One of the techniques a lot of writers do when they’re writing is the no-load day. That’s when you’re specifically not thinking about your book. Just take the day off.
You have to have been writing for a long time to really enjoy the fruits of this. If you’ve finished at least two books, the no-load day does something amazing.
You’ll have brief impressions of your book throughout the day. Little thoughts and glimpses. Don’t pursue them. Let them run.
Okay, now sit down to write that night.
I bet you just wrote an entire scene without even thinking about it. The words just poured out.
Why?
If you’ve written two novels, your brain is now trained to write. You’re trained to think in terms of scenes, emotional units. And if you keep digging into your brain and your creativity, at some point fatigue sets in.
Before this happens, I’ve learned to fool myself into thinking, “I’m not going to think today. I’m going to leave my writer’s notebook closed.”
Now the scene you’ve had the most trouble approaching will begin to perk in your mind. Don’t give in. Don’t work on it. Think of other things.
[Tweet “If you’ve written two novels, your brain is now trained to write.”]
I bet your brain is distracting you, right?
Yeah, it is! The story keeps popping up. Let your brain work on it.
What’s going on is your brain is writing the scene for you, without your conscious mind really being part of it. It’s compiling the structure of it. All you have to do is write the dialog and narrative to go with it.
And your mind probably even did a lot of that.
You can’t do this if you’re a beginner, still working on the first novel. Probably can’t even do this if it’s the second.
but the third? Oh yeah.
