List of Ten: Free your Creative Mind

Art Credit Jane Ray

Every once in a while my mind gets stuck in a loop of cliche. For the life of me, I don’t have a fresh idea to bring to the table and all I can do is pick the low-hanging fruit. In writing about a young girl from a small farming town in the 1950s, I asked:

• Where should a scene take place? House, farm, truck...ugh.

• How should I up the stakes? Lying, cheating, stealing..ugh.

• What is my protagonist’s dream career? Teacher, nurse, secretary...ugh.

After struggling with this bee in my bonnet, I found a simple yet solid technique to escape cliche. I call it a List of Ten. 

“What is a list of ten?” you ask.

Whenever you get stuck try this: get out a sheet of paper, write the problem at the top, and brainstorm ten solutions. Most likely, the first three or four ideas you scribble down have been the answers that you’ve been mulling over and over. Since you are not satisfied with these solutions, you must keep going. 

“Ten why ten?” you ask.

The List of Ten works because it combines divergent and convergent thinking, which are the cornerstones of creativity. Divergent thinking generates multiple ideas from one starting point. The divergent process of creating a list requires you to use the associative or daydreaming region of the brain. You write at least ten solutions, no matter how ridiculous, because this forces fresh energy into the problem. With all the cliche out of the way and a list left to complete, I reach further. After hitting number seven, the technique really pays off. For example, in thinking about the career dreams for my farm girl, I clear out: teacher, nurse, secretary, and seamstress and finally get to zoo keeper, lingerie designer, and Russian spy. 

“But those are just unrealistic answers,” you might be thinking. “Where is the real solution?”

Now that you have fresh ideas, you must bring them back to your novel. This is where convergent thinking comes back in. Convergent thinking combines multiple pieces of information to form one solution. When I am stuck, I am trying to converge with too few, stale ideas. The divergent process of creating a list gives you fresh ideas to converge on in order to arrive at a creative and cohesive solution.

Yes, some of the solutions on your list will fall into the bat shit crazy camp. For example, I don’t want my farm girl aspiring to be a Russian spy, leading me out of historical romance into spy thriller territory, but maybe in converging on a solution with these wild solutions, I get the idea that my protagonist has a best friend who is Russian and experiencing loads of discrimination and abuse in the cold war era. So this list can infuse energy into your book, beyond the sticking point you are trying to solve. The solution could be one of those initial answers, but with the addition of this new friend, the real problem of a lack of conflict is exposed and the fight for this new friend solves it. 

Most often though, you find a novel solution to a sticky problem because you just couldn’t get out of the rut of the first three cliches. It often doesn’t drastically change the shape of your novel, but you can finally move on. And sometimes one of the solutions takes you on a wild ride of a girl picking peaches in the fifties who finally decides to follow her dream of designing racy lingerie and taking on the raging patriarchy that is trying to reassert itself after a depression and world war.  

“But I don’t wanna,” you say.

It’s amazing how when I feel stuck. I fight even the idea of a List of Ten. Just a simple exercise feels both ridiculous and arduous. I resist because it’s not only my novel that’s stuck, but my feelings are stuck too. Maybe it’s self-doubt, a lack of inertia, or a harsh inner critic. These things take more than a List of Ten to resolve for real, but the technique can circumvent them by pulling you back into creativity, fun, and momentum.

You can do this. And this will help. Even if it doesn’t solve the problem, it will get you closer to a solution. It will help you shrug off the debilitating state of stuck.

“This worked so well!” you exclaim after finally trying it.

Hooray! You don’t even have to be stuck for this to be useful, try this when you want to level up your imagination. When you want to take an ordinary scene and spice it up, make a List of Ten. I even use this tool for my real-life decisions - planning activities, buying birthday presents, or deciding on my dreams. After all, I am my own protagonist. 

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You are too kind. Writing novels is a long term investment and I don’t get too much validation, so it means the world to hear you say that. You can enter your email here, and I’ll send future posts to your inbox.

Creativity as Self-Care: Writing in the Time of Covid

As shelter-in-place orders spread, I started to see this strange pressure on the creative, “Now is the time to write the next great American novel.” And then came the rebuttal to this argument that the amount of anxiety in quarantine is not compatible with creativity. Well, I offer something in between. 

I propose that creativity can be a form of self-care right now. The pressures are all too real. Creativity shouldn’t be another one, but at the same time abandoning one’s creativity means taking away a tool, an asset, a coping strategy. Now more than ever is when we need to hear our souls sing. Whether through poetry, pottery, or print making, connecting with that higher part of yourself can make this time bearable.

In my experience, the more time I spend away from my artistic endeavors the crazier I feel. My primary creative expression, writing, feels like medicine. It flushes out the toxins. While expressing my ideas and imaginings, my writing also expresses the blight from my system. And right now we need all the healing power we have at our disposal. 

