writing process Archives – Constance Brewer

ADHD-ing My Way to Writing Success

Constance October 21, 2024 October 21, 2024 Essay / Writing

Working with the ADHD Brain

I have a blank space in my brain between the trip to London in the spring and OMG kids (not mine) are going back to school. I think it’s called summer-oh no-what happened-it’s-fall. It’s been hotter than ever in my corner of the U.S., highest temp on the back porch was 111—in the shade. Daily it was 90 to 100 with the 90s hitting about 9 a.m. Needless to say I didn’t get much done outside the house except scanning the horizon for wildfires. Now it’s almost November and I’m still wearing shorts and a t-shirt. Still scanning for wildfires.

Inside, however, is another story. Lots of writing going on. My ADHD brain decided to juggle the sequel to one contemporary fantasy novel, a second epic fantasy novel, and poems all at the same time. I’m holding multiple characters in my head, and you know what? It’s working. Such is the superpower of ADHD. Compartmentalizing and switching tracks on a moment’s notice. I wish I had seen it as a superpower long ago instead of a detriment as I was told.

It also holds the ability to hyper-focus, allowing me to actually do one paragraph and more outlines of chapters. Me, outlining more than a sentence. (Checks outside for flying pigs. Who would be crispy bacon in the heat.) It’s helped lock in that compartmentalizing part of my brain. If I got stuck on one story, I hopped to the other. Or poetry. Or some artwork. (Housecleaning, not so much.) Rinse, repeat.

I used Scrivener to do the outlining because I really like the corkboard function. It’s probably what trolled me over to the dark side. (Outlining). Then I slowly came around to other methods of outlining after a nifty fiction writers meeting. They helped explain what each part of the outlining method was supposed to do. And I understood it! Finally! I think combining the showing part of the presentation, examples, and hearing it aloud helped tremendously. I’But never fear, I still pants some of my chapters when the outline isn’t quite loosey goosey enough. So the best of both worlds, really.

I haven’t quite adapted to using Scrivener for the actual writing part. (Or Auto Crit) I think too many years of using Word makes it the more comfortable option. Technology—including air conditioning—has made this a season—or two seasons rather—to get serious writing done. I usually look forward to winter for writing, trapped in the house is prime time to let the percolating thoughts loose. But right now it falls to fall to be my vizualization time. The cool mornings, hot afternoons, and cool to cold nights fit my fickle brain perfectly. So I’ll stay in my bubble and crank out more words. Then we’ll see how ADHD brain handles editing this time around. Despite the flip-flopping thought process, perfectionism is still a thing. How do you multitask? Does perfectionism get in the way of your writing?

Outside Links

Why people with ADHD make great writers

Writers with ADHD

Links to More of My Essays on Writing

Is Writing Time Absolute?

Writing in Dual POVs (or more)

A Meditation on Walking and Writing

Using Weaving for Bursts of Writing Creativity

Figuring it Out as You Go

Find More Essays on My Non-Fiction Tab

Resetting My Writing Brain via London

Constance May 18, 2024 May 18, 2024 Essay

We took a fun excursion to London recently, and I didn’t think about writing once. I wanted a reset. No poems, no notebook, no scribbled ideas on my latest novel. Just the day-to-day joy of being in the moment. I didn’t even take as many pictures as I normally do, wanting to experience everything without a filter between my eye and the subjects.

We mostly toured museums, our passion for the past driving us. The British Museum in particular, where I could see all the mummies, statues, pottery, tools, chessmen, and hieroglyphs my heart desired. Things I’d studied in history and art history classes. Of course, to complete the art history trifecta, we hit the National Gallery and Tate Modern museums. Admiring paintings in person made my brain happy. There’s nothing like seeing the swirls of paint in a Van Gogh for yourself.

Horse head from Parthenon, British Museum

Lewis Chessmen, King, Bishop, Berserker — Lewis Chessmen – King, Bishop, Berserker
British Museum

Four Philosophers — The bane of studying for my Philosophy degree.
Ancient Philosophers.

Now that the trip is a couple of weeks in the past, my mind turns to exploring the sights and sounds of having been in London, looking for patterns and turning phrases around and around. Poems lurk on the periphery, waiting to be coaxed into life. I use the feelings of being a stranger in another country in my novel, guiding the character through missteps. We didn’t make that many—I think—because we read and videoed up on the place before we went.

