daily ten - an introduction

constraints and freeing myself up

Last week I co-tutored a non-fiction course with Alexander Masters. I’ve long admired Alexander’s work, I studied Stuart: A Life Backwards at university. In many ways it opened the world of narrative non-fiction to me, suddenly here was someone doing something exciting, daring, with facts. I hadn’t seen that before. When I was asked to tutor with him, I wasn’t sure what I could bring to the course, but last week was intensely satisfying, and I think the writers attending went away happy, or at least, everyone seemed to. I know I did. I find tutoring really reinvigorating, I’m so busy helping people find their way around their own work that it makes me do the same. And a week away from staring at the screen, the blank page, the uncompliant page, helps. The subconscious mind is the best thing.

During the week, Alexander and I wanted to free writers up a bit. Sometimes writing can feel so daunting that we freeze up before doing it. A freeze state doesn’t help when it comes to making something reasonably good. I read somewhere it takes around 400 repetitions to create a new synapse in the brain, whereas when this is done in play, it only takes 10-20 repetitions. The more playful we can be in our approach to things, the more quickly we learn. Last week we did a few exercises designed to do just this, and they really worked. And then, I realised, it’s been a long time since writing felt like playing and since I felt playful in my writing. It’s become a job, with deadlines and expectations attached and although that’s great, it sometimes takes away the element of play. I want that back.

Ironically, all the exercises we did involved placing a constraint on the attendees’ writing. Although it seems counterinitiative, tightening the rules or the limits around writing can often result in something fresher, more innovative. The Oulipo are a great example of this, and although I lack the discipline (talent) to adhere to their school, I often place constraints on myself. I read Louise Gluck say she did similar, with a sense of now what can I do at the start of a new project. I like that feeling of rolling my sleeves up and thinking of what I’m doing battle with next or what part of language is riling me up. Ava Anna Ada has no descriptive adjectives and no similes. For a while both made me feel a bit ill when I read them, so I systematically set about not using them in the book. I liked the sense of crusade this elimination created. It was also fun to think of ways around them - I’m aware that maybe my definition of fun might need work. But in a way, doing this created the playful approach I’m talking about and feel I’ve lost slightly.

At 3 this morning, I was awake thinking about what to do about this. It feels obvious to me now that I need to not only be more playful, but be more consistently so, and I here is a good place to do it, I like writing here, it feels like doing something just for me. I largely forget this goes to other people, I still really struggle with the idea of people reading my work, so I like writing like this, it’s not a book. And because I like this, I’m going to do my own daily exercise that I’ll post here, for nothing other than the enjoyment of it.

Each day, I will write and post a ten minute snapshot of the day. I won’t overthink it, the title will be where I am and the time it’s taken from, the post, what I’m doing or thinking or seeing. I hope this creates a sense of play for me, but I also hope it makes me see more, listen more - taking my own advice after telling people last week that the most important component of writing is listening - and also creates a kind of mini-diary. I have no idea if this is something anyone will want to read. That’s the risk of personal writing, our own lives are infinitely more interesting to us than to anyone else, but in the spirit of play, that bit doesn’t matter.

I’ll start tomorrow. I have a fear that the most exciting part of my year is behind me. I’m about to largely hunker down to do some intense work, so it might not be all that exciting, but again, in the spirit of play, I will try to ignore that and see what happens. The constraint is it’s writing in real time in a way, reporting back on something just happened, without editing or embellishing or overthinking. Ten minute instant snapshot, maybe even with a picture if I can be bothered to be real fancy. I don’t know what I’ll encounter along the way, but I’ll try to be faithful to the project; ten minutes to write ten minutes of my day. There will still be longer posts too, just these as well.