistic process by demanding that no one seek entry into worlds other than their own, but because the act of creation can feel so divine, and by placing yourself in the shoes of another, you can tap into a well of empathy inside yourself that i think we all frankly benefit from having access to.

artmialma:

Darrel Rhea

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maxknightley:

maxknightley:

in the contemporary world, the most fundamental human right - and, it often seems, the least protected one - is “being both Allowed and Able to go Somewhere Else.” the rest is commentary.

the torments of prison are predicated on Not Letting You Leave. the most terrifying and degrading aspects of childhood are predicated on Not Letting You Leave. misogynists wail and moan and fearmonger about divorce and equal opportunity employment because they Allow Wife To Leave. borders and immigration restrictions exist, in no small part, to Prevent People From Leaving countries where they will be exploited and/or oppressed. fuck you for trying to leave. fuck you for exerting any control over your life whatsoever. that makes you the one at fault, actually.

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greelin:

the horseman wouldn’t be headless if he met me. If you get what i’m saying

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beardedmrbean:

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