“A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper.” - E.B. White
One of the beauties of this 100 Day Challenge is that I’ve learned I CAN write at night. I CAN write when I’m tired. I CAN write under time pressure. I CAN write when I’m hungry or full. In the afternoon. Between work projects. In the car while waiting to pick up my son. When I’m not sure what I’m going to write.
It may not all be stellar writing, but ideas appear on paper. The work has started. And anytime you start the work, there’s going to be a gem in the muck somewhere. That’s just the odds.
This challenge has shown me I have greater flexibility around my writing conditions than I previously thought.
Like a pro baseball player that wears the same pair of stinky socks for a month if on a winning streak, writers can form superstitions. The stories we tell ourselves. Usually because we’ve heard them from other writers. Like the best time to write is in the morning before your inner critic is awake. Other writers swear by writing after midnight. I’m a morning person. But I’ve learned: why limit myself to this?
Some writers work in a certain place in their house. With fresh flowers. With a mandatory cup of coffee. Or if you’re William Faulkner, with whiskey. "You see, I usually write at night. I always keep my whiskey within reach," he once said to a reporter.
Some writers swear by creating first drafts by hand, pen to paper. Some writers always listen to music while writing. Or never. Haruki Murakami says, “When I’m in writing mode for a novel, I get up at four a.m. and work for five to six hours. In the afternoon, I run for ten kilometers or swim for fifteen hundred meters (or do both), then I read a bit and listen to some music. I go to bed at nine p.m.” That is a guy who loves his routine! And has the context and ability to stick to it. Admirable. But not my cup of tea!
One of Henry Miller’s writing “commandments” was to “Work on one thing at a time until finished.” Yeah, well, Miller probably didn’t have to juggle parenting, earning through client writing, keeping up with elderly parents, trying to maintain some intimacy with your spouse, and deciding which project to work on with writing a dream deferred. (That’s me!)
I do love many of his commandments though, like “Don’t be nervous. Work calmly, joyously, recklessly on whatever is in hand.” It’s true that my best work comes when I can find a place of love rather than anxiety. But like he also said, “When you can’t create you can work.”
Khaled Hosseini counters Miller by saying, “You have to write whether you feel like it or not.” And I have to do this (at 10:30 at night after a long day) to keep my 100-Day streak.
In all this lies the issue. We are all looking for sound suggestions on the pathway to publishing. And there are a ton of them out there, authors writing about writing or just sharing their habits in interviews. BECAUSE WE ASK THEM! We want to know.
Ultimately, we try some of them—I’d avoid the whiskey—and it can be hard to stay aware so we can keep what works, discard what doesn’t and find our own methods of churning out stories.
I think we just have to remember, I have to remember, that I can always change the story. The one I’m writing and the one I tell myself. For example, I’m not just a morning writer. I’m an anytime writer.
Photo by Thom Milkovic on Unsplash