How I Start My Daily Writing Practice
(Or: Why blocking out writing time is NOT the answer to your procrastination!)
This week in my Coaching Circle for Visionary Writers, we looked at the Ritual Writing Warm Up. Today I’d like to take a deeper dive with you into that practice, why I developed it, and how it works.
When I was writing my PhD thesis, I would give myself weeks at a time to get a chapter written. I’d know the submission deadline was approaching. So I’d solidly block out whole days for writing, making no other plans until the chapter was complete and submitted. During these times, I stopped:
· Going to yoga
· Walking on the beach
· Meeting friends for lunch
· Phone calls with family
· Cinema, shopping, housework…
I cleared EVERYTHING from my calendar, so that I could purely and simply focus on my writing.
And. I didn’t write.
I would sit at my small fly-leaf table in the only room I could afford to heat, surrounded by piles of books that I was using for research. Get bored and restless. Take my laptop to the café. Order cake and coffee. Sit downstairs in the wooden nook on a soft, brown leather sofa. Eat the cake and drink the coffee. Not writing. Think – a lot – about what I wanted to say.
Worry – a lot – that what I wanted to say wasn’t good enough.
Start paragraphs. Start sentences. Start new documents.
Quit.
Start again.
And on and on and on…
I would continue to do this throughout all of the ‘writing time’ I had blocked out.
Until. The deadline was too close for comfort and I would realise that I JUST HAVE TO WRITE SOMETHING. Anything, at this stage. Just write anything, so that I have something to hand in.
Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash
Then, after many days of procrastination, I would – finally – begin writing.
In these situations, I would start writing the first paragraph and just make myself keep going without stopping.
Eventually, I would start relaxing into the practice. The words would start to flow. I would realise that what I was writing was ok, it was good enough for me to keep going. It was good enough for me to just keep writing, and see what I wanted to write.
I would usually keep going in this way until the first draft of the chapter was more or less complete. This might take about 3 days for a 5-to-10-thousand word chapter, back then.
Then, once the first draft was complete, I would allow myself to take a break, and come back and read it through.
Maybe the first paragraph was a little rusty, from where I was just getting started. So I might cut that, or work with it if it was essential and could be improved.
Often, the rest was actually pretty good – at least good enough – and I could tweak it and redraft it as I was re-reading it.
Always, I would leave the finer details until last – the referencing and citations, synonyms where I stuck on a word choice. I would highlight them on screen as I was writing, and if I couldn’t find the information I needed or an alternative better word within about 30 seconds, I would leave it highlighted and move on.
That way, my brain and nervous system would be satisfied that I wasn’t going to accidentally miss it in the re-draft and hand in a paper full of errors. But it also meant that I didn’t allow myself to disrupt my flow by searching for something that was not easily to hand, and that could just end up becoming a distraction.
Actually, I would probably only replace my original word choice about 50% of the time during the redraft. If I still couldn’t find a better word the second time around, I would un-highlight it and move on.
There’s not much room for perfectionism when you’re writing to a deadline. And that helps to get the writing done.
I put myself under a lot of pressure to get it right, and get it perfect. But the only way to get the words down was to let go of that and just write.
That’s why I developed the Ritual Writing Warm Up to help me – and other visionary writers like you – to get out of the loop of over-thinking and make three simple transitions to get your writing onto the page.
I use this every time I sit down to write, especially if I have already blocked off the writing time.
Here’s where you can find the Ritual Writing Warm Up to try it for yourself: The Ritual Writing Warm Up
Or read on for a deeper-dive into the practice…
Step 1) Pre-Writing Practice:
In the Pre-Writing Practice, I allow my hand to move the pen across the page, wherever it wants to go. I let go of direction, intention and outcome. I attune to my breath, my belly, and my body. The physical sensations of moving the pen on the page. Deepening into relaxation as my brain hemispheres come into greater balance and my nervous system regulates to parasympathetic functioning.
This helps me to become more receptive and aware of my intuition and inner wisdom.
It helps me to quieten the inner critic that would tell me I’m not good enough.
It helps to create a soft transition from my not-writing, busy, active, hyper-alert state of being into a more relaxed and receptive writing-state of being.
So often, this critical transition point is overlooked and neglected. When we expect ourselves to just sit down in the whirlwind of everything we have just been doing, and write. Not only that, but we apply the pressure of our hyper-developed inner critic to create the idea that what we write now has to be finished, and perfect, and ready for review and stand up to scrutiny.
