![]() ![]() And when I get back to the keyboard, I find a vacuum tube full of work sent up from the girls in the basement. (Especially if I’m really enjoying the podcast or audiobook.) But if I write the sticky note and then think about the question as I walk away, my own story can be the interesting thing that engages my brain. I always turn back to radio before I shut my Jeep off, so podcasts and audiobooks don’t automatically start playing, but it’s hard to break the habit of hitting that media button on the dash. And it’s even more difficult if I’m running errands. (Writing it down makes it a more deliberate intention in my mind.)Īnd when I walk away, I leave my AirPods and my iPad on my desk (and put my phone straight into my pocket). As I’m preparing to leave my desk to go run errands and do some housework, I write a question on a sticky note. So here’s a tool that I’ve found to be very effective when I make myself use it. (So if I close this out with an awkward okay, bye that’s why.) As I stood up, I popped my AirPods in and listened to four minutes of a podcast. And thanks to today’s tech wonders, I don’t have to.Ĭonfession: My dog just had to go out and did I think about how I want to close out this post while waiting for him to do his business? No. It’s tempting to point fingers at a lot of different things, and to try to defend my ability to multitask (it’s a lie I tell myself regularly) but the hard truth is that I never allow my brain to be bored. Sometimes (often) audiobooks or podcasts are the way I get through household chores I don’t want to do (which is all of them).īut I do remember, back in those early days, when I’d have to run errands or do housework and my brain would get so full of story, it would just flow out when I finally got back to my keyboard. ![]() It’s hard to resist the instant satisfaction of Netflix, Hulu (and my embarrassingly long list of other streaming apps), podcasts or audiobooks. Honestly, I probably fail more often than I succeed, but at least I’m trying. It’s a struggle every single day to let my brain be bored. While I worked through that class and talked to the coach, it became obvious to me that the 2017 lightbulb moment had fizzled out because I still wasn’t embracing boredom as a necessary (for me) writing tool. (A lot of writers have high Intellection, I guess, which isn’t surprising.) I need to give those girls in the basement time to mull things over before they put their work in the vacuum tube and send it up to my conscious mind. (You might be thinking that me mentioning Becca Syme should be a drinking game, but I definitely don’t recommend that.) And there in my Top 5 Strengths, sitting at number 4, is Intellection. Now we’re in 2019, when I took the Write Better-Faster class from the Better-Faster Academy. (Sidenote: I’m loving Roni’s new Substack, The Nourished Writer. So when I sit down at the computer and open my manuscript, I shouldn’t be surprised when the subconscious/muse/girls in the basement just sit back and say “What? Ain’t got nothin’ for ya today, dollface.” (Apparently my subconscious mind is a Prohibition-era gin joint. Other than a quick shower, there are literally no minutes in the day when my brain is not actively engaged and processing incoming content. In my house, washing the dishes takes the same amount of time as a show with no commercials. My iPad travels around the house with me, streaming TV episodes I want to catch up on or favorite movies to keep me company. Now? There are no radio commercials and songs I don’t like because I have a constantly curated playlist of current favorites on my phone. When I sat down at the computer to write, my subconscious had been hard at work and I had story to put on the page. While doing the dishes, I’d plot out the big action scene. While driving, I’d tune out the commercials and songs I don’t like on the radio and figure out the heroine’s backstory. The hours away from the computer, doing housework or commuting or whatever, were when I sorted out my story in those days. We always joke that the best ideas come to us while we’re showering or driving or cleaning the dryer vent (I’ll have to take people’s word on that last one), but it’s actually true. Our subconscious mind works out answers to things when we’re bored or doing something relaxing. Toward the end of 2016, I was reading Roni Loren’s review of the book Deep Work by Cal Newport and one line really stuck with me. (I would link to the post, but sometime this year, I’m going to have a shiny new website and the old blog won’t be part of it.) The first part of today’s scribblings comes from the blog on my website, written in January of 2017.
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