“You need to create a lot of garbage to get to the heart of it.”
This quote from Vicki Spandel’s 9 Rights of Every Writer expresses an idea that I have really grown to embrace in my own creative process. My freshman year of undergrad, after reading a chapter of Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird entitled Shitty First Drafts, I started to realize the benefit of just writing; Literally anything. And as someone who constantly struggled with writers block and this idea that I had to find the perfect way to articulate every single thought, the idea that I could just write whatever the hell popped into my head provided a sense of freedom to play if you will. This has created a space to explore and organize my own thoughts in a way where I may write three pages worth of nonsense, and find just one line worth keeping; and that’s okay because that one line may be a springboard for an entire piece.
I have also come to realize that I am slightly particular about my writing environment, and it varies depending on what I am writing. For example, if I am writing a research paper or something academic, I generally have headphones on blasting a 10-hour white noise playlist to drown out any distractions. However, if I am writing something more creative there’s a good chance I have music blaring in my office, the TV on in the living room, and left my Ipad on a shuffling playlist of NPR Tiny Desk concerts in the kitchen. If I’m writing something “professional” I need complete focus and zero stimuli. If I’m writing for fun or creative expression, I prefer a chaotic, overstimulating environment. As for my actual process when writing, I’d say it is just a constant juggling of generating ideas, translating them, and reviewing the relevance, value, and poignancy of each as described in McAndrew and Reigstad’s chapter The Writing and Tutoring Process from earlier this semester. This is why embracing the idea that it’s okay to “write badly” has been so helpful, understanding and appreciating it as an essential part of the process that is generating ideas. This is perhaps where I most differ from a “novice” writer.
When writing online or via other multimodal resources, I tend to feel more relaxed and lean into that creative environment. I find myself less focused on the “writing” aspect and more interested in how the project takes shape as a whole. For example, in high school we spent a few weeks making book trailers, and I spent the majority of my time composing the music and filming video as opposed to focusing on the script. While it’s still that same idea of balancing the generating, translating, and reviewing of ideas, the room for play and “Shitty First Drafts” is much greater, and I definitely enjoy that freedom.
Check Your Tone 
Hey Anthoni,
Your first quote got me right away. I agree that you kind of have to spit out whatever onto a page just to get your ideas down first. This is usually really hard for me though because I am such a perfectionist, so I want what I write to be perfect the first time I do. Plus, it does make the revising process a lot easier, but it also makes it very back and forth because I am always adding or taking away new ideas. I also agree that when writing online or via multimodal resources, I am more relaxed because you don’t have the pressures of school where you’re fixated on little things like grammar, syntax, etc. that you’re typically graded on. You can just write as you feel.
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Hello Anthoni,
I agree with your opening paragraph 100%; thinking too much about perfect articulation was a huge hinderance to my writing process for years too. I started to break this mindset initially by journaling (of sorts) about whatever I had to write; I’d write a paragraph about how much I hated whatever the assignment was, or sometimes more vindictively how much I hated the teacher. Now, I just allow myself to write my thoughts, sometimes they’re not even full sentences. Another thing I’ve noticed about my process is that if I’m writing, I cannot stop to look for textual evidence; instead, I write what the evidence I remember (sometimes vaguely) and approximately where it is in the text. Of late, I think the next step, which has been very helpful to me, is I write whenever I’m in the mood to write. If I’m at work on a machine, I’ll pull out a notebook and write, sometimes one sentence at a time because I have to keep up with work; but I’ve found that it is much easier to enter the writing mindset when I embrace it when it comes naturally.
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Hey Anthoni,
I may have to steal your Tiny Desk Concert idea for background noise when I’m getting work done, those are always so fresh and inspiring I can already see myself being really productive! Thanks for sharing your unique voice and perspectives, I really enjoy your style of writing because so much of your personality is evident in it. Plus, Nick Miller is pretty much all of us when we first sit down to accomplish much of anything, thanks for the chuckle.
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