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Writing as a Way of Life

This book is designed to stimulate and sustain your creative flow. It will help you through those difficult patches when inspiration seems to have deserted you, and the whole process feels like horribly hard work. It will help you celebrate and utilise to the full those exciting times when your creativity seems to take on a life of its own and you feel as though you are running to keep up with it. It will enable you to tap into that inner wealth you may have forgotten you had. If you can just remember to have this book to hand and turn to it when needed, you need never be stuck again.

First, the more practical matters. This opening chapter looks at how our work habits can be improved in order to free and maintain that natural creative flow. Management of our time and our resources – including that most important of writers’ tools, the human body – is considered as part of this process. Antidotes are suggested for some of the unnatural mental and physical practices we impose on ourselves in order to write. If you feel tempted to skip this section in order to get down to writing straight away, then please remember to return to it later. This is very important. Many writers have found solutions to long-standing problems by taking some of the simple steps suggested here.

WRITING AS A PHYSICAL ACTIVITY

A writer is like an athlete; a competitor or skilled performer in physical exercises, to quote the Concise Oxford Dictionary. Because we spend so many hours seated at our desks, it is easy to forget this – until our body protests. Our neck, shoulders and head ache, our eyes refuse to focus, our wrists succumb to repetitive strain injury, and then we remember that our mind operates through a physical organ in a physical body with needs of its own.

These aspects of a writer’s physical make-up need particular attention:

Keeping your brain alert

Like all our bodily organs our brain needs nourishment, a rich blood supply, plenty of oxygen and adequate rest in order to function well. Hours of sitting hunched in a stuffy room, skipping meals or eating junk food will put it at a disadvantage.

The simple acts of opening a window, circling your arms and breathing deeply will boost mental processes tremendously. If you find it hard to remember to do these things, write a note to yourself and place it where it will catch your eye from time to time.

Brain food

Our brains thrive on foods rich in iron, phosphorous and the B vitamins (particularly B6, which is said to help with ‘writer’s block’). Liver, fish, pulses, grains, wholemeal bread and green vegetables are all excellent writers’ foods. My current favourite ‘boosts’ are extract of malt, or thick wholemeal toast with tahini, banana and honey. Oh no? OK – what’s yours?

Brain fatigue

We need rest, not only to combat tiredness but to enable the body to replenish its cells – which, of course, include our brain cells. For this reason, burning the midnight oil (a common symptom of ‘writing fever’) may reduce our mental and physical efficiency over time – something we may find it all to easy to forget or ignore. Many writers have found it beneficial to replace their late night writing habit with an early morning start when the world is just as quiet and their brain is rested.

Efficiency is also improved by a regular change of task – on average, every hour and a half. (See glossary: Circadian rhythms). Use a timer with an audible signal as a reminder to take regular breaks. Ideally, leave the work room and do something physical. Have a list of suggested activities to hand – anything from a short-duration household task to a brisk walk around the block. Physical movement will invigorate your body. Also it can, in itself, trigger a flow of words and ideas (see Use physical activity to stimulate your creativity below).

Brain waves

Your list could include some of the audio-visual products which use pulses of light and/or sound to alter brainwave patterns. A 15-minute session with one of these can calm an agitated brain, or revitalise a flagging one.

Highly recommended are the products available from LifeTools, and the light and sound machines from Photosonix and Tools for Wellness (see Useful addresses).

Further information can be found via the Internet (see page 166 Personal Growth Products and Websites) NB Pulsing lights should not be used by people suffering from epilepsy.

Further suggestions for activity breaks appear in the sections which follow.

Checklist

To function well, your brain needs:

Keeping your eyes healthy

Computer users

If you use a word-processor, you probably spend many hours staring at the screen. An anti-glare screen, either built in or added on, is essential. If over-exposure causes sore or itchy eyes, try bathing them with a cooled herbal infusion of eye-bright and camomile. Your local pharmacy will also carry a number of remedies for this condition. (Also see all writers below.)

Such exposure can leave eyes deficient in Vitamins A and B2, so supplements of these vitamins are advisable. Vitamins C and E also promote eye health.

Alleviate eye and neck strain by having the monitor exactly at eye-level. If necessary, place some blocks underneath it to achieve this. Positioning your feet at the correct height is also important. Ideally both the knee and the ankle joints should be relaxed and should form right-angles.

