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POWER WRITING^©
by Patricia E. Vermeire

HOW I LOST FIVE POUNDS, CLEANED MY HOUSE, SLEPT REGULAR HOURS, AND STILL WROTE THE FIRST DRAFT OF MY NOVEL (44,000 WORDS) IN 40 HOURS OVER LABOR DAY WEEKEND – A SUCCESS STORY

What this article is about: A technique to saturate the right side of the brain with all the material it needs to write a story and put the left side to sleep long enough to get the damn thing written.

What this article is NOT about: How to write.

A little background on the author: I am blessed with the solitude many writers crave or fight to preserve. I have no family to speak of and so few friends that I was able to escape for three days and nobody noticed. As long as I fed my dogs twice a day and let them out every now and then, we got along perfectly. And they were the only thing I thought about in those three days that didn't center on the story I was writing. Realizing this is a writer's utopia, I accept your skepticism that this technique will work for you. But you won't know until you try.

References and ideas that are not mine: The "incubation" technique comes from "Movies In The Mind" (MITM) by Colleen Mariah Rae (1996, Sherman Asher Publishing; I found mine at a used bookstore). The Accelerated Yog Method (AYM) for speed-writing I discovered in a post by Steve Eley on the First-Novel ONElist listserve, content used by permission (available at http://www.sff.net/people/sfeley/AYM.htp).

Preparing the Story: I write character-driven stories; a new personality pops into my head, appears in a setting, and tells me a story. For several weeks prior to this experiment, I listened to the story unfolding in my head. Scenes played on the movie screen of my subconscious; I overheard conversations; new characters appeared. I knew I had a story to write.

"Movies In The Mind" presents a method of story development involving "digging the clay" and "incubation". In the same way a sculptor works the clay before applying it to the armature, the writer works the story from several angles before attempting to put words to paper. Incubation means doing nothing, allowing the subconscious to build the story in your head.

To "dig the clay", I wrote a synopsis of the story from the point of view of each of the three main characters. A plot developed and conflicts arose. I did some light historical research, character interviews, and kept at it until I knew the story had sufficient structure to "hang together". Finally, I jotted notes for some twenty-odd scenes on 4x6 cards, arranging them in what looked like a logical sequence.

For incubation, MITM espouses the technique of visualizing the story so well in your mind that you can see it projected as if on a movie screen. You fast forward, rewind, stop action, instant replay – in short, manipulate the movie to see the story from every side, smoothing out the rough edges – and listening to/seeing the story as the characters reveal it to you. Relaxation and visualization techniques are nothing new; any good reference text will teach you how to do it well. Try it. It is also important to keep the story inside – discuss it with no one, until you feel as if you will burst if you don't get the story on paper. That's the moment you know you're ready to write.

Preparing for the "Event": Knowing I have an advanced degree in procrastination, I spent the two weeks before Labor Day eliminating every excuse I knew I would use to keep from writing. I cleaned the house, did laundry, cut the grass, cleared out closets, put things away, recycled newspapers, pre-cooked meals, played the handyman, and eventually crossed everything off my "to do" list. If you have one-tenth the problem I have with procrastination, you know what I'm talking about.

When the Big Day hit, the only distractions available were the TV and the internet. One took a little willpower, the other… unplugging a modem.

The Goal: My goal was to write the first draft of my incubating novel, from start to finish, in the hours between six p.m. Friday and ten p.m. Monday, or when I finished, whichever came first. Allowing for sleeping and other necessary interruptions, I estimated I had a maximum of 60 productive hours in that time period. At three pages (750 words) per hour, I would have 180 pages of manuscript draft, which represented the largest volume of writing I had ever done in my life (bigger than my Master's thesis, oh, so many years ago). The goal seemed possible; I was excited.

Side Note: I compose entirely on the keyboard of my computer; it's the only way I can keep up with the words in my head (I suffer from really BAD handwriting). I'm rated at 70-80 wpm typing speed. If you handwrite or hunt-and-peck at the keyboard, your mileage may vary – set a different goal.

The Rules: MITM requires that you write for a portion of each hour then take a break, whether you need (or want) it or not. (Knowing my own writing habits, I chose to write for 50 minutes and break for ten.) Stopping for a break in mid-sentence is preferred, as it gives the subconscious something to chew on and prevents that terror-filled moment of staring at the screen when you return, asking, "Now where was I going with this?"

During the breaks in writing, whether each hour, at "half-time", or bedtime, anything involving words is strictly prohibited. This includes reading, talking, TV, radio, singing, etc. The idea is to keep the words in your head pure and focused on the story.

