One of the things I love about having a daily writing practice is the way it feels like I’m sitting down to have a little chat with myself. I look forward to it—yes, I look forward to writing, which used to be true but has not always been true. It’s challenging to sit with our own minds. Try meditating—something else I used to dread even considering which now I do daily and enjoy. Writing has an element of meditation. You are sitting with your own mind in the present. Why not make a cup of tea and have a chat? (Not in your meditation practice, but in your writing practice.) Beginning in this loose, easy way, I discover what matters to me most. Great ideas and deep feelings bubble to the surface alongside grocery lists and errands around which a sense of pressure is building. It’s all there. It’s not pretty. I am afraid it’s a little like my bookshelf, on which are some of the great volumes of the world, from Mad About Madeline (yes, tons of kids’ books) to The Metamorphosis. But there is also an old phone that we aren’t using any more, a bottle of Elmer’s glue, a nightlight. There is a glass jar full of water and glitter–a meditation device drawn from a great book called Moody Cow. Point is, the brilliant and the mundane exist side by side on my bookshelf an in our minds. Your bookshelf may be better organized than mine, but I’m willing to bet your mind veers from the frumpy to the fantastical with ease and some frequency. No?

“Chat” has such a relaxed energy, a back-and-forth simplicity, lightness. And yet it is also a lovely thing, to have a chat, isn’t it? Put chatting with yourself into your daily writing practice. Start there. Loosened up, you will be able to turn to creating scene, to understanding character, to playing with language.

Angie and I have a somewhat daily practice of exchanging time. We set a timer for three minutes. One of us talks and the other listens without speaking at all. No murmurs or interjections. When the time goes off (today we used a harp sound for magical effect), the listener reflects back what she has heard. The speaker can make corrections or clarifications or help if the listener gets stuck. Then the listener says, “Do you feel heard?” and so long as the speaker assents, we change roles.

This is another great writing practice. Ask yourself questions. Ask your character questions. Ask God or the Universe or your cranky editor or your gorgeous muse questions. And then answer them on the page–or rather let your character, God, the Universe, your cranky editor or your gorgeous muse answer them. This sounds absurd but produces incredible results. Like meditation, exercise, massage and writing classes, these kinds of activities are ones we often know are effective–they work for us!–and powerful, but somehow we neglect to do them.

How can you put reflective listening or a cozy chat into your writing practice? What might it open up?

Still not convinced?

One Night Stands v. Habits

Here’s why routine writing daily is more thrilling than writing as a one-night-stand, and the awkward, explosive passion possible only between strangers:

We treat writing like a one-night stand: we only want to do it when we’re “in the mood,” when it feels exciting before we begin. We ask it to lure us from the corner of the bar, draw us out, entice us. We throw ourselves into it on the occasions when writing seduces us. We forget ourselves, go long hours without realizing the time is slipping by, emerge fuzzy mouthed and thick headed, exhausted, spent.

But then we care when writing doesn’t call us the next day, doesn’t seem to remember we were ever involved. We want writing to be committed to us, to think we always look great and are worth getting excited about on our worst hair day. We go back to the bar, or on to a different bar, and stand in the corner, waiting to be lured. When nothing happens, we shrug and give up on writing.

The truth is, the most passion isn’t found in the occasional, random one-night stand. Your thing with writing? It’s is a relationship, folks. It can be boring. It can seem like a chore. Sometimes you have to work for the spark, sure. But you know that when you get going, you reconnect with the deepest, truest, loveliest fun–with something you LOVE.

Just like love, writing isn’t a feeling–it’s an action.

What you need is a date night, a weekend away, a place to rekindle the romance you once had with writing. Plain and simple: go deeper, stay with it, fire up the flames again. Yes, still talking about writing.

Registration for BWW’s Spring Quarter will open April 1–that’s next week. BWW classes do sell out, but if this is where you’re meant to be, you’ll find a place. You just have to be ready. So you’ll be hearing from me an extra time or two this week with the information you need to have to be ready to grab your place, to say yes to your writing.

Meanwhile, make contact with your writing. Don’t wait for some drunken urge. Invite writing around for a cuppa tea. Hang out and chat. You’ll be surprised how funny and deep writing is on an ordinary morning when you start off simply and let things flow.