How Authors Do Their Best Work
Few things feel as good as looking up from writing and noticing the last 5 minutes of your writing has actually taken three hours. You have written five times as much as you expected, your mind is buzzing with ideas, and you simply can’t stop key-stroking your wondering and wanderings. Call it “flow state” or “the zone” or “hyperfocus,” this act of being consumed with work you are passionate about is partially what makes being a writer enjoyable. You get lost in your thoughts and new worlds which are far beyond ours.
Life is made of moments when we are in flow state, but rarely do we try to give ourselves the opportunity to get into the zone with any semblance of predictability. However, the incredible increase in productivity, learning, and creativity produced while you are hyperfocused is something we all should take a stab at understanding and using to the best of our abilities. Writers, in particular, should take a serious look at finding out how to get themselves in the zone to produce their best work.
I have luckily found my flow state when I am near water. Something about the waves of the ocean or the running water from the shower gets my mind wandering and helps produce my greatest ideas. Heck, spending time on the ocean is how many of my ideas for the Levels of Ascension came to fruition as I typed away on the deck of a ship on vacation. While this method of getting into the flow state won’t work for everyone, here are some other writers who found their way into the zone.
Stephen King
Most of us have been captured in some way or form by Stephen King’s ability to bring us into a story. What you may not know, though, is he maintains a routine which helps him get into his hyperfocused state. King asserts our schedule exists in order to habituate ourselves, preparing us to dream just like getting ready for bed at night. The key to the routine, as he puts it is having a specific space. “The space can be humble … and it really needs only one thing: A door you are willing to shut. The closed door is your way of telling the world that you mean business.”
Karen Russell
The famous fictional writer from Florida is one who tackles getting into the flow state head on. She takes a brute force method where she doesn’t keep track of word count, but the sheer amount of uninterrupted time she has spent writing. Russell is comfortable with writing badly, recognizing a lot of her work may be thrown out because she isn’t satisfied with its prose. This kind of acceptance, however, is what has allowed her to get into the zone by sitting down and just getting words on a screen.
Her take on the subject, “I’ve decided that the trick is just to keep after it for several hours, regardless of your own vacillating assessment of how the writing is going. Showing up and staying present is a good writing day.”
Ernest Hemingway
One of the greatest authors of all time, Ernest Hemingway got himself ready for a writing session the same way every morning. He wrote at first light, when all was calm and cool, and he could pick up right from where he left off the day before. Hemingway made sure to stop writing in a place where he knew what was going to happen next. This way, he could let his thoughts marinate until the next day, when he could continue his writing with ease.
Hemingway once told The Paris Review, “You write until you come to a place where you still have your juice and know what will happen next and you stop and try to live through until the next day when you hit it again.”
His method clearly let him accomplish an enormous amount of works, and may just work for you to help you get into the zone.
Kurt Vonnegut
Who would guess that one of this famous author’s favorite ways to keep himself in the zone is to do push-ups and sit-ups throughout the day? Nonetheless, this kind of commitment to continual exercise helped him create 14 novels, three short story collections, five plays, and five works of nonfiction. As he put it, “I do push-ups and sit-ups all the time, and feel as though I am getting lean and sinewy, but maybe not.”
Clearly there are many ways to get into the zone as a writer. The important thing is being willing to experiment with different ways to get yourself hyper-focused, unlocking your productivity and creativity inside. If you have other quirky or interesting ways you get yourself into flow state, I would love to hear about them. Comment below!
Sources:
https://medium.com/the-mission/daily-routines-of-nikola-tesla-mozart-hemingway-woody-allen-maya-angelo-van-gogh-stephen-king-474982e9fe96#.njyisgnio