Two kinds of writing

I've been writing every day for three weeks now (yes, you got me, I started before the first of January), and it's teaching me something about how writing works. There's nothing new here that I haven't heard other writers say over and over again, but it's different when you experience it for yourself, isn't it? 

The first thing I notice is that there are two modes of writing for me - what Objective Personality System* calls blast report and consume report. 

Blast Report:

The one where I have an idea of the whole shape of what I'm going to write and a pre-drawn plan with the main headings. An outline like the outline in a colour-by-numbers drawing. That sort of writing is easy, like writing up a patient assessment. Since I know all the headings already I just have to slot the data in there and there it is. I don't have to think much about it during the writing. In fact I close myself down so there's nothing coming through my senses, and I'm not listening to the wild and weird connections that my brain is flowing about in all day. I've set the plan in my head so that nothing comes to me that's outside the lines of my pre-printed outline. And what comes out may be technically true and with luck useful, but it feels dead.

Now I'm not saying that there aren't people who can make colour-by-numbers writing deep and rich. There certainly are. Dividing any human behaviour into two categories is always going to be gross oversimplification. 

Consume Report: 

This one is where I have an image, a memory, a feeling, and I may have a ghost plan as to where it will go but during the writing something takes over that I have less control over, if any, and the direction of the writing is dictated by something much more nebulous but in fact more powerful and interesting than a pre-planned outline could ever be. Something that is more of an expression of the life that I am than any logical exercise could ever be. To do this I have to open to what comes without so much urgency to focus it down. I have to open my eyes without judgement and watch the thoughts and ideas as they pass. I have to let the writing lead me, instead of trying all the time to lead it. I have to be able to accept that I don't, won't, can't understand how it works, all I can do is allow it to express itself on the page and see what happens. I have to let go.

And what happens is so much richer and deeper and I hope much more engaging to read. And it often ends up having a satisfying shape to it, that could be summarised in an outline in retrospect, but not in anticipation. I think the difference between blast report and consume report is like the difference between colour-by-numbers and art. It can look pretty much the same at the end but there's something so much richer, deeper and engaging in the original. (I'm telling you my writing is art! Hahahaha, get me!)

Characters with a life of their own

I think this is what fiction writers mean when they say their characters take on a life of their own. When the writer resists the whole idea of a pre-set outline of a work of fiction. When they speak to non-writers, non-artists, publishers and agents about the fact that they don't want to commit themselves to an outline or even to what their novel is about and get blank looks. As if they'd said they're going to get on the first plane out of Heathrow Airport and find out what kind of holiday they're taking when they get there. How absurd. 

But haven't you ever wondered what adventures you might have if you did just that? 

Haven't you noticed that the best holidays are not necessarily the ones you planned most carefully, but are the ones where you let go of expectations and just let the world happen in front of your eyes. Sometimes it only happens when the holiday's such a complete disaster that you have no choice but to stop trying. But when you let go of the trying, what a difference!

Then, being in a new place lets you see the details and differences, the way the people move around and interact, the way ordinary things happen on ordinary days. When you open your eyes without judgement and watch the world as it passes by. A holiday where you let what happened lead you, instead of trying all the time to impose your expectations on it. Then being on holiday doesn't give you new experiences exactly, it gives you new eyes.

Holiday Eyes

How would it be if you did that at home? After all, life isn't something you can really outline is it? While you can have goals, a general direction, things that you would never do, life is what happens when you're planning other things, as they say. 

No one can really predict what will happen to you today, let alone tomorrow, next year, next decade. There are some certainties of course, death and taxes, love and loss, frustration and flow. And you can work hard to balance the odds in your favour for some things like having food to eat and a reasonably good relationship with other people. 

But by controlling and predicting and planning everything you lose the eyes that show you the adventure of life. You lose what's true and deep and rich and not under our control about being human. Which is a pity because that's the best bit.

*https://www.objectivepersonalitysystem.com/