Your Methods: How, Where, When

I'm supremely curious about how people perform the act of writing. What is your process? How do you overlay your muse to your chassis?

*Your writing prompts. The ways you get ideas. The ways you generate your energy into words. Post-its? Mobile phone? Five- Star Notebook?

*Where do you draft? Where do you finalize?  Can you do it around people at the park or must you sit in concentric circles with candles?

*When? During lunch-breaks, the witching hour?

There you go being deep again...facilitating critical thought...I usually pick a key word and build around it..Ideas usually come from..working on a piece about that right now actually..autopilot..words just pop up in the brain..intuitive process..cell phone and a journal for brevity's sake when that rush introduces...its everything..I draft in between everything else going on..concentric circles with candles..stillness is a prompt itself for mind bending acts, truly....lunch breaks and witching hour...you should include your personal process too....keeps the dialogue open..

I find I have to cast a circle of salt and then I have to perform a full blood ritual on a hamster to Baphomet. I then fill my ink pen with the blood of a virgin (which is as rare as rocking horse shit in England) and let it rest for 3-5 minutes before chanting in honour of the webmiss and offering the pen a piece of cheese bread in exchange for my soul... or as it’s more commonly known “the DU paid membership subscription”.

... If I don’t have time for that... we’ll then I write on my phone. On the back of receipts. In my journal. Anywhere really. I’ve been known to get ideas and scribble them on my leg until I can find somewhere to write it down.

I absoloutly adore writing in public. People are such a great observational muse. Any time of the day really.

hello there I usually get up in the early morning hours, log in here and read... that sometimes sparks inspiration if it doesn't I listen to some music and just write and see where my muse takes me...other times I can be lying in bed or riding in a car and an idea will come to me that won't let go until I write it...mostly I just let go and let my muse lead... she takes me to some interesting places...

A few discombobulated thoughts:

For a year I wrote daily, 1-6 poems a pop. When it flows, it flows. I probably could've crashed a few times trying to get some writing done while driving. The meditative state induced by piloting a car is really dangerous.

During this time, I had this favorite place to go to: a strange park consisting only of two picnic-tables and an over-look. It showcased the conservation of a marshland/large estuary next to a bustling industrious port. Gorgeous place. I was often alone, with the occasional binocular-wielding enthusiast,  observing the tide daily.

I also like writing very late, outside, in the garage, bundled in layers, pacing, at 3:30 A.M. when the world near me is dreaming and can send me messages along the power-lines of the dark. Madness?

I have notebooks that I take to bed with me and in the midst of a sleep-state I like to write the words that pass through my subconscious mind. And then pull it apart the next morning.

When I'm pushing to be creative, I go through my day re-naming things in my proximity until it becomes autopilot like Nari mentioned.

For a while I turned off the faucet. You can stop listening to yourself, and it's a lonely thing to be and that reminds me of the song "The Origin of Love"

"
.....
Last time I saw you
We had just split in two.
You were looking at me.
I was looking at you.
You had a way so familiar,
But I could not recognize,
Cause you had blood on your face;
I had blood in my eyes.
But I could swear by your expression
That the pain down in your soul
Was the same as the one down in mine.
That's the pain,
Cuts a straight line
Down through the heart;
We called it love.
....."

- Hedwig And The Angry Inch

Miss_Sub said:I find I have to cast a circle of salt and then I have to perform a full blood ritual on a hamster to Baphomet. I then fill my ink pen with the blood of a virgin (which is as rare as rocking horse shit in England) and let it rest for 3-5 minutes before chanting in honour of the webmiss and offering the pen a piece of cheese bread in exchange for my soul... or as it’s more commonly known “the DU paid membership subscription”.

... If I don’t have time for that... we’ll then I write on my phone. On the back of receipts. In my journal. Anywhere really. I’ve been known to get ideas and scribble them on my leg until I can find somewhere to write it down.

I absoloutly adore writing in public. People are such a great observational muse. Any time of the day really.


hahaha deep deep deep underground you are.

i was wondering if anyone wrote on their skin to preserve a thought, lo and behold!

crimsin said:hello there I usually get up in the early morning hours, log in here and read... that sometimes sparks inspiration if it doesn't I listen to some music and just write and see where my muse takes me...other times I can be lying in bed or riding in a car and an idea will come to me that won't let go until I write it...mostly I just let go and let my muse lead... she takes me to some interesting places...

i've read some of your stuff and she's doing a good job being your tour guide.

Mostly I write on my phone. Capturing whatever thought is determined to be heard at that moment before it escapes. Slippery little buggers, they can be! But once in a while it has to be old fashioned paper and pen, laying sprawled on the bed. Depends on what my muse is in the mood for...she calls the shots. I just dance to her tune...I do sometimes wish she would just let me sleep though...

I like to write in the shower.  I bought some pens where i could write on the shower walls and not leave any permanent marks.
I write anywhere and everywhere when a thought, Feel, stanza, or song pops into my mind.
I've written on toilet paper (I know, I know -- tmi) and Pub napkins and my arm.
Point is, I write nearly everyday.  It's not a poem yet but just a lot of thoughts on paper.

When I get home (unless still taking that super hot shower) I will have piles where I will put the scraps
for later review and later put together.

I will use cursive in a spiral book then transfer to the MS word and rewrite a couple of times
and many times, rewrite again when it gets in here.

FromTheAsh said:Capturing whatever thought is determined to be heard at that moment before it escapes. Slippery little buggers, they can be!

...I do sometimes wish she would just let me sleep though...

yes, they fleet so quickly don't they? and totally true about the sleep deal, synapses firing too much.

Tallen said:I like to write in the shower.  I bought some pens where i could write on the shower walls and not leave any permanent marks.


Showering is another place of fleeting thoughts, like when stuck driving a car. What a great solution. What kind of pens???

bump goes the night.

I sometimes feel like my process goes through some sort of flux..change in attitude..some days the muse pulls harder for cohesion, completion in a manner that agrees with us/ our body politic and other days it won't let up. Creativity probably has about 3 maybe 4 days worth of material backed up; in the pipeline (that's a record). Quite frankly its frightening; making me think we're writing our last will and testimony. Don't die before you can get enough of them out right!? Cycle of life..take it as it comes.

Nari said:I sometimes feel like my process goes through some sort of flux..change in attitude..some days the muse pulls harder for cohesion, completion in a manner that agrees with us/ our body politic and other days it won't let up. Creativity probably has about 3 maybe 4 days worth of material backed up; in the pipeline (that's a record). Quite frankly its frightening; making me think we're writing our last will and testimony. Don't die before you can get enough of them out right!? Cycle of life..take it as it comes.

i had a really long response and i changed it, now it won't let me delete!

well. it was some long tirade about robert jordan who wrote 4 million words. and how we should not worry. but forget about those weird outliers as our poster motivations. dumb. be afraid of what you're afraid of. i am the same.

Interesting sci fi and fantasy is pretty much a whole nother word for me. The plotting of word usage by gender on your link is unique. My background has mostly been international affairs but after grad school we had no reason to be interested in those topics..and at the same time...I read less because I would rather be a "cultural engineer" creating my own culture moreso than absorbing someone else's in long streaming fits or bouts of popular all the rage. My last truly provocative read that fussy can remember is here....the book pretty much outlines how worlds that are normally thought of as being separate entities can end up meeting underneath extenuating or compelling situations/circumstances...my life story..ironically.
https://www.publishersweekly.com/0-374-19969-8