My first college writing teacher made us free write for a set period (anywhere from three to ten minutes) at the start of every class session. I used this approach with my own writing students years later, except mine was a weekly assignment. As with me as a student, my own students resisted the assignment. Why? Writing is hard, especially getting started.
My students eventually found out what I did when I was forced to write. I had something to say. Sure, the first few sentences are usually garbage, but my thoughts clarify as I kept writing. Ideas spring up, take root, and develop in the mind, but they flourish when written down. They become solid.
While I can wander mentally when thinking, I cannot when writing. I can only think about what I’m writing down as I write. The key is to keep writing. That was the one rule my writing teacher gave: don’t stop writing. Eventually, writing focuses your thinking.
Writing is thinking for me in ways that mental only thinking is not. This is why I write something every day and why my reflective practice involves a great deal of writing.
Planning is an essential part of the writing process. With the availability of resources at my fingertips, though, I can always keep planning. There’s always more to learn and to add to my plans. At some point, planning must move into writing. Ideas must become solid.
The writing doesn’t even have to be particularly good at first. Almost any words on a page/screen will do. Solid writing (i.e., writing people want to read) is revision, after all. Eventually, though, it’s time to take the best ideas found while planning, to stop waiting to write, and to write.
“Use the best idea you have right now. Claiming you need to ‘learn more’ or ‘get your ducks in a row’ is just a crutch that prevents you from starting. Education is a lifelong pursuit. You will always need to learn more. It’s not a reason to wait.” (James Clear)
The past few months, I’ve done a lot of planning for book #2. Researching. Reading. Thinking. Talking. Outlining. Connecting. The time to let planning morph into writing, to move out of planning mode, and for thinking to become solid has begun.