All writers

Most methods of getting words onto paper involve your eyes in long periods of repetitive activity. They will function better if you take regular time out to exercise them. Add this ‘eye-gymnastics’ routine to your activities list. It need only take a minute once you have mastered it.

Cold tea-bags, cucumber slices or diluted lavender oil on a damp cloth are all very soothing when laid on closed eyelids. You can also bathe your eyes with a cooled herbal infusion of eye-bright and camomile (as advised for PC users).

Eating well

A tight schedule might tempt you to skip meals, eat junk food, or eat absent-mindedly while still writing. These are false economies which you will pay for in brain and body fatigue – and probably digestive disorders, later. Keeping going with stimulants such as alcohol, coffee and tobacco will also have a punishing and detrimental effect on your system.

You owe yourself proper meal breaks – relaxing times spent away from your desk, rewarding mind and body for the hard work they have done. How would you feel about a boss who insisted you work through your lunch hour? Don’t do it to yourself!

Exercising your joints, muscles, heart and lungs

How would you feel if ordered to sit in one spot for several hours moving only your fingers? Writers regularly submit their bodies to such torture. The long-term results will be stiff joints, atrophied muscles and a variety of other ills which could adversely affect your life – not to mention your creative output.

To redress the balance, add a choice of physical work-outs to your break-time activities list. Work with a yoga or pilates DVD for example, to ensure that your whole body is exercised and flexibility and strength are maintained. You also need an aerobic activity, to exercise heart and lungs and send blood and oxygen to all vital organs, including the brain. Jog, cycle, walk your dogs, dance to Gabrielle Roth, work out with your favourite celeb – whatever you enjoy the most.

Tae Bo is a particularly good work-out for writers as it thoroughly exercises the heart, lungs, arms and upper body and brings an invigorating flow of blood to the brain.

The need for desk workers to take regular exercise breaks has long been recognised by companies such as RSIGuard and WorkPace, who have produced software which interrupts your computer use at chosen intervals and takes you through a workout, including eye exercises. The websites of such companies are well worth a visit and many offer 30-day free trials of their software. Despite my initial irritation at being interrupted every hour, I have found my health has benefited hugely since I installed one of these programs.

Checklist

Your physical health and, as a result your writing, will benefit from:

Using physical activity to stimulate your creativity

As mentioned earlier, physical activity can often release a flow of words and ideas. This could be connected with our early development, as we learn to use the rest of our bodies before we speak. I saw a striking example of this effect while working on a language-skills programme for children with special needs. The group included an extremely withdrawn eight-year old boy who had been silent throughout his three years at school. Having marched round the hall to music, the children wanted to ‘march’ lying down. As they did so, the boy in question began moving his arms and legs faster and faster against the floor. Suddenly out came a torrent of speech, which increased in speed and volume until he was shouting whole sentences. Somehow that particular sequence of movements had triggered his speech processes.

Using physical triggers to stimulate the thought processes

Practitioners of therapies like Gestalt and Bioenergetics utilise such physical triggers as enabling mechanisms. Writers can do the same. Crawling, kicking, jumping, punching cushions – ‘marching lying down’, can all help words to come. Close the curtains and try it – what can you lose!

Writers use a variety of physical triggers to get the creative juices flowing. Veteran sci-fi author Ray Bradbury used to swim. Charles Schulz, creator of Peanuts, would walk or skate. Poet and author Diana Gittins leaps into a boat and rows. Comedy writer Peter Vincent ‘gets up from his desk every hour or so to do yoga’. (‘Or eat a biscuit,’ he adds after some reflection.)

Like many writers, Peter finds that when ideas start flowing he strides about consuming large quantities of food. He also experiences a strong link between his creative process and his physical well-being. He can suffer indigestion and abdominal pain for no apparent reason, make an alteration to the script he is working on and immediately feel fine again – literally a gut reaction.

Checklist

Value your health and treat your body well. It is the vehicle of your talent.

Flexing your writing muscles

‘Get in action,’ Natalie Goldberg advises. ‘Work it out actively. Pen on paper. Otherwise all your thoughts are dreams. They go nowhere. Let the story move through your hand rather than your head.’

If writing is your main occupation, you probably write daily from necessity. If not, it is good to keep the ‘writing muscles’ flexed in this way. With any discipline, leaving it for a day can lead to several days and so on – until suddenly weeks have passed and you are horribly out of practice. If the discipline in question is an important part of your life, you can also find yourself horribly ‘out of sorts’ if you don’t pursue it. Writing is no different in this respect. You must maintain the momentum for progress to be made and – if writing is your passion – for well-being to be maintained.

