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Inspired? Would you like to see your name on this website and your book up on those bookshop shelves? This is where we bring you a round up of writing tips, ideas and hints. | How to find a daily practice and stick with it |
by Fiona Robyn I have a daily writing practice. I also have an ongoing-struggle-to-be-almost-daily meditation practice, but that’s another story. My writing practice began in 2005, when I launched a daily blog and committed to keep it going for a whole year. At the end of the year I gave myself a ‘break’ for six months, writing the blog only when the urge struck me. I like the idea of breaks – we all need to laze about from time to time and read trashy novels. But after a while, an idea started to nag at me. It tugged on my skirt when I was thinking about something else, whispering ‘Daily writing is a good thing. Go back.’ I went back, and I’ve been writing my blog daily ever since. Why would I ‘make myself’ write every day? I certainly don’t enjoy it all the time. Sometimes it gets late before I realise I haven’t written anything, and I feel rebellious and annoyed as I look around desperately for something, anything to write about. Some mornings I realise I’ve mislaid a couple of days, and I have to trawl back over my schedule to find something worth saving. Sometimes I bore myself. Nothing would actually happen if I missed a day or two at my blog. Nobody is hanging on to my every word with bated breath. No-one is paying me. Making a pledge to write every day is a way for me to honour my devotion to writing. Writing is important to me, in a way that other people’s children might be central for them, or their gardens, or their work for a local charity. Writing helps me to pay attention to the world around me, and to make sense of complicated thoughts and experiences. It gives me a voice. It isn’t always sweetness and light - last year my writing was going badly and I was seriously thinking about giving it all up – but what relationship is easy? Writing daily, even if I’m feeling ill or am away on holiday, and even if I only manage five words in a row, is the best way I know of strengthening this thread running through my life. The other benefit of having a daily practice is that it gives me a chance to practice perseverance. This is certainly an essential skill for writers. Most of us need to find a way to sit down and write whether we feel like it or not, and to deal with ongoing rejection. But getting to the end of a novel or finding a publisher aren’t the only situations in life where we can’t expect it to be easy. Our daily lives are full of instances when we could choose to go forward, or not. Shall I get up early to go swimming or switch off the alarm? Shall I try and talk to my mother again? Shall I keep looking for a better job? A daily practice allows us to practice perseverance because there will inevitably be days when we don’t want to do it. Days when we don’t want to do it, but we do it anyway. As the Zen teacher Katagiri Roshi used to put it, we’re not ‘tossed away’. We’re not tossed away by the desire to stay in bed – we get up. We’re not tossed away by any of the long list of intricate and inventive excuses we come up with. We have a quiet determination to continue, ‘no matter what’. This isn’t to say that we should beat ourselves with a stick. Perseverance or self-discipline is often thought of as wilful, almost self-punishing, but the best description I’ve ever read of discipline (from Henepola Gunaratna’s ‘Mindfulness in Plain English’) likens it to patience. Gunaratna describes self-discipline as a matter of becoming aware of our excuses – ‘I’m no good at this’, ‘I deserve some time off’ - and to simply stay with them. He suggests that if we can learn to allow all this stuff to come up and calmly wait it out (which isn’t as easy as it sounds!) we discover all that shouting is just an empty threat. The avoidant urges are just impulses. We listen to our excuses, we think ‘there are those excuses again’, and we get on with our practice. I’ve certainly found that it isn’t helpful for me to push myself too hard. If you push anything too hard, it breaks. Perseverance isn’t the answer every time either – sometimes it is more helpful to take some time out. A balance is needed between encouragement to keep the practice going, and the ability to be flexible. I came slowly to a daily writing practice, and I don’t punish myself if I have a few ‘off’ days’. I’m still on this journey with my meditation practice – sometimes managing to pull myself back from listening to my excuses, and sometimes not. Maybe it will become daily, maybe it won’t. There are no easy answers – all I can do is continue listening to myself. Writing is my thing, but it might not be yours. All kinds of pursuits can be fashioned into a daily practice and produce the same kinds of benefits. Different forms of art are an easy example – doing a single sketch, taking a single photograph, or writing down a phrase of music. Spiritual practices also work well on a daily basis – meditating, praying, or reading from a spiritual book. There’s also no reason why more ordinary things can’t take on an extra dimension as a result of your commitment to them. A walk around the garden every morning, even if it’s drizzling or blowing a gale, might bring you unexpected gifts. A daily writing practice doesn’t just help me to be a better writer, or to continually honour my commitment to writing. It doesn’t just help me to engage with the world around me. It also helps me to keep practicing patience – to become aware of favourite excuses, to get to know myself better. And it helps me to build faith in myself – in my ability to persevere with my writing, and to persevere with myself. I hope you find a practice you can love, so you can also start edging your way towards it. Edging towards it, full of ambivalence, but edging towards it nonetheless. Read extracts and reviews of Fiona’s latest book, ‘small stones: a year of moments’, at www.fionarobyn.com . Her daily blog is at www.asmallstone.com . The quote from Henepola Gunaratna, ‘Mindfulness in Plain English’ in full: “Discipline” is a difficult word for most of us. It conjures up images of somebody standing over you with a stick, telling you that you’re wrong. But self-discipline is different. It’s the skill of seeing through the hollow shouting of your own impulses and piercing their secret. They have no power over you. It’s all a show, a deception. Your urges scream and bluster at you; they cajole; they coax; they threaten; but they really carry no stick at all. You give in out of habit. You give in because you never really bother to look beyond the threat. It is all empty back there. There is only one way to learn this lesson, though. The words on this page won’t do it. But look within and watch the stuff coming up-restlessness, anxiety, impatience, pain-just watch it come up and don’t get involved. Much to your surprise, it will simply go away. It rises, it passes away. As simple as that. There is another word for self-discipline. It is patience." |
| Posted: 01/07/2008 13:55:02 Last Updated: 01/07/2008 13:58:05 |
Chick Lit > Writing Tips :: How to find a daily practice and stick with it