The Zone

[MaeveoSliabh]

You know the one. The one that happens when the words just flow.

Some authors have a little ritual to help them get to that place. Others have to have one certain thing - a lucky hat, peace and quiet, a certain song/album/playlist, etc. What helps you hit your zone?

 

[impressive]

I don't have a zone.

Well, not a writing zone.

 

[MaeveoSliabh]

I don't have a zone.

Well, not a writing zone.

That one's called subspace. er.... depending on what part you're playing.

 

[cantdog]

It happened twice. Both times it was late at night, when I was descending from an alcohol buzz into that fragile threshhold of sobriety you reach from that side of it, and when I ought by rights to have been asleep hours before. Both times I wrote right up until I had to get ready for work RIGHT NOW or be late. They were fabulous.

My best poetry, on the other hand, came when it was late at night, and I was coming back from a marijuana buzz into that muzzy happy state you reach from there, and I was extremely horny and sexually frustrated.

Re-creating the external circumstances has never gotten me back there. It remains a mystery of the Muses.

 

[TheeGoatPig]

I don't know what got me there, but the first two Over the Sinks and The Neighbor's Ghost were all written in it. I wish I knew how to get back there. I would like to write some more.

 

[Belegon]

Re-creating the external circumstances has never gotten me back there. It remains a mystery of the Muses.

that's me. It just happens.

 

[cantdog]

It'd be nice to learn how, wouldn't it?

How to get there at will.


Just sit in the car and drive, that's all.

But it isn't that way yet.

 

[wishfulthinking]

I don't have one either, but most of my stories are written on a 3 day weekend. By the third day I'm relaxed and have done everything I need to, so I might write.

 

[chris 44]

My zone is sitting in the front room with the laptop on me knee. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but the more often I go there, the more good days I seem to get.

Usually takes 10/15 minutes fiddling about - rereading what I did last time and getting back into the groove. When it comes, it flows like warm honey, when it doesn't it's like walking barefoot on broken glass, but the important thing is that I keep coming back.

Chris

 

[impressive]

I've been thinking about this. Instead of a writing zone, I have a creating zone. Its focus varies, though, because its muse is a schizophrenic with ADD.

 

[gauchecritic]

I have a creative hat. It's a porkpie hat and I would wear it whenever I write a story. The operative word there is 'would', I haven't found or bought it yet but it's out there somewhere I know it is.

 

[Chantilyvamp]

I don't have a zone either. The muse just sorta slaps me upside the head wherever I am. I grab paper and write or type it up if near the computer. Half of it is trashed, some of it is hidden and the rest I force others to read

 

[christabelll]

What has been working for me recently what with all the ill health and added stress of an engagement and moving etc..... oh muse'e, muse'e muse'e. Where for art thou Muse'e!?!?
Is to take out things i floundered on previously and tweak them... play with them... not neccessarily done with them, but no realy new writing either.... and then if possible have a really fabulous evening of hedonism and debauchery... I just wrote 22 pages after a three month dry spell! but that failing I start reading... either what I wrote or some one's works that I LOVE.... and try to let the words run around in my head to play...

I wrote a three part poem just fucking around one day with an old fashion typewriter .....

But mainly its just getting the fingers moving whether in posting in the forums or fiddling around with an older piece.... usually I can let the muses take flight from there.... bribes of good wine and better sex helps though....

 

[sxcascinn]

My zone is sitting in the front room with the laptop on me knee. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but the more often I go there, the more good days I seem to get.

Usually takes 10/15 minutes fiddling about - rereading what I did last time and getting back into the groove. When it comes, it flows like warm honey, when it doesn't it's like walking barefoot on broken glass, but the important thing is that I keep coming back.

Chris

Yeah quite often it is the getting started that gets me... No kids some good music and open word and search for the muse even if it is total crap at least i am writing something. But once I start sometimes the momentum just carries me along for a while...

 

[Guest]

Yeah quite often it is the getting started that gets me... No kids some good music and open word and search for the muse even if it is total crap at least i am writing something. But once I start sometimes the momentum just carries me along for a while...

That's the thing, isn't it?

No kids (or kids occupied, their needs met, etc.) the house not too messy, no chores pressing, schoolwork done, no performances, no rehearsals, no errands, blah blah blah -

And then - if I'm in the frickin' mood????

My muse needs to get her ass in gear.

 

[sxcascinn]

That's the thing, isn't it?

No kids (or kids occupied, their needs met, etc.) the house not too messy, no chores pressing, schoolwork done, no performances, no rehearsals, no errands, blah blah blah -

And then - if I'm in the frickin' mood????

My muse needs to get her ass in gear.

Yeah i forgot the damn housework.
I swear it has it's own guilt tripping demon going off in my head telling my muse I must not write til I have satisfied its black heart I have worked my arse off...
I have tried to set myself a time to write... After the kids are in bed. So after 9pm only problem is I get up around 7am by the time I get the kids off.. It's a struggle to write for at least an hour...
I write better in the middle of the day lol... unfortunately I have 1 day kidless a week where I don't have to go out. Only something keeps happening to that 1 day
Anyway I will say this. I want to write more so in that goal I am trying to set up routines so that I can make the time!!