Intuitive Writing
“Intuitive eating” is where you eat only when you’re hungry. It’s sounds obvious, but we often eat for many reasons. We’re conditioned to “finish what’s on our plate” or “eat your vegetables before dessert” or “drown heartbreak in ice cream.” With intuitive eating, there are no restrictions, diets or rules. There is only listening to your body–which is harder than it seems. But babies do it. They eat until they’re full and then stop. In other words, intuitive eating ispossible. We all used to do it, once upon a time.
I like the concept as a parallel to writing. We want to write, like we want to eat, but often there are rules or restrictions. We must write five pages a day, or five hours every week. It’s not that goals are bad. It’s that we cling to them as the only way to write.
Instead, I strive for “intuitive writing”. I do set aside time in my day to write, just as I would take time for breakfast, lunch and dinner. But if I feel like a feast, I dive into my draft. Some days, though, I’m not terribly hungry; so instead, I peck away at my revisions.
If we need to learn to listen to our bodies to eat intuitively, I think there’s value in learning to listen to our minds to write intuitively.
And, like throwing away the fad diet, it alleviates the guilt.
Just some food for thought. 🙂