WRITER'S BLOCK: FREEWRITING AND FLOW

Flow goes hand in hand with freewriting.  Time dissolves.   Keeping your hand moving no matter what comes out of your pen is essential to freewriting.

From freewriting there may be long passages worth keeping, or little nuggets, or even nothing at all.  It's the good and the bad of freewriting.  However, the process of being in flow is something that cannot be valued highly enough.  Nor am I pooh poohing the work of revision.  (In other posts I've talked about the importance of freewriting in the revision process.)

Flow is not something that we can will to happen.  It is something that happens when we are totally unaware of it.  When we're in flow, we're involved, immersed, engaged, engrossed.  We've lost track of time.

Flow is a goal for the very reason that cherished nuggets will emerge as a result of this experience.  This has been described and discussed in various books by Csikszentmihalyi (e.g., Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention, Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement with Everyday Life (Masterminds Series), Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience (P.S.)) who first talked about the concept in 1997.

Freewriting is a way to get into flow, but freewriting is not flow.  While freewriting is not flow, it is one of the most reliable ways for a writer to engage flow.

Some days I have to write for a long time before flow emerges.  Other days, it's there quickly.  So, it is necessary to be patient and dedicated to the freewriting process to be sure to reap the rewards that come from flow.