Finding the time

When we work from the creative rather than the logical mind, the process cannot be rushed. To derive maximum benefit from the exercises in this book, you need to allow enough time for the experiences to unfold.

However, if you find yourself juggling a heap of responsibilities and wondering how you can possibly clear a space for writing, a short regular slot each day is a good compromise solution. Even if you can only manage ten minutes, at the end of the week you will have 70 minutes-worth of writing under your belt. While not ideal, it keeps you writing. In fact a novel per year can be produced in this way. Try using an old A4 diary for the purpose and filling a page each day.

Going for it

One of the problems with only having ten minutes, is that it can take that long just to start thinking. The answer – don’t think. Set yourself a time of ten minutes, twenty minutes, an hour -whatever you have available, and just write. Get in action. Keep your hand moving. Whatever comes; no thinking, crossing out, rewriting – just do it. Stick to the allotted time – no more, no less. A timer with an audible signal focuses the mind wonderfully. Some of what you write may be rubbish – fine! When you give yourself permission not to be perfect, things start to happen. You can find yourself swept up in the joy of what writer Chris Baty (founder of National Novel Writing Month) has termed ‘Exuberant Imperfection’. At the end of the week look back and highlight the things you might be able to use.

Another excellent way of both flexing your writing muscles and focusing the mind is to set yourself the task of writing a complete story in – say – 100 words; no more, no less. Try subscribing to Flash Fiction Online (see Appendix). I have found this a refreshing once-a-week change from my daily timed writing. Chris Baty’s No Plot? No problem, and Margret Geraghty’s The Five-minute Writer are greatly expanded versions of this go-for-it approach.

Getting started

Write: ‘I remember when …’ or ‘I don’t remember when …’ ‘I want to tell you about …’ ‘I don’t want to tell you about …’ ‘I have to smile whenever I…’

Write about a colour, a taste, a smell, an emotion. Write about a favourite outfit, an embarrassing experience, a holiday disaster, a beloved pet, a dream. Write about what it feels like to have no ideas.

Write: ‘If I were a piece of music I would be …’ or ‘The woman on the bus made me think of …’ or ‘The meal I would choose as my last would be …’

Open a book or turn on the radio and start with the first sentence you see/hear. If you get stuck, write your first sentence again and carry on.

If you would like to try a more technological approach, Write Sparks! offers a quick-start generator which is fun to use, and particularly suited to timed writing. It even provides a space and a timer if you want to time-write on your PC rather than by hand. Also try writingbliss.com which, among a huge variety of writing activities, offers to e-mail you a daily writing task – for free!

If you want to apply timed writing to a larger project – say, completing the first draft of a novel, software available from WriteQuickly.com ‘guarantees a book in under 28 days, working for one hour per day’.

Finding new ways

Whether you are doing timed writing, taking notes or first-drafting, writing in a linear way from left to right is only one of many choices. Try writing round the edges, starting in the middle, writing in columns, spirals, flower-shapes – whatever takes your fancy. I find linear note-taking of little use for recovering information afterwards.

I prefer to ‘chunk’ my thoughts (see Figure 1) so that they leap off the page, demanding my attention. I draw a shape around each chunk as I write, to keep them separate. (The doodles come later when I am thinking.) I also like to organise my writer’s notebook in this way. When I scatter snatches of conversation, description, and general musings around the page, I find they come together in ways I might not have thought of if I had used linear jotting.

I find coloured paper and pens useful – and fun. They alleviate boredom, evoke a particular mood, and help me organise my thoughts.

Checklist

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Fig. 1. ‘Chunked’ notes from a story-telling workshop.

Timed writing as a daily practice

Many writers, whatever their situation, find daily timed writing useful. If short of time, it can help bypass any panic engendered by a blank sheet of paper and a ticking clock. When time is not a problem, it can help combat that perverse ailment, don’t want to start. Having moved mountains to clear a day – or a life – in which to write, some of us are suddenly afflicted with a paralysing torpor. This can be because self-motivation is new to us (see Organising your work time below) or because of self-doubt (see Writing and your identity below). Timed writing cuts through both by a) giving us something definite to do and b) setting no standards.

Try: ‘I am now going to write as badly as I can for ten minutes.’

Timed writing also clears mental ‘dross’ so that the good stuff can start to flow – like priming a pump. It is the equivalent of a performer’s or athlete’s warm-up exercises. It can also produce something amazing in its own right.

