Writer's Flood ... and Prayer

Some friends have asked me if I ever have writer's block. To say "No" in my out-loud voice feels like asking for trouble ... but, "No."

And on this project, there is definitely no writer's block: it's more like "writer's flood." So much to say, that I've waited so long to try to say, so many places to begin, each of them depending on the other ... writer's flood means writer's confusion, as in "where do I start?" (when there's so many places to start?) and "how do I say this?" (and be true to what I know without pissing people off before they get a chance to hear what I'm saying?)

I like the story Anne Lamott tells, about her brother's struggles with a writing project on birds when he was a kid. Her brother was overwhelmed with the magnitude of the task, and her dad said "Just take it bird by bird." (Good enough advice to become the title of her book on writing, Bird by Bird.)

But the help I like best with writer's flood is prayer. I have been a praying writer for a while now. I pastored part-time from 2001 to 2004, and one of my favorite parts of that gig was developing the sermons: researching the text, looking at the words used, checking out the Greek and Hebrew roots, thinking through the implications of the text for the community I was preaching for/to/with, writing the sermon.

As do lots of preachers, I'd look ahead at the texts coming up; each one got a back burner on my mind's stove, and as I went through the days I'd see or hear or read things that went into the pot. Lots of times I'd come across something accidentally, or wake up with an idea or a problem solved. I learned that my mind kept working -- and often did its best work -- when I wasn't looking. I figure my sub-conscious was sneaking off to talk to God without me in the way.

When I began to write the sermon I'd sit and pray and ask God to be in the middle of it, that what I would write would get as close as I could to what God wanted. If I wasn't sure how to start, or if I felt human fear about what I felt I needed to say, those prayers could get really specific.

Sometimes, when I just couldn't figure things out, I'd stop. Sit. Pray in that wordless way that acknowledges need, willingness, openness.

And usually something would start writing itself in my head, and I'd scramble back to the keyboard.

I do know this smacks of delusions of grandeur, or lunacy, depending on how you look at it ("Reeeaalllly? God tells you what to write?"), so I'll leave it at that. But, no question, I do believe in the Spirit that resides at the heart of the word "inspiration."

These prayers make the work feel more coherent, even if the writing is not. I am reminded that I can pick a place to start and get going and fix it later if it wasn't the right place to start. I am reminded that there are lots of editors in the world, but no one else can write this first draft. I am reminded that anything worth doing is worth doing wrong or badly to begin with. I am reminded that I am loved, whether or not I write a word.

Choreographer Twyla Tharp, in her book The Creative Habit, talks about having a ritual that carries you into the work of the creative process every working day. Sitting with God is part of mine. I wake, write morning pages,* get breakfast for the kids and get them off to school, read through where I was yesterday (I try to quit in the middle of something good so I have some momentum the next day), edit and tweak a little, and then get away from the computer and sit.

*(yes, another good friend of a book, Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way)

I imagine God sitting in front of me; God is bigger than I am, sitting in a huge rocking chair ... all I can see is legs and a lap. I put whatever I am praying about in the lap. And just sit.

At some point in these writer's prayers, little tendrils of words start weaving themselves in my head, and I take the hint and get to work. I try to get five pages done before I quit for the day. When I hit a stumbling point, I stop, close my eyes, empty my mind, wait. The word comes ... a way through ... I keep going.

When my mental endurance is flagging, I'll play guitar (six-string prayer) for a while or go for a walk (moving meditation). Often an idea or a turn of phrase or at least some more energy will come.

An atheist could probably use the same practices without calling it prayer, without God in the middle of it all ... but you know, dissertating is a lonely business. I'm glad for the company.