Physical activity during the breaks is best to keep from going insane and to exercise those atrophying muscles. I made a list of things I could do for short periods - walking (love my treadmill), playing with the dogs, cleaning (again), taking out the garbage, changing the sheets on the bed (did that twice), checking the mail, etc. Repetitive boring activities that suspend time are the very best. Driving works especially well for me, but ten minutes isn't enough time for that; the treadmill was a great substitute. (To counteract repetitive stress on the wrist/hand from the keyboard, I recommend a soft ball to squeeze – alternating hands for a minute or two every other break.)

In those magic ten minutes, work the clay for the next portion of the story – see it in your mind, hear the dialogue, feel the emotion. Try several approaches if you're at an impasse. Even when I left the keyboard stumped as to what was going to happen next, at the end of the incubation time the answer was there ready to be written. After a few hours, you will be jumping into your chair when the bell rings.

Every four to six hours I took a half-hour break to totally wind down but still followed the rules. I slept between six and eight hours a night, waking when I was good and ready. This was important for energy renewal and also allowed the subconscious a generous amount of REM sleep to work on the story. After lights out, I reviewed the portion of the story I was working on, letting the movie run in my mind, and asking every question I needed to answer in order to continue. I had some amazing dreams…

The Writing: Here's the key to reaching your goal – the Accelerated Yog Method. As Steve puts it, "…take what's in your brain and dump it to paper." It doesn't have to be perfect, beautiful, complete, or even sensible – just write.

This method is designed to work for the first draft only and the content is up to you. It can be a glorified outline, or just the plot, or exactly the words you will use in the final draft, in any combination. One scene might be sketchy, the next detailed with dialogue. It doesn't matter. The goal is to write the story in whatever form will tell you that it will work when finished – plot, conflict, structure.

And here's the second Law of AYM: Never Revise. Never go back to what you have already written. "All progress must be forward, not backward." If I found something wasn't going to work, I just made a note to myself, surrounding it in brackets like this: [give her a different excuse for going back the house; the dress angle won't work]. If I was stumped for a word or concept, I just used an underline: __________, or a descriptive phrase. My favorite stump from this draft is: [insert fascinating fact about coffee and India here]. I knew what I wanted, I just didn't have a specific fact to use (now I know that some kinds of Indian coffee are dried by the monsoon winds – fascinating, no?).

The challenge in AYM is to turn off the internal critic. To fool the left side of the brain that I wasn't doing anything serious, I chose to write in third person present tense - rarely used in romance. Knowing that I was just "fooling around", I was free to write anything that came to mind. Occasionally I still had to remind the inner critic that anything I wrote was subject to later revision and/or deletion. I remember saying out loud, "We don't have to use this, but I'd rather write it now than try to remember it later." It worked.

To keep the left side of the brain inactive, I turned off the spell checker (that thing what puts those squiggly lines under misspelled words). But I left the autocorrect function running, so that transposed letters didn't alert the critic either ("hte" instead of "the", "ahd" for "had", etc.). There were a few times I had to slap a hand reaching for the thesaurus, and twice when I had to look up a word (compromises with the critic).

But when the internal editor wants to interrupt the writing to look up a fact, or says, "this is really awful, you know" or "that will never work", you just thank the analytical side of your psyche for the input and promise that in the next draft you will entertain every suggestion. In this draft, progress is more important than perfection, and meeting the goal above all.

The Result: I kept a running tally of how many hours I spent writing each day and how many words came forth, according to the Word Count function of my word processor. In spite of a major computer crash on Sunday morning that consumed three hours and was never fully resolved (I worked in Windows' Safe Mode after that), I reached my goal early, finishing the entire story at five o'clock Monday evening. The grand total was 43,990 words, which roughly translates into 180 manuscript pages. I don't claim to be psychic, but I take perverse pleasure in having hit the goal smack on the nose.

The Future: When I begin the second draft, I will start over from scratch – not editing the first draft. I have printed out the first draft and may refer to it as I write, but I will start with a brand new file. The next draft should be a dream to write, as the first draft worked out all the structural details and has a significant amount of dialogue. I just have about six months of historical research to do before I'll be ready to create that masterpiece…

I expect to use the Power Writing Method, in modified form, for the second draft. Incubation will play a primary role, as will goal setting and timed writing; controlling and focusing the "flow" of words from the subconscious are enhanced by this method. However, the second draft will be written in "voice", consisting of careful prose rather than quick, imprecise words, and will accept more input from the analytical side of the brain. The third (and final) draft will polish the story to publication quality (when the internal critic has her day).

Setting a goal, incubation, timed writing, and controlling the internal critic can be useful in any writing project. I hope you found something here that will help you in your own writing endeavors. And when I get this puppy published, I'll let you know!