Prime meridian — Prime Meridian, Greenwich Observatory

Clock Tower — Big Ben from one of our walk abouts

It was the small things. Standing to the right on escalators to let the impatient people go by. Waiting for others to get off the train before we got on. Saying good morning to our barista. (Who got to know us well.) Remembering politeness, something that seems to be dropping by the wayside as the century goes on. We found Londoners to be generally polite people. I was always offered a seat on the subway by random males. Perhaps due to the silver streaks in my hair? But it was appreciated. Especially after six hours walking in museums and the time spent walking from the Underground (and its numerous stairs) to the latest location.

This is not the Army’s hiking

That was another thing I enjoyed (mostly) The walking to get places. My current hometown is very car-centric, so being able to use public transportation and pop out close to my destination was a relief. I’m sure you folks in big cities know the feeling. Of course, being on vacation, there was no real rush to get places. We arrived when we arrived. We could enjoy the streets and scenery. Twice we took random walks, once in the Paddington neighborhood we stayed in, where we found a fabulous Italian restaurant, and the second time when we blew off another museum and just walked around Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens. It was beautiful, we enjoyed watching the dogs frolic on the expanses of green grass, got rained on, saw Guards on horses practicing for a parade, and generally just reveled in the pretty (long) walk.

Our home base for excursions was Paddington Station, and it’s funny how having a ‘center’ at the beginning and end of the day really helped. Not to mention the coffee shops in the station. Got to get our fix coming and going. The hustle and bustle in the station was a nice contrast to the slow pace of my rural hometown. My brain embraced the contrast, and now that I’ve had time to digest it all, I feel words stirring. The urge to jump back into writing and explore relationships between people and places. I’m ready.

What do you do to reset your writing brain?

Some of the Places We Went

British Museum

The National Gallery

Tate Modern

Royal Observatory Greenwich

Hyde Park

The Cleveland Arms Pub

Briciole

Harry Potter Studio Tour

More Essays

Five Poems That Pulled Me Into Poetry

Backwards This Language Is

Sketching Out a New Year

How Cats Help You Write

More Lessons From Printmaking

A Meditation on Walking and Writing

For more essays, search the Non-Fiction Links

Is Writing Time Absolute?

Constance November 14, 2022 November 14, 2022 Essay / Writing

Let's Rock Mittens Front — “Let’s Rock” Mittens Front

Just before the first snow arrived I got the urge to pick up my knitting again. I tend to slack off during the warm summer months as I like knitting with wool and it can get warm. I don’t do much weaving in the summer either. I think fiber arts go by the wayside in general during the hot weather. Too much to do outside. Jumping back into doing a colorwork hat, I forgot how much I enjoyed the meditative quality of knitting. Around and around, flicks of contrasting colors here and there, plenty of time to contemplate other things besides the Yankees totally blowing the playoffs. (I’m not bitter. Much) What do I contemplate? My latest writing problems mainly.

I’m down to plugging the holes in my Next Fantasy Novel. I’ve outlined cards in Scrivener, most marked “Final Draft” but there are still half a dozen chapters marked “To do”. I jotted down the idea for each To Do chapter on the cards. Somewhere in novel one, I discovered I could break away from my rigid linear thinking, scribble down a one-paragraph outline for a chapter, and roll merrily onward. Some writers may scoff, having done this all along. I had to shake loose from my rigid expectation that the only way I could make progress on the novel was to slog through it in order. What comes next? Write that. Next? Next? It was keeping me from seeing the possibilities jumping around provided. (Not gonna lie, the thought of working out of order still makes me cringe.)

Fiber Arts as Teacher

Maybe it came from knitting patterns, where you have to do things in order or you end up with a Frankensweater, or off-kilter colorwork. Every pattern has its progression. A-Z with no stops in between. Then I got wild and crazy with the knitting and weaving. I warped my loom the normal way, started weaving, and wondered, what if I changed the weft yarn to this multicolored thick yarn? So I did. It was shocking. Intriguing. And pretty cool looking. I played around with different yarns in the same project. It circled me back to my roots as an artist in grad school, where experimenting was the norm. Where did I lose that?

I think when I ran out of big blocks of time to work. If you’re going to squish a project into the little bits of time after work, you don’t want to make any mistakes. You want perfectionism. But mistakes are where the fun’s hiding. Instead of forcing my writing to march forward in line, I scribbled ideas down in Scrivener, grabbed a Chapter card, and started writing. When I finished, I tackled another one. My pantsy outlining was the key, enough info in a paragraph to point me in the right direction, but not enough to lose the fun of exploring where the idea was going. Too much outlining always made me feel as if I already knew the story. So why write it?

