Freewriting

Freewrite--An Exercise in creativity, or...

It's an exercise in creativity, certainly, but much more than that. English 268 is set up as a creative non-fiction class, and it is every bit of that. The emphasis is on the creative part. Most every day there's a freewriting event. We're required to put the pen on paper, and not lift it off, scribbling whatever free association words, ideas, thoughts, wacky concepts and ephemera come to mind--no thinking; just writing, writing, writing. It sounds crazy, useless, mostly a way for the teacher to take a break in the middle of a two-hour class. But the exercise has an amazing ability to dislodge jammed up concepts, constipation of the brain and generally viscous thoughts that are otherwise begging to be born. Some of the stuff is even usable!  Try it sometime: take a prompt, let's say "I'm afraid to..." and go to town. Just scribble and write and jot and scratch until your hand is numb. You might be amazed at the direction and result you come up with. 
In the picture above, one of my get-rich quick products is shown. It was a diary of sorts, an E-Book designed with the basic freewriting concept in mind. Take one of the diaries--they were called Burn The Baggage--open to the day in question, such #29 which would be today, and read the prompt. Then write down all the scary, angry, fearful, useless, restricting thoughts you have about that prompt, and get it out of your system. The idea was to do this for thirty days, then burn the results, burn the baggage that keeps you trapped in place and won't let you create what it is you're capable of creating. Burn the negative to end up with the positive. Just don't burn your homework.