Cocaine gets recommended to writers / creatives all the time because (in my experience) cocaine makes it easier to write without editing / criticizing in real time. Your internal critic just gets overwhelmed by your internal cheerleader telling you everything you’re doing is awesome and it makes it much easier to just get something onto the page. It is possible to learn how to do this much more economically without cocaine, but a lot of writers who start using cocaine never figure out how to do that part without it. And there’s the whole addiction thing that makes writing a lot harder the longer you use it. Really tough to try to be creative when you’re jonesing.
His internal editor screamed “no they were supposed to be playing with model trains. Like weird 55 year olds. Or cool 55 year olds who get way too into it so their sets are badass. It’s a sign of them turning into weird slash cool 55 year old men look I like model trains” and instead we got, well, Cocaine Stephen
Your internal critic just gets overwhelmed by your internal cheerleader telling you everything you’re doing is awesome and it makes it much easier to just get something onto the page.
The only way I was able to finish my final paper in college was adderal + weed + booze. I used to be completely unable to write anything because the internal critic.
Now, I do 5 minute free writes on paper. Set a timer, no corrections, do not stop writing until the timer goes off, reword the sentence you just wrote if you can’t think of anything else.
Also weed still. Weed lets me write and write, and write…
Cocaine is the least useful substance in the creative substance (or so I’m told). Good old legal marijuana (thank you Trudeau), is probably the best all round, and if you use a typewriter, you might find you start typing to a rhythm.
However sometimes it’s better to put it down for a while and go to something else. Just like with anything, you can get burned out and fixated on details, redoing things over and over in a circle.
I outline, then I write, then I update the outline, then I write. Then I ignore the outline.
But when do you do the cocaine?
“Yes.”
-Stephen King
How much cocaine?
Also yes.
Cocaine gets recommended to writers / creatives all the time because (in my experience) cocaine makes it easier to write without editing / criticizing in real time. Your internal critic just gets overwhelmed by your internal cheerleader telling you everything you’re doing is awesome and it makes it much easier to just get something onto the page. It is possible to learn how to do this much more economically without cocaine, but a lot of writers who start using cocaine never figure out how to do that part without it. And there’s the whole addiction thing that makes writing a lot harder the longer you use it. Really tough to try to be creative when you’re jonesing.
This is how you end up writing about kids running a train on a girl to escape from an evil clown with a balloon.
His internal editor screamed “no they were supposed to be playing with model trains. Like weird 55 year olds. Or cool 55 year olds who get way too into it so their sets are badass. It’s a sign of them turning into weird slash cool 55 year old men look I like model trains” and instead we got, well, Cocaine Stephen
The only way I was able to finish my final paper in college was adderal + weed + booze. I used to be completely unable to write anything because the internal critic.
Now, I do 5 minute free writes on paper. Set a timer, no corrections, do not stop writing until the timer goes off, reword the sentence you just wrote if you can’t think of anything else.
Also weed still. Weed lets me write and write, and write…
Cocaine is the least useful substance in the creative substance (or so I’m told). Good old legal marijuana (thank you Trudeau), is probably the best all round, and if you use a typewriter, you might find you start typing to a rhythm.
Somewhere after drinking to oblivion and shortly before the looming deadline
The outline is like a scaffold for a building. Very helpful early on, but if it’s still standing when you’re done, you’ve done it wrong
I think as long as you’re constantly rewritting you’re moving in the right direction.
However sometimes it’s better to put it down for a while and go to something else. Just like with anything, you can get burned out and fixated on details, redoing things over and over in a circle.
Patrick Rothfuss confirmed greatest author of our age