Writing Roots

Knitting was the same, sorta. I grabbed a pattern and used it to learn the technique, going in with the mindset I may have to rip it all out and start again. Instead of bemoaning all the time wasted, I became more careful with how I progressed, setting stitch markers to keep track of repeats, and marking charts to note progress. Technical ability increased my confidence. So it went with the writing. I found my outlining sweet spot, not afraid to go back and rewrite shaky parts, and revise the outline. None of it was a waste of time when I had a goal to shoot for, and didn’t let my anal retentive need for complete control take over. My first Norwegian Star hat has a wonky tip on one star. Nobody noticed it but me. The Rock and Roll mittens have a few miscues. The recipient didn’t care.

Let's Rock Mittens Back — “Let’s Rock” Mittens Back
& Skulls Hat

My new mantra? Let it go. What’s the worst that could happen? (Besides getting the Frozen theme song stuck in your head.) I’m my own worst critic. But I don’t have to be. I’ve even learned to knit a sock toe-up instead of top-down. Flipping my expectations. If it doesn’t work out, rip it apart and start again. Einstein showed in his thought experiments that people traveling at different speeds, while agreeing on cause and effect, measure different time separations between events. (Wikipedia). I’m going to quit measuring the time I don’t have and work with what I do have. My time is not your time. I’ll travel at my own speed, and if it’s not perfectly linear, well, that’s okay.

Let’s Rock Mitten Pattern

Skull Hat Pattern

Essays on Writing:

How Cats Help You Write

Figuring it Out as You Go

More Lessons From Printmaking

Using Weaving for Bursts of Writing Creativity

What I Learned from Editing

For other essays, search the Writing or Writing Process tags.

How Cats Help You Write

Constance August 12, 2022 August 12, 2022 Essay / Writing

How do cats help you write? By focusing the eyes of judgment upon you. Continuously. Under the heavy scrutiny of a feline, one tends to look at their work with a more critical eye. No? Just me? My Tuxedo cat, Lorenzo, likes to sprawl on the bookcase across the room and watch me as I write. I’m hyper-aware of those yellow eyes observing and judging. Especially when I read a passage aloud.

It’s bad enough to have to listen to my voice attempting to add inflection and create different voices for the characters. I can’t help it, I glance over at the cat as I’m doing it. He stares with eyes narrowed to slits. The tail gives a lazy flick. My words suddenly become weak under the weight of feline perception. I click and highlight puny words, and rearrange sentences. Remake, redo, rewrite.

How Cats Really Help You Write

Lorenzo never jumps in my lap and attempts to comfort me. Or change my prose. He doesn’t walk across my keyboard. Well, he did once when he was new, but never since. Rewriting is not his job. Instead, he skulks above on the bookcase, peering down, forming opinions and conclusions, black and white face a mask of indifference. If that’s not a hypercritical reader, I don’t know what is. Not much awes a cat.

(The Corgis would gasp and gush “I love it!” even if I read them a grocery list.)

Sometimes my spoken words get scant approval. He lazes with a paw hanging over the edge of the bookcase, head turned away, the cat version of impressed. I feel good. “This is a new chapter,” I tell him. “The one where the hero realizes the antagonist is not who he thought it was. Life is about to get worse.”

Lorenzo rolls over, crouches, and leaps the six feet to the floor. A big stretch, then a whack to a toy mouse in his way. He pounces, rolls over, savages it, back feet flailing, claws digging. This goes on for a good five minutes. Finished, he spares a glance for me and utters a cross between a soft yowl and a gurgle. He stalks over to his cat tree, climbs to the tallest bed in the tower, and curls up for a nap, back to me.

Rewrite, Human Slave. It’s Your Only Hope

Message received. My hero needs to suffer more. The great revelation needs punching up. I pound away at the keyboard in a frenzy, rewriting, tossing my hero off a cliff into a pit full of stinging jellyfish riding the backs of pissed-off alligators. Hours later I read it aloud, gratified when Lorenzo uncurls from his sunny perch to come over, staring up with unblinking yellow eyes. He admits several vocalizations that sound more like guttural wahs than meows. Does it mean I’ve done it? Impressed the judgmental cat?

No.

It’s dinner time.