Ouch.
How we learnt to write in school – with the pressures of performance, with every line determining our future (a sentence), when we knew that we would be judged for every misplaced comma – may contribute to a lot of the trauma that our adult selves still feel about writing, every time we sit down to write.
The first phase of the Ritual Writing Warm Up helps to calm the nervous system, quiet the mind, and give yourself full permission to just be present on the page with no agenda or attachment to an outcome.
I recommend spending 1-3 minutes on the Pre-Writing Practice, to help you create that soft transition into a more relaxed and spacious writing-state of being.
Step 2) Free-Writing Practice:
Taking a deeper breath and letting it go, it’s time to transition into the Free-Writing Practice.
You are probably already familiar with the concept of Free-Writing. Giving yourself full permission to write whatever is on your mind, whatever is in your body, whatever is present and alive for you in the moment, and putting it down on the page.
In the Free-Writing Practice, you write without stopping, editing, criticising, or judging. I encourage you to continue in the same relaxed state of being that you have cultivated in the Pre-Writing Practice. Keep the pen moving on the page, and let the words come up and out – whatever they are. No judgement or agenda. No self-criticism or self-doubt.
These are just words. They don’t have to make sense. They don’t even have to be legible!
Can you let them move through you as you become the compassionate witness to yourself in this moment?
Acknowledging what is arising, and letting it go as it passes onto the page. Be present with whatever emotions are stirring within you – without judgement or criticism. Just noticing. Acknowledging. Letting go.
The page is our Crucible for alchemical transformation.
When we allow the words to move down and out of our bodies, through our hands, onto the page, we may also notice that we are moving those energies, those feelings, those beliefs, out of our bodies and our energy fields.
It may take several sessions before those energies move on and release completely, but we can keep being present with them while they are there. Just witnessing, noticing, as the words move through us onto the page.
The page will transform those words for you. The page will transmute what needs to be set free.
As the words move out of your body, your story, your energy field, you will begin to notice a difference in yourself.
A deeper confidence in trusting yourself, your emotions, your inner wisdom, and what you have to say.
A stronger courage to align yourself more fully with your truth.
A clearer recognition of your own truth.
Making time for the Free-Writing Practice whenever you sit down to write can also help you to be present with any emotional material that you might have been ignoring and that is blocking you from writing. This used to happen to me often. I would repress and suppress what I was feeling and experiencing, so that I could put all of my focus and attention on what I needed to write. But by blocking myself from expressing my feelings, I was blocking myself from expressing anything at all.
I recommend 3-5 minutes for the Free-Writing Practice, to help you to find the words that are true for you now, in this moment, as you align yourself more deeply with who you are and what you truly want to express.
Step 3) Focused-Writing Practice:
The final stage of the Ritual Writing Warm Up is the Focused-Writing Practice.
In this stage, we complete the soft transition into our purposeful and productive writing time. We start to shift our attention to the thing we actually wanted to sit down to write!
Beginning with a key theme or bullet point from your Visionary Book Outline, use that ONE IDEA as your focus for this writing practice. Choose what that will be ahead of time, or allow the focus to arise for you spontaneously as you make the transition.
With your key theme in mind, write that at the top of a new page, and – again – allow yourself full permission to write. Staying in the same relaxed state of being that you have been cultivating throughout the Ritual Writing Warm Up. This is a timed writing practice, so remind yourself that you have 5-7 minutes to write about your key topic or theme now, and full permission to write whatever is present and alive.
Enter into your Focused-Writing Practice without judgement, criticism, fear or doubt. Allow the words to flow as you have been doing. Let the ideas arise and the words land on the page.
When your time is up, you can continue writing purposefully for the remainder of your writing time – however long you have blocked off – or you can take a few deep breaths, some gentle stretches, and create a soft transition out of your writing practice again.
It’s important to acknowledge that you move into a different state of being while you are writing. So giving yourself time to gently make the transition in and out can really help to support your nervous system and enable you to cultivate the space you need to write – wherever you are and whenever you need it.
If you are writing for long stretches – perhaps you’ve blocked off several hours or the whole day – come back to the Ritual Writing Warm Up any time you feel that you need to kickstart your creativity again.
Here’s where you can access the Ritual Writing Warm Up to try it for yourself: The Ritual Writing Warm Up
Let me know how it goes!
Keep Writing,
Sally-Shakti