Keep a notebook by your bed and do your timed writing before even getting up. This is an excellent way to kick-start your writing day.

Checklist

Timed writing can help you:

WRITING AND YOUR LIFESTYLE

‘To nurture your talent requires considerable discipline, for there are many other good things you will not have time to do if you are serious about your creativity.’

(Marilee Zedenek: The Right Brain Experience.)

There are also many not-so-good things which you will not have time to do – or may feel forced to do instead. It’s amazing how compelling the laundry or this year’s first cleaning of the car can feel when you’re having trouble with starting your writing project.

How important is writing to you?

List all your current projects and activities. Rate the significance of each one on a scale of 1–10, then list them again in order of importance.

Organising your workspace

Do you need silence or do you, as Peter Ustinov did, find it unbearable? Do you need to be free from distractions, or can you work at the kitchen table while your two-year-old plays football with the saucepans? Do you need everything neatly labelled and filed, or do you prefer cheerful clutter? How important is the decor?

Claiming your territory

You may have to share this space with others. How protective do you feel about the area or areas you use?

For many of us this territorial aspect of the workspace is very important, and needs addressing. Having to worry that papers might be moved, read, damaged – even accidentally thrown away, is a most unwelcome distraction.

If you have your own work room, are you making full use of the freedom this allows you? Has it occurred to you that you can do anything you like in there? For example, writing on the walls and ceiling can be very liberating – perhaps chunking ideas (as in Figure 1). The result feels amazing – like sitting inside your own brain.

Going walkabout

Having organised your workspace and settled in, make sure it does not eventually become a new rut. Try working somewhere else occasionally – a change of scene can help ideas to flow. Even a different part of the house can feel surprisingly adventurous when you have got used to one particular location.

If you really want to trigger your imagination, try some of the places you chose in childhood – behind the sofa, in a wardrobe, in the cupboard under the stairs. (Does this sound like a daft idea? Would it help to know that at least two well-known and respected authors write underneath their dining room tables?) In an article called ‘Where I Like to Write’ (Author’s Copyright and Lending Society News, February 2005) author Carol Lee describes sitting on a polishing box by the fire when writing in her childhood home. She emphasises the importance to her of finding just the right place. I used to love writing in my father’s shed – an exciting place, full of objects which were quite mysterious to me as a child. As an adult, my own shed doesn’t feel so intriguing – but writing in someone else’s can still do the trick!

‘People try to become everything except a song. They want to become rich, powerful, famous. But – they lose all qualities that can make their life joyous; they lose all cheerfulness, they become serious.’

(Osho Morning Contemplation)

Wanting to be somewhere else

Do you sometimes feel you need to be somewhere else entirely – then if you manage to get there, find it is not right either? Does isolation make you long for company and vice versa? Do you rent a cottage by the sea, and end up writing in a cafe in the centre of town? ’I thought it was only me!’ other writers will probably say if you ever confess. It is very likely that this yearning for something we cannot have is a necessary part of the creative process. Once, when writing a certain story, I felt compelled to stay in a seaside boarding house up north, in winter. The arrangements I had to make in order to do so were considerable. I stuck it for just one day. Now I use my imagination to go where I yearn to go. This is quicker, cheaper and far less disappointing.

Organising your work time

Does your time feel as though it is structured for you, or do you set your own schedule? We have seen how timed writing can help in both situations. We have also looked at scheduling a writing day around regular breaks. If you are used to working for someone else, both self-motivation and time-management may feel difficult at first. The leisure-time writing habit may also be difficult to kick, so that you find you are writing all day every day and exhausting yourself. Is this something you need to change?

Whether you are fitting writing in or fitting other things in around writing, some organisational skill will be needed. As with your workspace, your work time needs to be claimed and marked out in some way. Those around you will need to know any ‘rules’ that apply to your writing time. If you live alone, make your writing hours known to friends, neighbours or anyone else who might call round. Let the answering machine take all your calls. Place a ‘do not disturb’ notice on the front door if necessary.

