Tag: Linkin Park

Confessions of a Consummate Scribbler

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And What shall I Write

Image by tomswift46 (No Groups with Comments) via Flickr

I woke up this morning so proud of myself.

I listened to my body last night and went to bed at a decent hour.  I woke up feeling rested and without my too-familiar reading hangover.  I poured my cup of coffee and went straight to my computer, opening up my WIP to its current draft.  I read over my changes so far, and with a rush of ideas, started to attack the next scene.

Then, nothing.

After about a minute, the cursor spent more time standing still and blinking rather than trailing words behind it.  I turned on Pandora radio, and tuned to my trusty Disturbed station, hoping angry, discordant music would remind me of whatever it was I wanted to say.  Still nothing.

It wasn’t for lack of ideas.  After all, the rough draft for WIP1 is finished.  Sure, most of the words cobbled together barely pass for sentences, but at least the words are there waiting to be rewritten.  Yet, the internal ramblings that woke up with me this morning and prodded me to my computer just, well, stopped.

Finally, I started doodling on the notepad that I keep on my desk, humming along to some Linkin Park.  And, what started out as daisy chains on a yellow notepad became the scene that I dreamed about when I woke up.

Thinking about it, I shouldn’t be surprised.  I’ve always been a scribbler.  I’m never without at least a notepad; my Moleskine notebook is a constant fixture in my tote bag.  I wrote most of my rough draft by hand first, before my fingers were able to fly over the keyboard and flesh out most of my thoughts.

I just figured in this drafting stage, I would be able to just do the changes straight on the computer.  Clearly, my brain disagrees.  There’s just something about the blinking cursor that my muses do not enjoy and so render me wordless in its presence.

So, I’ve made peace with the idea that I will just scribble and type through this drafting stage as well.  Though it may seem like an extra step, at least it’s helping me move in the right direction: a finished draft for my beta readers.

So Tell Me: do YOU have any writing quirks? Surely, I can’t be the only one with a writing Monk-ism.

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What Music Inspires…

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"These Black Lines"

Image by shifty eyes. via Flickr

I love to work out with great music; I feel that a lot of times, the right music helps to increase my focus, intensity, and overall determination to finish the task at hand.  So it is with my writing.

Overall, I have different types of music for different types of writing.  For example, my “wake up, morning writing” is set to Snow Patrol and Dashboard Confessional.  I just think it’s amusing that my current writing project relies heavily on my Disturbed station on Pandora Radio.

So, just for fun…the following is on heavy rotation on my Pandora Radio “Disturbed Station”:

Disturbed: “The Game”; “Indestructible”; “Divide”; “Another Way to Die”; “Fear”; “Pain Redefined”

Linkin Park: “Given Up”; “Breaking the Habit”; “Hit the Floor”; “Bleed it Out”

Shinedown: “Fly from the Inside”; “Sound of Madness”

Godsmack: “Fully Awake”; “I Stand Alone”; “Voodoo”

Korn: “Coming Undone”; “Freak on a Leash”; “Shoots and Ladders”; “Twisted Transistor”

Flyleaf: “I’m So Sick”; “Fully Alive”

Three Days Grace: “Pain”

Sick Puppies: “You’re Going Down”

Drowning Pool: “Tear Away”

Metallica: “Fuel”; “Enter Sandman”; “Master of Puppets”

Don’t worry.  My story isn’t about death, destruction, or mayhem (though I’m not saying it doesn’t contain these things… 😉 ).  I think the music though helps me in the act of writing; to keep going and give me the drive to finish, as if I were in my squat rack, or the last interval of a high-intensity interval training run.  Plus, it helps give amazing focus, by shutting out the rest of the world, and clarity, as if my subconscious is suddenly open and available to me.

With that said, time to turn Pandora Radio on, and dream of my worlds.