A Room Of Your Own: Speak-Write

lizshine74by lizshine74

In A Room Of Your Own, On writing.

You’ve heard of Freedom, right? Software you can pay for that shuts off your Internet for how ever many minutes of writing time you desire?

I won’t lie. When I head about it, I was more than intrigued. As I considered downloading it over the course of several days, I slipped the news of this new software into all sorts of social conversations. Other writers. Women in my running group. Strangers also waiting for their coffee beverage of choice. Everyone thought it was an excellent idea. I did too. So, why did I hesitate?

I hesitated because I have a tendency to throw money at my problems on a whim, only to face devastation when the problems don’t actually go away. The shoe organizer I bought didn’t keep me from buying too many shoes. The self-help book I bought with On-Click-Ordering didn’t cure my tendency to behave as if my boyfriend should know how I feel, what I want, without my having to tell him. I’m not any less pissed when he doesn’t read my mind.

Hours wasted checking email and browsing people’s status updates are symptoms of a larger problem. Freedom? The idea is absurd, if you think about it. Pay money to shut off Internet you pay money for because you don’t have the self control to open your browser instead of your document? And is there a program to turn off my phone? Keep my son from walking into the room even after I’ve told him I’m writing and need to concentrate? Turn the TV down in the other room? Make the rain start? Pick up the pen for me?

The larger problem?

Most of us live in environments unconducive to flow. Our society seems hell-bent against it. In our quest to avoid boredom, we have opened ourselves to a ceaseless chatter of information and stimulation. We cannot hear ourselves think.

One very concrete trick I have for inducing flow, wherever I am?

Speak-writing.

Speaking while I write and reading the words aloud after I’ve written them. There’s something about the physical act of writing combined with the sound of the words from my mouth that enables me to find that space where I am able to write despite distractions internal or external. Sure, people look at me funny when I do this in public, but who cares? I like to think the quirk just adds to my mystery.

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Some past posts to keep you making time: 
Adjust your pace accordingly.
It’s about the routine and how you shake up the routine
There are things you will have to give up
See it to achieve it
Washing the dishes
Write slowly
A celebration of the pause
Monday, a run through the driving rain
Zen accident
Get out of your comfort zone

lizshine74

lizshine74

Liz Shine teaches high school English, writes, edits, and coaches other writers from her home in Olympia, WA. When she begins to feel overwhelmed by it all, she simply looks up at Mount Rainier in the distance and gets back to work. If that fails, she heads to the ocean. She is a founding editor at Red Dress Press. Her Substack Make Time is her gift to writers, like her, trying to magic time in this crazy, busy world. All of those posts are cross-posted on the blog here. You can see more of her writing at lizshine.com and find her on Instagram {@lizshine.writer} cooking, traveling, and in other ways seeking moments of awe. She has been an active participant in communities of writers since the early 1990s. She’s learned that two things feel truly purpose-driven in life: writing and coaching other writers. In the in between (because one cannot be driving for a purpose every moment), she enjoys looking for wonder and connection. She is a lifelong yoga student, an enthusiastic walker along streets and trails, and an amateur gardener and vegetarian cook. She lives in Olympia, WA. She believes in the power of practice and has been practicing writing since some time in the early 90s when she became an adult in the rain-soaked city of Aberdeen. Writing began with journaling, as a way to understand a confusing, sometimes violent coming-of-age. She writes mostly fiction, some nonfiction, and poetry, and holds an MFA from Pacific Lutheran University’s Rainier Writers Workshop. She is a founding editor at Red Dress Press.