What's your process?
Martin (welcome back!) and I got into a little discussion today. He asked about my process for writing and how I get started. After answering him, I realised it is something I have never really given much thought to. This is despite the fact I have been writing in some capacity since I was 15 / 16.
When I was in my teens, my process was emotionally-driven. If I was upset about a boy, inspired by something I read in a magazine, amused by something a friend said, I would write in an effort to immortalise the moment, the emotion, the thought.
When I was in my early 20s, I would often write while on the toilet (TMI?). It was the fastest, most efficient way of getting work done and my phone was often abused for this purpose.
In my late 20s, long drives would prompt my creative juices. I would start out with a thought, usually based on a teaching given by Rinpoche, and run with it while driving. By the end of the drive, I would have a piece almost entirely fleshed out.
These days, most of my work is editing-based and whilst I still write, a lot of it is not necessarily known to you guys. Nevertheless, the way I start a new piece has metamorphosised. There are times when I am triggered to write because something has upset me (usually related to the Dorje Shugden ban, ha!). Most of the time however, I find a phrase that will get me hooked onto the piece, and I keep finding phrases thereafter to keep me going. It can be as benign as “every reason” to something more convoluted like “farcical play of manipulations“. More often than not, it is the former rather than the latter and, more often than not, they tend to be two-word phrases that play in my head over and over again until I put pen to paper.
Just like this blog post. While I am in the middle of another major piece of writing, the word “metamorphosised” has refused to leave my head and until I use it somewhere, it has become hard to return to the work I am actually supposed to be doing.
Sigh.
So what’s your process? Do you do anything special to get started? Let me know!
Share this:
3 Comments → “What’s your process?”
Leave a Reply
I got some of my best writing ideas and inspiration while driving and cooking. Hehehe….
I say use the emotions you feel and create characters and stories out of them!!! And as you are in dharma, make it a dharma motivation!!!!
That way, whatever you feel turns to dharma hehehe
Whenever there is something I don’t want to do but know that I have to do I usually get myself to be able to do the thing that it is I don’t want to do and after I am able to get it done I feel good that I was able to accomplish the thing I was suppose to do, but did not want to.