I hit a hard place this past winter and started doing all the things that doctors tell you to do: exercise, eat well, sleep well, go outside, but I had forgotten about an essential piece of life until a friend reminded me. “Joanna, have you been writing?” she asked. I opened my novel the next day and a bit of relief rushed in. I realized that creativity is my self-care. Writing allows me to connect with my soul, but unfortunately, it’s one of the first things I let go when life gets hard.

We all need to escape. The Netflix binge is necessary in these times. We need to rest and retreat, but when your mind becomes mushy from endless episodes, excessive napping, or obsessive news consumption, try reclaiming your own creative power. Carve out some generative time for yourself and see how that makes you feel. 

If you work from home, shut off all notifications for a bit. If you have kids, use some nap time or screen time in order to feed your own soul. You could even allow these time-boxed departures to be a structure for you to get as many words on the page or as many songs in the air as you can. Despite the higher activation energy required, you might feel a lot better afterwards. You might feel lighter, you might feel your own power, you might feel hope. 

When you do create, create without pressure to produce. You don’t have to discover the law of gravity or pen a work of genius. Creating with the ego at the forefront doesn’t usually end well even under normal circumstances. Instead, create to care for yourself and banish the expectations and critics (inside and out). You just need to give yourself the space to talk to your soul. 

If you can’t manage to find blocks of time (I’m looking at you full-time working parents), let your mind play while you are doing the mundane tasks of cooking beans and feeding a baby. Play with ideas in your heart while your body does what it needs to do. What would that melody sound like? What wounds might drive my protagonist? How would these colors blend?

And if you are totally exhausted and can’t manage any of this, just survive. I wish I could hold your hand. This will end, and we will create on the other side. 

Let It Be Easy

Elizabeth Gilbert posted her top ten tips for writing the other week. And #10 really caught me.

“Be willing to let it be easy.”

For the past several months, I’ve been dreaming up and outlining my second novel. And last week, I was ready to get going with the first draft, but I paused at the start. Eyes squeezed shut and teeth clenched.

Writing my first book felt like a battle with little victories and lots of struggle. I think all the fight came from fear. Was I doing it right? I applied that question to every part of the novel and every stage of the writing process.

Is the first chapter right?

Is my character development complete?

Is this detail historically accurate?

Is the plot moving too quickly? Too slowly?

Is this joke funny?

Is the ending satisfying?

Ugh, exhausting. Thank goodness for my unrelenting drive to write and my dear, patient writing friends that scooped me off my keyboard over and over again. I produced a first novel I feel very proud of and now as I start my second, I braced for the onslaught again.

Then came Liz’s #10 tip. Let it be easy.

Intellectually, I know that the first draft is crap. Anne Lamott really drove that home for me in Bird by Bird. Writing a first draft lets me find the story. It helps me meet the characters. It lets me test out the plot. But I don’t think I really allowed that for myself.

Energetically, I was still feeling like I needed to get it right. I’ve received the advice to write badly, but that didn’t land the way “easy” landed. ‘Let it be easy’ bypassed the judgement of good and bad. The advice invited me to check in with my energy not my craft. ‘Let it be easy’ let me set aside my judgement, and therefore my fear, and just write.

In my experience, the hard came from the judgement, and really the inappropriate judgement about my work. It’s not time for me to worry if I nailed the first line. It’s not time for me to worry if my characters are fully developed. It’s time for me to get the words on a page. Letting that go, allowed me to melt into ease.

So each day, I hit my word count. I am not getting blocked because I can’t get it wrong. It’s easy…for now anyways.

Honor Thy Creative Impulse

Creative impulses have been sparkling in my mind - big ones like hosting a creative retreat for women writers and little ones like building a rainbow bookcase.

When these ideas started to arise, I questioned them. Aren’t they distractions from my main gig of novel writing? Should I really be doing all this with my energy given that it’s in short supply as a full-time mom of two?

Turns out, spending time on artistic projects that are separate from your main endeavor strengthens your creative mind. Let’s call this—creative cross training. Creativity is all about generating innovative ideas. Bending, breaking and blending concepts to produce something new, and people who have lots of diverse inputs can do this even better than people siloed in one skill.

Research shows that Nobel Prize-winning scientists are significantly more likely to have artistic hobbies compared to their technically skilled peers. They are 2 times more likely to play musical instruments, 7 times more likely to draw or paint, 12 times more likely to do creative writing, and 22 times more likely to perform as actors, dancers, or even magicians. I wonder what the prize winners in literature do in their spare time.

