A lot of important writing takes place in the shower. Take screenwriter Paul Guyot for instance.
So, my deadline is today. For the heist script. And I awake happy
and energized – knowing I have but two more scenes to right and I’m
done, on time.Then in the shower, it hits me. A cavernous hole in my plot. In the
actual heist itself. A hole big enough that to repair it means a major
rewrite of about 30% of what I already have.
This happens to me all the time…and in the shower, too. What the hell is it about showers anyway?
On our first series staff job, the showrunner had a shower in his office and I
figured it was in case he ever had to pull an all-nighter on a script and had to freshen up in the morning.
It wasn’t until later I knew what it was really for… every day writing… finding plot
holes, crafting dialogue, and coming up with new stories.
I’ve got to get a shower in my office one of these days. I’d be a lot more productive.
Okay, it was a rhetorical question, but…
For me it’s bicycling. I have a 12-mile commute (round trip) to my day job, and that’s where it happens for me. I think there’s something about automatic motion (pedaling, soaping–anything done so often that the brain can clock out) that lets the unconscious engage with the conscious more easily than usual.
It could be worse: You could, well, sitting.
The falling water is white noise, as well. Knitting can be helpful in the same way. I keep a sock going by the keyboard. If I find myself staring at the screen, I pick up the socks. Usually something will pop into my head.
//For me it’s bicycling. I have a 12-mile commute (round trip) to my day job, and that’s where it happens for me. I think there’s something about automatic motion (pedaling, soaping–anything done so often that the brain can clock out) that lets the unconscious engage with the conscious more easily than usual.//
Um, Keith, how do you rinse/lather/repeat while you’re on a bicycle???
It’s not just writers who get ideas in the shower, and it frankly creeps me out. My boss is always starting off some new project by telling me he was in the shower and he thought of this great new thing we should do. I don’t mind the work, and it isn’t a sexually harrasing kind of thing but i just don’t like the visual of him in the shower. I always picture him with shampoo in his eyes yelling “Eureka!”…. I get all my good ideas right as I am drifting off or in to sleep. I keep a notebook by my bed and if I am lucky what I have written down is legible.
how do you rinse/lather/repeat while you’re on a bicycle???
Dude, havent you been reading my blog? I can work up a lather anywhere.
For some reason I get my best ideas while ironing. And my clothes look sharp, too.
Oh yes! I get my best ideas (also the worst, though) in the shower. I think it must be the running water causing some kind of special stimulus for the body and therefore for the mind. One of my writing partners gets her best ideas in the car. She just has to go and sit in the car and WHAM she knows instantly what we should do with our script. While writing our last screenplay I had to send her couple of times to sit in the car when we couldn’t figure out something important. It worked every time!
I’m usually sleeping in the shower at 5 AM. I would be interested when the rest of you take a shower and how long it takes for an idea to ferment. Damn, I never thought about writing….
I think it’s something about being away from your computer. Somehow, your subconscious knows you can’t stop to take a few notes, so it decides to screw with you. (I have a very antagonistic relationship with my subconscious.)