Category Archives: peak creative time

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The REAL Reason for highway rest stops

Driving home from NC in April,
I was desperate to find a rest area,
not for the usual reason,
but to jot down the many ideas
that had popped into my head as I drove north.

Nothing like a long drive
to get my mind wandering.

The first thing I wrote:
“I now know the REAL reason
they have rest areas…
so writers have a place to pull over
and offload their thoughts.”
(I just found that paper yesterday.)

“Driving kicks over my writing engine…lets me write full throttle…,” writes Julia Cameron, and she includes a quote from Steven Spielberg: “Why is it that I get my best ideas while driving?“

Cameron credits the act of getting out, being able to see off in the distance and the flow of images coming at us as the pot-stirrers of our thoughts. The pressing matters that usually consume us are temporarily pushed off to the side. What did writers do before cars were invented?

In defense of all this seeming craziness, The New York Times ran a story just this past week on the Virtues of a Wandering Mind. :-)

Q: Are painters, cooks, business managers, singers, teachers, knitters and others similarly affected? I might think about this on my next drive.

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Source:
Julia Cameron, The Right to Write: An Invitation and Initiation into the Writing Life (New York, NY: Penguin Putnam, 1998), 195.

This post is part of an ongoing discussion at The High Calling Blogs book club.

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A Writer’s Daily Roller Coaster, or is it Just Me?

Picture 31

I’m writing a book and I’ve noticed a trend: At the beginning of the day I LOVE it and at the end of the day I HATE it.

Do other writers experience this?

At 6 A.M., I’m  quite enthusiastic. At 10 A.M. I think it’s the best writing I’ve ever done. In the early afternoon, the good feeling I have about reaching the day’s goal is overshadowed by thoughts of how much remains to be written. After that, it’s all downhill.

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While preparing dinner, I’m slicing, dicing, stirring and wondering what made me think the book needed to be written in the first place … AND I’m muttering, despairing missed opportunities to do something else with my life. (I would’ve made a very good NANNY or ASTRONAUT!)

The sun sets and when it rises again (or before), the whole ride starts again.

It’s a NUTSY life, this writer thing. I TOLD people I wasn’t cut out for it. I’m not unstable enough.

Let the record show that just yesterday my own mother said, ”You’ve always been a very even-keeled person.” (I think I need to put that in my book.)

My next step? Well, I’m NOT going to stop working on the book. We just had that discussion over dinner, the same discussion we’ve had over dinner almost every night since this started.

I just heard someone on the radio talking about Eunice Kennedy Shriver being a force behind the Special Olympics. The man said: “She simply would not give up until she achieved her goal. She believed in following through, all the way to the end.” Yes! Thank you, Eunice Shriver. I will follow all the way through to the end.

BUT I am seriously considering ending my writing day earlier, before I fall off the cliff. :-) I’m going to stop earlier and go do something else.

Can someone please tell me, though. Is this a normal writer thing or is it just me?

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Peak Creative Time


picture-8My mezzo-soprano friend, an influence on my seat-of-the-pants training in the ‘artist’s world,’ scolded me once for my tendency to schedule all my appointments and run errands early in the day.

“But I’m a morning person!” I answered.

“Yes!” she said. “And THAT’s the time you should be writing!”

She was right, I knew. I could write more – and better – in 3 hours in the morning than I could the other 21 hours of the day combined.

As it was, I would get my errands run, but never get around to writing. I was too tired. OR, having gone out for an appointment, I would wind my way over to the grocery store or run into a friend for coffee. Once out, I’d fritter away the better part of a day.

Failure to take responsibility for setting boundaries around one’s creative time is a major reason artists ‘talk’ about what they envision rather than actually doing the work. 

Granted, when my children were young, tasks had to be taken care of around their schedules with an eye to my energy level, etc., but THAT is a season (as much as it may not seem that way at the time) AND when you are raising children, THEY are the primary art to be engaged in. The nurturing and shaping of children IS an art…..but I digress.

Now I’m older and freer. Despite this, it is still hard for me to refrain from saying, “Give me the earliest appointment!” I keep working on it. Not every day, but on writing days, I try hard not to plan something else for the morning.

This is on my mind today because today is a writing day and despite my best efforts to schedule at another time, I have someone coming on a business matter in a few minutes. I feel a little like a person packed for a trip, sitting in the car with the engine running, but going nowhere. I’m eager to get to work, but need to wait.

Okay, the unavoidable does occasionally happen.

Do you know your peak creative time? Do you respect it? Is it an ongoing challenge?