Curiosity is the driving force behind creative impulses. The force that wonders, “What would red wine and rosemary taste like in fig jam?” is that same force that veers my characters out of cliché and comes up with my plot twists. Embracing these impulses when they show up rather than banishing them as superfluous invites them to come around more often. Even though picking figs cuts into my word count goal, it keeps the mind nimble and inquisitive.

Creative cross training also helps me practice imperfection. And boy do I need the practice. During my first attempts at watercolor, I had to face the nasty voice of my inner critic telling me, not only, that my painting was crap, but that I was crap. Strengthening my resistance to this thought pattern has helped me begin my second book. Returning to the shitty first draft stage after working with polished prose has been hard, but my artistic side hustles are reminding me to relax. Perfection is an enemy of creative endeavors, especially at the beginning.

But what about my time and energy?! In my own experience now, spending time creating has always given me more energy rather than less even in the face of sleep deprivation as a new mom. Creativity is generative. It’s not a zero-sum game. The energy that comes with a creative impulse is not really all that transferable either. When you have the urge to collage a coffee table, it’s not like you can bottle that enthusiasm to do your taxes. So when the energy comes, I let it flow and it often spills over into the next things on my to do list, especially my novel.

Many creatives recommend sitting down to work on your craft every day, whether the muse or creative impulse shows up or not. I agree with this advice. That discipline makes novels happen. It’s the only way that I finished my first book. But the opposite is not necessarily true, ignoring the muse to write and only write is not great advice. Do both. Don’t wait for creative impulses but honor them when they show up.

Creative cross training is not procrastination. Hopefully, creative impulses are showing up just as much for your main endeavor as your side projects or hobbies. If they aren’t, then that might be something to consider. Maybe you aren’t letting yourself embrace the imperfect and the whimsical with your main project like you are with your side ones. Maybe the main and side projects should be swapped. Maybe the joy of the side projects can help you get through a challenging and not so fun part of the main one.

As a busy mom, creative cross training has been especially important. Sometimes I don’t have the space or mindset to dig into my novel but letting myself follow creative impulses that fit into smaller spaces has kept my creative soul humming. I don’t need to do a complete revival when I get the time to sit and write. I am already alive. My mind is primed.

And lastly, but possibly most importantly, following these creative impulses in my life has brought tremendous joy. It’s so easy to belittle them as silly ideas, but they bring light and sparkle to the mundane and the difficult. This is neither silly nor superfluous. This is everything.

So I have become a disciple of my creative impulses. I trust them. I follow them. And I can’t recommend it enough. Pick up some hobbies. Dabble in something new, something superfluous, something pointless and see what might come of it. You know that itch to learn the ukulele. Or that idea in the back of your head to knit a sweater for a stop sign. Go for it. It might set you free.

Daily Creative Meditation: Awareness and Intention

I love my creative time. Yet when I sit down, I often open the New York Times and then my email and maybe even Instagram (and then back to the New York Times).

When I asked myself, why don’t I just sit down and start the work I love? I found that I have some thoughts and feelings in need of recognition. Sometimes I feel tired. Sometimes I feel scared. Sometimes I want a hit of validation.

What I really want is an intentional beginning to my creative time, which for me means becoming aware of these feelings, allowing them, and then refocusing on my intention.

Meditation came to mind as a possible solution. I have meditated for years, but I never thought to combine my mindful and creative worlds…until now.

In meditation, we practice noticing thoughts. We accept them and then redirect the mind, rather than allowing it to be dragged away by distractions. It isn’t about denying our desires and thoughts, instead the practice allows us to choose where we focus our attention.

I searched for a guided meditation for writers. I really wanted something simple without music or sound effects. Since nothing answered my needs, I paired up with my soul sister, Leah Pearlman, and we created our own meditation to help begin creative time.

It’s short and sweet (four minutes), so it doesn’t take much time away from our work, but helps us start in a centered place. The mediation begins, asking us for awareness and allowance of our body, our feelings, and our thoughts in the moment. Then it addresses the big challenges that often make starting hard for us– handling distractions, feeling blocked, and questioning our own creative worth. Wrapping up, it reconnects us with our personal intentions—to create—from our core motivations.

I’ve been using this meditation for the past month and found some surprising outcomes. It didn’t magically focus me on the task at hand each and every day, but, more importantly, it helped me see and honor my emotional needs and creative energy.

During the month I used the meditation, I had set the goal of finishing a draft of my novel. So when I did my very first meditation, I was surprised by my inner response to the question: can you open to the universe of creativity? While my novel topped my to-do list, when I paid attention to my creative energy it was surging in a different direction. The meditation gave me the courage to follow it. A beautiful blog post flowed out in under an hour. I love it when that happens. It feels like magic, but maybe it’s just paying attention and aligning with my creative force.

