Sometimes, a little down time makes all the difference.
Yesterday, I did all the right things. I immersed myself in the work, sat down at the scheduled time, and avoided distractions for 3.5 hours.
But nothing came out. I barely managed 250 words.
Today was different. I sat down and the words started putting themselves down, flowing from my hands—well, not exactly without effort—but I’d say more readily than yesterday.
What made the difference?
Time. Down time, to be exact.
Yesterday, I put in the hours and did the hard work of trying to put together the myriad facts and ideas, but the puzzle just wasn’t fitting together.
Later in the day, as I rested and played and slept, I suppose my subconscious mind had time to find how to connect everything.
When I woke up today, all I needed to do was to paint the formed puzzle in my mind with my verbal wordbrush.
The takeaway from this, if you’re doing any kind of creative work, is to allocate sufficient time in your schedule for your mind to fit the puzzle pieces together.