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This is a fairly common practice, crafting a ritual where you sit down at the same time every day, in the same chair, writing in the same kind of notebook, creating a repetitiveness that borders on self-hypnosis. This is what Hemingway did, it is what Mario Vargas Llosa does.

“Have you tried doing less on the problem?” is an underrated strategy to get unstuck. Most people try to do more.

The idea of needing to "linger in confusion" reminded me of a passage I like from Freud's 'The Interpretation of Dreams', where he's introducing the idea of free association and quotes some remarks by Schiller: "At a point in his correspondence ... Schiller answers a friend who complains of his lack of creativeness in the following words: “The reas... See more

If you want to do great work you have to interface with others—learn what they have figured out, find collaborators who can extend your vision, and other support. The trick is doing this without losing yourself. What solitude gives you is an opportunity to study what personal curiosity feels like in its undiluted form, free from the interference of... See more

It often takes considerable work to keep the creative state from collapsing, especially as your work becomes successful and the social expectations mount. When I listen to interviews with creative people or read their workbooks, there are endless examples of them lamenting how hard it is. They keep coming up with techniques, rituals, and narratives... See more

He writes that the workbook needs to be “so unpresumptuous and undemanding and is intended to sustain like the mellowest woman almost any number of my peculiarities.”

• Work so fast that you don’t have time to self-censor. While writing the intensely confessional My Struggle, Knausgaard forced himself to write five pages a day to overcome his tendency to freeze up in shame. Every time he acclimated to the pace of his writing, he increased the quota so he would always be overwhelmed—at one point he forced himself t

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There is some question about whether or not politics can ever create good art. The answer for me comes down to whether or not the author feels the need to provide answers. A good writer will leave things a bit ambiguous and explore an issue rather than veer into the didactic, trusting that the audience can follow along, while also exploring charact... See more