I’ve been testing a new approach to writing, thanks to my work with the amazing writing coach and friend Azul Torronez.

It feels entirely different. I let the writing come through me rather than forcing myself to come up with ideas. I sit down to write with no preconceived plan, and as I write I explore what’s on my mind. When I do it this way, without a specific agenda, but rather for me to discover what it is that I have to say, I’m able to feel what I write more than think it. The key way that I know that I’m writing well is when I feel it.

Strangely, when you write in this way, you read through what you wrote and think to yourself, “huh, I had no idea I wrote that?”

This type of writing feels complete in a whole different manner. The piece itself is complete, even if it needs editing. I know it’s complete because I can’t feel anything else to say.

And what I end up writing comes as a surprise, even to me!

In writing, and possibly in many other domains, my best work is when I don’t try so hard. 

This is very difficult for those who believe that they should have a plan or every outcome.

What Azul taught me is that everyone gets the craft of writing backwards. Many people have an idea for a book or a topic, and then they outline it, and then they try and write their point. At least for me, what I’ve discovered is that I can do the opposite. I get curious about something and then explore it through writing. 

The point of what I write arrives at the end, as does the title and as does me understanding what I have to say. I feel into different ways of communicating as I’m sunk into the writing process without being so directed. I can write something that I *know* I should write without me knowing that I should have written it moments before. It’s like pulling a thread and seeing where it leads and then getting clear signals about what you must say or share. 

In this way, I’m writing as a discovery process – the ideas are ahead of me, not behind me. My best writing exists in what I discover, not in what I know.

The more vulnerable I am to go places in my writing, the more I feel connected to the thread I’m following, and the better the writing feels for me. There’s a time and place for editing and categorization, and that comes after you’ve gotten out what you want to say. 

Where do I pull my ideas from if not myself? How do I write things that I don’t already know that I have to say? I believe that this is where artists get it right, that there is some other aspect of consciousness, our own or others, that we can tap into that is more spontaneous. 

Because I’m pulling from a source that is expanded beyond myself, my ideas themselves are more expansive and whole in their form. 

If I was writing only what I already knew, I would only be writing over well-worn territory. How did Einstein come up with novel ideas in physics? He used his imagination to go beyond his own limitations, he connected to something beyond thinking. He dismissed logic and praised imagination. 

The mind knows the past, and where you’ve been. As you go beyond your own thinking, your creative future is in an intuitive synthesis, connecting to a consciousness beyond yourself. When you go beyond your individual self, you connect more with the whole. 

All of this has me wondering and learning more about how and where I can apply this process beyond writing. How can this same process work in speaking, recording, coaching, coding… even making decisions? 

Another interesting area related to this is learning. 

Have you ever just “known” something? 

Or have you ever picked up a new skill set and it just “clicked?” immediately? I felt this way when I picked up a camera.

Everything about how a camera worked to me was intuitive. I didn’t *technically* understand a camera but I knew intuitively how it functioned so that I could use it well despite not having technical understanding. 

This idea I’m talking about is not new or novel. Artists across history have spoken about the muse, or how they pull from something larger from themselves to create their work. 

The direct experience, however, for me is still and always completely new and novel, because it’s always surprising, spontaneous, and more enjoyable than working with your mind as the planner and control.

A big takeaway from this process for me is to create first and organize later. When I let go, the raw material emerges in a way that’s more authentic and surprising. 

Afterward, I can refine, categorize, and polish. You want the initial spark to come straight from the source—wherever that mysterious muse might live. Then you can edit and organize, and often it needs it. The material is raw, it’s precious, but needs refinement. 

Boundaries and constraints help as well, for example, word counts or lengths of a song. I like to use 1,500 word counts as a basic constraint. Constraints help bottle the creative stream of consciousness and help you pour it into something more structured and concrete. 

You can still do “planning” just enough to create direction and constraint, and then you can let go and allow the experience or work become what it wants to be. 

What I’ve noticed is this work also feels more “complete” than work that I would have otherwise tried to plan to a T. 

I love this sense of completion, it’s satisfying because you feel like you reached into the depths and grabbed something and now that you’ve pulled it out, you’ve done your job and the work was the work it was meant to be at that time.

I talk a lot about enjoying your work as you do it, and there’s no better enjoyment than getting into a flow state with your work and not forcing any agenda.