For the first few weeks, I listened to the meditation everyday at the start of my writing time. Initially, I felt rushed by the brevity of the recording, but as a daily practice I came to really appreciate the swift check-in. Different parts of meditation spoke to me on different days, and it helped me identify what needed my attention. Soon the practice of touching in became a pattern without listening everyday. My mindfulness was primed as I sat down in my writing spot. I would listen to the meditation when I felt scattered as a way to reconnect rather than having a daily requirement.

On a few days, I found that my emotional needs for another activity spoke louder than my intention to create. I needed to rest or connect with a friend. Before this reflective practice, I might have taken these breaks, but not without a heaping dose of self-judgment. By really knowing and honoring my needs, I allowed and enjoyed being “off task” and returned naturally to my creative projects when I was ready. This meditation is not a productivity tool, but a support for self-awareness and connection with the creative force inside us.

Leah and I made our mediation available on YouTube, for those that might want to try it out. If starting your creative time on the internet doesn’t sound supportive, I am also happy to send you an mp3 file as a thank you for signing up to my newsletter. We hope you enjoy it.

How I Became a Writer

Some people came into this world knowing what they want to do or be.

We hate these people.

No, not really. (Maybe a little).

The rest of us haven’t always known our purpose. Maybe we have a guiding idea but don’t know how to translate it into an action, or maybe we have so many ideas we don’t know how to pick, or maybe we have no idea at all.

I spent the first decade of my adult life training as a nurse and scientist. This felt as right as it could until I looked up and saw that even if I was as successful as I could be, it wasn’t the life I wanted. That was very hard to accept after years of intensive training and heavy expectations. I didn’t know until I knew. And once I knew, I had to leave. So if I wasn’t a scientist then what was I?

Using our savings, my partner and I moved across country. We landed in the Bay Area, and I tried everything. I farmed, I protested, I coded, I cooked, I designed, I organized, but I still didn’t know. And I desperately wanted to know. Oh how I envied the people that knew their calling to their core, but there was no clear signal in my heart. After a summer of exploring, I started to panic.

I took a break and went to the beach. I used to read scientific journal articles with my feet in the sand, but I heard that normal people read novels. I couldn’t quite remember the last time I let myself read for pleasure. But once I started, I could not stop. I wanted to live inside the fictional worlds I found. Now some people say that, but I really meant it. I felt like I belonged in books. I read. All. Day. Long. Some books I just looped through, over and over again, refusing to leave.

The only thing that finally brought me out of my reading frenzy was the idea to write my own book. I opened up my laptop and started chapter one of my first novel.

But I couldn’t make it as easy as that. Even as I continued to write, I refused it as a vocation. Writing fiction, don’t be ridiculous. Writing is not a real career. Making up stories doesn’t add value to the world. So I continued my search. I craved a sense of identity. What should I do? I tried more things. I foraged, I researched, I volunteered, I knit. I even considered going back to science.

I finally reached a breaking point. I wanted to commit to something, and I just needed to pick a horse and ride it. I leaned on my analytic skills (maybe that’s the reason I got a PhD, ha!). I opened up Excel and made a matrix. I listed my values along the top row: justice, beauty, kindness, family, things like that. Along the side, I listed out all the potential jobs I’d consider. At the very last moment, I threw “writer” on the list.  Then I assigned a number from 1 to 5, indicating how much each potential career fulfilled each value. I totaled the rows. Writing received the highest score. Wait, really? Writing? And because I’m a nerd and really needed to be sure I also ranked the values and produced a ranked score. Writing won again.

I felt a little scared. This is not how I conceptualized myself.

My partner offered a solution. Try it. Write. Commit for three months and stop asking the question “What should I do?” and just do it. This was powerful for me. Trying something new and edgy is hard when you question the whole enterprise every other day. With the financial support of my partner, I committed (just for three months). I let myself write all day long. And when I questioned myself, I looked at the date circled on the calendar and said I can consider all my doubts then.

Eventually I doubted less and wrote more. I didn’t even realize when the three months had ended. I didn’t need to return to the spreadsheet. I still had no idea why writing resonated with me. I still wondered where this vocation came from, but I knew that I didn’t want to do anything else.

People ask me, “How did I choose writing?” It’s strange to say, but I think that writing choose me. Looking back, I see that three things had an important impact on my discovery: the ability to walk away from a career and identity that didn’t bring me joy, giving myself the chance to try all the things, and committing to something I loved in the face of doubt.

Doubt has returned countless times in my writing journey. Apparently doubt is a defining characteristic of a writer. But I just can’t stop. I tried, but I returned over and over again to writing.

I wish I knew, “Why writing?” I still ask myself that. It’s not something I imagined choosing. It’s not something I designed. Even without understanding it fully, I commit because I can’t hardly help it.

Some people came into this world knowing what they want to do or be. Others have the creative adventure of discovering it along the way.

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