An Open Letter To Stuff I’ve Written When I Should Have Been Writing Something Else
Is "productive procrastination" a thing?
Dear Stuff I’ve Written When I Should Have Been Writing Something Else,
You’re such a dick. You pop into my brain uninvited, fully formed in a way whatever I’m supposed to be writing refuses to be. You are often pretty, witty and weird — a golden trifecta of prose that begs to be explored.
Are you a gift from the muses? Or just my procrastination in overdrive, distracted by a shiny new word toy?
Is multitasking creative projects a way to keep things fresh, or the death blow to true productivity?
Take the following character vignette. I wrote this while I writing something else, which was an outline for A Serious Piece of Literary Writing:
These characters do not populate the Serious Piece of Literary Writing. I rarely write prose in the third person, and I haven’t the foggiest where this story was going, if it was going anywhere at all.
Am I glad I jotted down this moment between these characters, that seems to have some intriguing tension brewing? Yes.
Was giving these characters a slice of my attention detrimental to the outline at hand? Not realllly. But if I gave bandwidth to every little notion or scene that popped into my brain, my creative output would be limited to captions and bite-sized content, long-form narratives vanishing like a fart in the wind.
(Confession: that last sentence was constructed entirely around using the crude but wonderful phrase “vanish like a fart in the wind.” I never got to be a 13 year-old boy who would use phrases like that, so I’m making up for it now.)
Do I know what to “do” with this character vignette? No.
Perhaps this is the real question. Does every scrap of prose, every artistic output need to “be something?”
I’ve always wrestled with this, and have always judged myself for it. This idea that real writers, real artists, create just for the sake of creating. That I am somehow not a “real” writer when I feel every effort spent in the creative process must build toward a larger goal.
For example, the idea of Morning Pages, aka writing stream-of-consciousness-mind-splooge as the first writing of the day. I have tried time and again to do this. But I feel like I’m wasting precious creative time on blah blah when there are “real” pages I need to be writing.
There is also room in this thought bubble for the acknowledgment of writing as a career, as a job one shows up to day after day, rather than some mystical art thing. Like any job, there are responsibilities and requirements. Sometimes it’s wildly satisfying. Often it’s tedious as hell.
Hmmm. Now we’re on the subject of writing and money. Writers getting paid money. The intersection of art and commerce. A sticky subject I did not intend for this essay to be about. And yet here we are, probably because as the WGA strike marches on and all my projects are on pause, I’m yet again scratching my head, looking at my bills and wishing I’d wanted to be a dentist.
And why not illuminate the topic at hand, by writing about something else rather than writing about how I write about other things when I should be writing about … other things.
I’ve found these pieces on the subject to be helpful slash insightful slash depressing slash intriguing:
How Much Free Work Do Writers Do to Get Paid Work? (The most concise breakdown I’ve yet heard on why the WGA is striking and how the industry will be better for it.)
Writers Are Shaking Up The Publishing World By Revealing Advance Payment Figures (Roxanne Gay revealing her advance $ and the Twitter convo really shook me.)
For years, I’ve used the term “productive procrastination.” I probably even thought I made it up. In reality, give the term a Google and find dozens of articles. I am not alone in thinking I’m still getting. shit. done. by delaying one task by doing another (less fraught) task. But can all this mental channel changing possibly be good for the creative process?
Take the following work schedule Henry Miller outlined in 1932, that he called his “Commandments.” I’m putting in bold the commandments that are different ways he tells himself NO, do not change your writing direction midstream.
This list was published in the book, Henry Miller On Writing.
Work on one thing at a time until finished.
Start no more new books, add no more new material to “Black Spring.”
Don’t be nervous. Work calmly, joyously, recklessly on whatever is in hand.
Work according to Program and not according to mood. Stop at the appointed time!
When you can’t create you can work.
Cement a little every day, rather than add new fertilizers.
Keep human! See people, go places, drink if you feel like it.
Don’t be a draught-horse! Work with pleasure only.
Discard the Program when you feel like it—but go back to it next day. Concentrate. Narrow down. Exclude.
Forget the books you want to write. Think only of the book you are writing.
Write first and always. Painting, music, friends, cinema, all these come afterwards.
But to just ignore you, Stuff I’ve Written When I Should Have Been Writing Something Else, doesn’t feel right either. When the muses toss wonder and beauty at you, grab your lasso and harness it down from the stars.
Take the following sketch, for example, also discovered in my Notes app. I was writing a screenplay at the time, when I had the intense urge to also jot down some memories of the small town I grew up in. I think there’s an emotional truth wanting to spring forth when these little don’t-ignore-me notions pop up. Maybe it’s going to build into another story for another time. Maybe it’s just good practice to get it out of the head and onto the page.
And now, I feel a procrastination gremlin this way cometh. In this case, I need to procrastinate getting to the point of this essay. So I will offer something of adjacent value. More links!
Things I’ve Consumed During Recent Productive Procrastination:
The Ram Dass Low-Fi 24/7 Radio
Chuck Palahniuk Shares the Strange Story of His Father's Murder
Tina Turner covering Whole Lotta Love. And Prince doing the same.
But wait more Tina Turner (RIP). A 1969 performance. Tina performing on the Johnny Carson show. Singing a duet with Cher. Singing with David Bowie.
Obsessively researching facts about the script and production of Midnight Cowboy (1969). In a recent crisis of faith about the state of writing and making movies (a strike with no foreseeable end will do that to you), I said to my fiancé “Show me cinema! Show me something I’ve never seen before that will make me remember why I’m trying to be in this bonkers industry in the first place.” And thus my first immersion in the weird, sad, sexy, funny, psychedelic dreamhouse that is Midnight Cowboy. Dustin Hoffman’s fantasy sequence of being a lothario to elderly ladies in Miami is perfection.
Here’s another thing I wrote while I should have been writing something else. Bonus points if you can read my serial killer handwriting.
A predominant thought when we were making MOON MANOR was how good it felt to only work on ONE project. I felt the same singular focus when I wrote a novel. I keep meaning to focus on one project at a time. The life as a working writer demands otherwise.
“Procrastination is typically thought of as a time-management issue. But Timothy Pychyl, a psychologist at Carleton University, in Canada, argues that it’s more an issue of emotion management. He notes that many people cope with negative feelings surrounding a task or responsibility by simply avoiding the task, at least temporarily. You have probably experienced this if you have put off a difficult conversation and justified it by saying, “I can’t deal with this right now.” From The Atlantic’s “Procrastinate This, Not That”
So I think we’re at the moment this Open Letter became more of a case-in-point. If it weren’t for the one thing that makes writing a perfectionist’s best friend » REVISION! « most of what I write and share would be all over the place, much like this essay.
Because procrastination, even of the productive variety, is a form of busyness. As the Buddhists say: “The highest form of laziness is busyness.”
Okay, that’s all I have to say about this.
Bye.
—Erin