Whilst chatting with Bill, my favourite writing pluviophile, he mentioned something about doing his “Morning Pages”; or rather, that he had let himself slack off but would be getting back on track, or something to that effect.

What are Morning Pages, you ask?  I had to look it up.  This was invented by Julia Cameron and is described more fully in her book “The Artist’s Way”.  However, it was more a blog post by Shelby of “Little Coffee Fox”  that got me even more intrigued.

Apparently, this daily ritual can unleash our creative potential, so to speak – and not limited to the creativity in writing, either.  It can help artists of all sorts.  The point of this practice is to encourage us away from negative self-talk and away from the fear that holds us back.

Okay, sounds a little woo-woo but hey… I’ve been writing my gratitude journal for over fifteen years and what harm is there in going to bed thinking of five things to be grateful for?  It forces me to think of five positive things.  Some days the choices are slim but find them, I do.

So. how does this work?  Pretty simple.  Every morning, first thing, you dump your thoughts by writing three pages in longhand.  No plotting or strategizing, just stream of conscious writing.  Nothing pretty, punctuation and all that jazz doesn’t really matter.  The important thing is to simply write whatever comes to mind and to not stop until you have three pages worth.  What if you run out of things to say?  Find anything.  Just do it.  Oh, and here’s the best part.

NEVER READ WHAT YOU WRITE.

More importantly,

NEVER LET ANYONE ELSE READ WHAT YOU WRITE.

It’s a brain dump. Let it out.  And let it go. You can’t let it go if you go back to it, can you?

Alrighty then.  I am three days in.  A little early to see if anything comes from it but I like what Glitter Guide said after she tried it for thirty days:  she missed her therapist a bit less and her mind felt less cluttered as she started the day.  Did she have any big creative breakthroughs?  No. But she was open to the possibility.

And so am I.

Now, if I can just stop calling them Morning Papers maybe Prince will stop taking up space in my head…