To discover a story, writers use a different kind of cognitive activity and enter a different state of consciousness. Whether we call it the writer’s trance, creative flow, flow writing, freewriting, dreamstorming or the awakened dream, it’s where most writers find creative bliss. The writer’s trance is notoriously illusive, but you can enhance your ability … More How to Enter the Writer’s Trance
In a previous post, I promised to explain why you should “keep your butt on the meditation cushion or your back on the yoga mat” in the early stages of writing. There is power is resisting the urge to write. I learned the value of delayed drafting at a writer’s conference decades ago. One of … More The Creative Power of NOT Writing
In the previous post, I said that drafting and revising rely on divergent thinking and editing relies on convergent thinking. It’s a weeny bit more complex. In Off the Page (2008 edited by Carole Burns), Richard Bausch says this about beginning a book: “I start writing with an image or a voice, but I don’t … More “Meditating” Your Way into Writing
In my previous post, I suggested that writers need to alternate between focused-attention meditation and open-monitoring meditation. In some stages of the creative process, we need divergent thinking, which open-monitoring meditation increases. In other stages, we need convergent thinking, which focused-attention meditation increases. (More about stages of the creative process in Chapter 4 of AWB) … More What Kind of Meditation Does Your Writing Need? Depends on What Stage It’s In
In the previous post, we identified the first of two essential pre-editing steps: read your draft and just love it. Jumping from loving your draft to critically analyzing it or starting to edit, reword, rework, cut, slash and burn would be a bit like ending a honeymoon with a stop at a divorce lawyer’s office. … More Pre-edit Step Two to Prevent Writer’s Resistance
The next time you have a weird dream that makes no sense, celebrate! The brain practices what we need to learn and/or remember while we sleep. Nonsensical dreams are your brain’s way of practicing stepping beyond the limits of rational thinking. Of course your rational, practical mind wants to call that kind of thinking “illogical” … More Weird Ways to Get Rid of Writer’s Block and Resistance
I’m not talking about the trance anyone can slip into when they get online, their eyes glaze over and they numb out. I’m talking about the intentional shift of consciousness writers make to enter the half-dreaming, hypnagogic state where the imaginary world becomes as real or more real than “consensual reality,” where images emerge without effort and … More Writer’s Trance Available Online
We can’t get into the waking dream of writing if we are constantly interrupting ourselves with trivia. Writers are particularly vulnerable to and negatively affected by our culture of distraction. … More Why You Need to Pay Attention to What You’re Paying Attention To
Bane of Your Resistance 