The truth about blog posts is this: when I’m writing, really writing, the last thing in the world I want to write about is writing. The act of sitting in front of a computer screen takes on a different meaning. Don’t use those words, my brain whispers to me. Use the other ones. Tell me a story.
Story mind is unlike anything else. Story mind is when you fall asleep at night still half in a scene, and wake up the next morning muttering dialogue. It’s demanding and impossible and utterly seductive. It’s something your family learns to see in your eyes, most likely with a bit of disappointment.
For me, story mind is magic. Not revision, not all the things that happen once the draft is complete, but those moments when everything comes at a feverish pace, and the story feels born of something entirely outside your own imagination.
I haven’t watched this talk in a while. I loved it when I saw it a few years back. Elizabeth Gilbert, 2009, TED. Try it out, if you haven’t already.