Research

Does your schedule allow plenty of time for any research you need to do? How do you feel about research? It need not mean hours spent in the library. Active research, immersing yourself in the place where your story is to be set, is likely to be more enjoyable and will help you to bring the setting to life for your readers. Novelist Marjorie Darke recommends conversing with ‘anyone in the locality who can increase my background knowledge.’ She also aims to share as many of her characters’ experiences as possible. While researching Ride the Iron Horse, for example, she took part in a traction engine race. Similarly, Peter Vincent spent many hours as a leisure centre user while doing initial research for The Brittas Empire, and Canadian writer Jo Davis thoroughly indulged her passion for trains while working on Not a Sentimental Journey.

Novelist Alison Harding describes research as ‘a sort of radar that picks up on things you need to know and draws your attention to them’. This radar also seems to work subliminally. Alison, in common with a number of writers, has often had the experience of inventing a happening in relation to a certain place, researching the location and finding that a similar event actually occurred there. I have several times invented a name for a character and had someone of that name enter my life shortly afterwards.

Reading

Make sure your schedule also includes plenty of time for reading – particularly the type of material you like to write. In order to be part of the ‘writing world’, you need to know what is happening in your chosen field. What appeals to you? What is selling? Who is publishing it? A particular joy of being a writer is that you can feel positively virtuous about being an obsessive reader.

Checklist

Staying in touch with the rest of the world

One of writing’s many paradoxes is that it is an isolated activity through which we reach out to others. It is a way of making our voice heard in the world. So how might the other half of that dialogue be conducted? Joining a group or a class is one very good way. Becoming an active member of some of the many writers’ websites (see page 167 Websites for Writers) is another excellent way (but beware, this can also become very distracting!). Reading the papers, watching the news, and conversing with a variety of people can also be helpful.

Do you read your first drafts to other people and value their response – or do you prefer to internalise the energy at this early stage?

Whatever your choice, the most important question is does it work for you?

ACQUIRING A WRITER’S TOOL KIT

Essential items

Look at – or imagine, your workspace. List the things you simply could not do without. Is yours a Zen-like existence – just a pad and pencil, or is your room overflowing? Would you like to add or discard things, or is it fine the way it is?

How do you feel about the theory that our surroundings reflect our inner state? Does a crowded work-space necessarily mean that our brain is ‘cluttered’? Perhaps your brain is more like a back-pack than an orderly bookshelf. Think of it as overflowing with useful things which you can grab when you want them. If you are not happy with the contents of your workspace (or your back-pack) list those things again in order of priority and see whether you can discard some. Or do you need to acquire more? If the latter, read on. Otherwise skip the next two sections – you might be tempted.

Highly useful items

Treats

These are important. Here are a few suggestions.

Items for writing ‘the right brain way’

The uses for these will be explained in subsequent chapters.

WRITING AND YOUR IDENTITY

Inventing yourself as a writer

Your writing self may well express an aspect of your personality which is normally hidden from the world. Perhaps you have a high-powered job which requires you to be very ‘left-brain’, while your writing self is poetic and vulnerable. Or the reverse – you write horror, crime or erotic fiction and teach infants by day. Perhaps you write as a person of the opposite gender. If you write in a variety of genres, you may have several writing selves.

In order to manage any tension between these different facets of yourself, or to prevent one popping out at an inappropriate time, try ‘fleshing them out’, much as you would your fictional characters. Make them the subject of timed writing or a complete play or short story. Perhaps one of the functions of pen-names is to allow the writing self (or selves) and the everyday self to lead separate lives. In that case a writing self might benefit from the construction of his or her full autobiography.

Valuing yourself and your writing

How do you feel about writing as an occupation or pastime? When you talk about it, do you feel proud – or embarrassed? Do you use the words ‘only’ or ‘just’ when you describe your work? Do you call it ‘scribbling’? Do you think of writing as a worthy pursuit or, if you are a professional, as a ‘proper’ job? Do you feel justified in claiming time and space to do it? How do you feel about the writing you produce? Are you confident enough to submit it to publishers?

How do you cope with rejection letters? Have feelings about yourself as a writer affected your attitude to any of the suggestions in this chapter? For example, do you feel it is worth following the physical programme, setting up a workspace, claiming time, collecting a ‘tool kit’? Are other things/other people ‘more important?’ Do you feel you are kidding yourself that you can do this?

It may be a while before you can give positive answers to these questions and really mean it – but, with perseverance it happens. An ‘invented self’ can be a huge help in this respect. A self that is feeling positive and strong can give the less confident one a peptalk.

A supportive attitude from those close to you is also invaluable. A friend at the beginning of her writing career heard her husband tell a caller, ‘My wife is a writer and cannot be disturbed.’ She felt she could do anything after that.