44 Comments

Ros, so cool! I have noticed a lot of those things in myself when I write and draw but did not have a framework for naming and managing them, just a sort of intuitive feeling. Thank you for sharing - I now have some tools to understand what I am doing better which I am sure will save time as I just allow myself to be in one mode or another!

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Wonderful! In my experience this is how it works across all creative/artistic mediums and indeed even physical practices like sports. There is a letting go required for the flow, and then craft and precision in the editing/selecting phase. I'm really happy if it's given you some tools to save you time :-)

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I'm saving this post to refer to in the future. So many amazing words of wisdom for us to keep in mind. Thank you

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Thank you for saying so, Tania. This post distills getting on for 30 years of experience of teaching dozens of creative writing workshops every year. The analogies are those that arose spontaneous at different points when I was explaining the process to groups (usually after their first direct experience of freewriting - get them doing it first!) and that I found useful, therefore repeated again and again. When you get plugged into the direct source of wisdom, you know about it! I pretty much see my job as a 'channel' these days, delivering what comes through me to the wider world :-). Freewriting keeps the channel clear.

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Always love your perspective Ros! Feel like I've been to these places, and would add the need to allow oneself to sit in stillness as well. Staring out the window and waiting for words to arrive is definitely part of my process!

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Thank you, Shoni. Oh yes, that is a *really* good one. I've been a very busy 'doer' all my life, and at the time I first wrote this piece, I had no way of experiencing stillness, so had to settle for the relaxed, receptive 'slack miind' state of washing up, or showering, or being a passenger looking out of train/car window. But graduatlly, finally, I have trained myself to meditate and yes, that is another good way to let your mind open and the words fall into the space. The only caveat I would say for the less experienced who might read this is not to start 'actively' waiting (which is more like *trying* to receive, because the 'asking' energy and the 'receiving' energy are opposites. But I love that you've added this, thank you.

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Right on, Ros! You can't ask for it; it just comes. This also applies to prayer. The Infinite Intelligence knows our needs; our job is to be receptive.

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Exactly.

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Glad it resonates for you. All your points definitely spoke to me. I love when you get to a critical point in a story and a detail you weren't aware of becomes clear all of a sudden. Or you wake up in the morning when you've been pondering how it's going to go and it all just slides into place. 💡

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This is such a good, clear, inspiring “How to Write” piece that I read it once a week and see something new in it every time

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Thanks, Miranda! Three decades of learning and teaching is distilled here, so I’m glad it’s helpful. I hope the individual ‘Finding Your Voice’ posts that bounce of this are proving useful too.

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I can't recommend freewriting enough

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It has been the making of me, and a lot of my students too. Thank you for the restack :-).

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Brilliant post. I love the compost heap metaphor. We have several compost bins out in the yard. And I really don’t like taking the lid of them. Ewww - slugs, worms, weird little sprouting things. Creeps me out. But it’s where the life is. Where things are changing.

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Some really good advice in this. This is a great guide to creativity! Thank you for writing this, I'm sure I'm going to come back to this from time to time.

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I needed this. I didn't know I needed this but I did. My first book was straight up flow but I didn't know such a thing existed, I simply wrote. I put more thought in my second book, not too much but a little planning. My third book I mapped completely and found myself staring at the page with no idea how to finish the chapter. Thank you for putting voice to what I am doing wrong.

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That’s great, I’m so pleased this helped make sense of things. Yes, I once tried planning a novel out from the beginning and the results were painful. So much better, an easier, to get into a flow state and let it grow organically.

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This is excellent,. I'll share it with the creative writing group I facilitate on Friday. I'll also share it around here, once I've worked out better how Substack works (I'm new here!)

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Brilliant, Juliet, I hope it proves useful to your workshoppers. I developed it from preambles around freewriting in hundreds of workshops and have found the analogies in particular really help people be less afraid to write freely, ignoring whether or not it is ‘good’ until later.

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Once again, you have added another insight into the creative process-no matter the process. We are blessed that you share this with us.

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Thank you, Ken. Honestly, it struck me recently that I’m getting on and if I don’t start sharing everything I know as freely as possible, then all that wisdom is just lost. And what’s the point of that? I’ve recognised I’m here to serve my fellow humans and I hope to be as useful as possible before I shuffle off.

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The timing of this is uncanny! It took me over a week to write post 4 of a series. I did what you said! Wow. Excited to publish in 20 minutes.

Thank you for the tips, encouragement, and confirmation!

🥳🎶🥳

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Brilliant, Stella! Yep, it used to take me ages to write things (longer and longer!) until I put this into practice. I’m so pleased you’ve experienced instant results.

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Oh clarity, I did what you said and found your post afterwards. Your article felt like a wink from God, letting me know it's normal, just press on. Thank you so much for this article. It's a saved one for me now.

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Ah, perfect! Yes, I love those God winks :-)

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This is why I take forever to write anything for myself - I'm not parking my critic head while being creative. Not that I'm trying to write a novel or anything, but I agonise over my blog's book reviews, self-editing the whole way through, they take hours and hours sometimes. This is such a helpful article and I love your analogies. Thank you.

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Ah, yes, creating while editing is the equivalent of driving with the handbrake on! I’m very happy to help.

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Thank you so much for this....really helpful and spoke to me. 🙂

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Thank you, Ruth. I’m very glad you found it helpful.

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I have done a bit of writing and wanting to do more. What you shared really made total sense to me as I seem to have two modes. The wild flow, which gets quite poetic and just comes out, and the rather wooden trying to write mode, which is rather boring. 😁

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This is tremendous! Thank you!

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I’m very pleased you like it; thank you for saying so 😊.

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Helpful for certain; I definitely fall into that edit while I write category, and from now on, flow I shall!

Ah, the challenges of the mind.

I appreciate you.

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Thank you, Janice!

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Thanks for this brief, yet comprehensive explanation. The first three analogies will stick in my brain. I will carry the last one, about jumping out of a plane, in my heart.

Recently, while combing through my files and notebooks, I found full-length rough drafts and pieces of stories from thirty-five years ago that I honestly do not remember writing. Of course, I am a different person than I was then, but you'd think I'd recall something about the inspiration for the story. Nada. As you point out, it didn't come from within me, but through me. What a glorious feeling to know that I am not responsible for creating, but only for opening a way for Infinite Consciousness manifest itself through me.

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Yes, completely this - how freeing it is to know we don’t have to ‘effort’ the words out of us, and can just hand over the responsibility. I wrote about this also, here, where I finally recognised the power of my subsidiary role: https://rosbarbernews.substack.com/p/resurrecting-my-invisible-friend?utm_medium=email&utm_content=post

I have a similar experience sometimes when editing my novels. The very best bits are those bits I can’t remember writing and don’t even know how they were possible to write.

It’s lovely to meet a fellow consciousness channeller, thank you for engaging.

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