Automatic

Managed another 2000 words today, it's been a good week so far. I might even pass the half way mark on Friday, which would be a great start to the long weekend.

Now that I'm writing regularly, I'm realising that there isn't necessarily a method to it. Before I began I read one or two creative writing books, thinking that I might learn about some magic process that would help me follow through on my ideas.

The information I gathered was useful to a degree. Having an idea about your characters' motivations and personalities does help, as does having a point to prove.

But once I start writing though, most of my preparation flies out the window. Yeats would talk of automatic writing, where he would place his pen on paper and it would seemingly move by itself. Another analogy is the state of mind people enter while exercising; the body takes over, the mind wanders and time jumps forward.

Every day I start by typing a few self-conscious words, feeling around to get my bearings. On a good day I uncover a seam and it pulls me into the scene, the characters are talking and moving around the stage I've built and I'm just observing now, my hands a blur on the keyboard, ears and eyes straining to catch everything, and when something snaps me out of it I've written pages without even realising it.

This isn't something I learned, or a particular talent I was bestowed; it just evolved from writing everyday.