The Power of the Writing Habit

There is a lot of great articles both on this blog (see here), and on other blogs (specifically here and here) that discuss ways to overcome writer's block.

This springs to mind because this blog's primary "field correspondent" Kristi Jones, is off at a writer's retreat and is kicking ass at knocking out her word count (see @authorkristi on Twitter for a play-by-play).

But I wanted to discuss habits.

 I read a book once called The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg (see here and here). It was a great book, and invariably, like most non-fiction books I try to read, I failed to complete it. In the book,  Duhigg tells many many stories about how habit is more important in lifestyle than any other one thing. Not only that but breaking the habit that leads to poor choices is more important than stopping the poor choice cold turkey.

One of the more memorable stories was about an older gentleman who suffered a severe brain injury. He was left without the ability to function normally in life. He always had to have a nurse or care-taker after the injury occurred. He many have even been a university professor prior to the injury (I suppose a re-read is in order). Nevertheless, the old guy would go for walks every afternoon. He couldn't get out of bed by himself, or brush his teeth, or make coffee, or any of the daily ins and outs of regular life. But he would go out the door and walk around the block every day without fail.

It was a habit he had before the injury and it was one that he kept afterward. If he was stopped while on his walk and asked about why he had decided to go on a walk, he wouldn't even be able to tell you. As I recall he didn't even realize that he was on a walk. It was just something that he did cause it was habit. I have a dog that does the same thing. I will start Killian on a walk and he’ll just go on and walk around the block by himself and eventually find himself at our backdoor waiting to be let in. It’s autopilot.

Bully for Kristi for kicking ass at the writer’s retreat. And could this could be sour grapes if only cause I would love the chance to take off for a writer’s retreat (gotta love those “professional” writers), but I think my writing has more to do with habit than anything else.

I get into the habit of writing and that’s what keeps me writing. The more I write the more I think about my novel and the more I want to write. If I wake up on weekends and write, then I keep waking up on weekends to write. If I write at night then I keep writing at night. Whenever something gets in the way of that habit, be in baseball games for the kiddo, or an interesting show at night, then BOOM the chain is broken and the habit is lost. For me it’s that quick. I have to go back out there and re-establish the habit if I want it back.

It’s the quick fall off of the habit that is my Achilles heel. I don’t think I’m an addictive type of person. I smoked for a while as a kid, then I came home from Europe and I stopped. Just stopped. I dipped tobacco in the Army. When I got out of the Army I stopped dipping. I wanted to lose weight so I stopped eating meat and cheese and milk and eggs. I want to lose weight so I stop drinking. Stopping things is just that easy to me. I just stop.

I wish that I had a more addictive personality where I couldn't get away from my writing, even to watch a nine year old pitch for the first time in a baseball game. I have a novel that is two thirds the way done right now just waiting for me to get back into the habit of writing. Can you just imagine how terrific it would be to be like that walk around the block fella or Killian and just BOOM find yourself sitting in front of your computer knocking out your novel and not even realize your doing it. 

Still, I’m jealous of the writer’s retreat . . . that’s a habit I could get used to.