by James Scott Bell
@jamesscottbell
Walt Whitman’s poem “Song of Myself” begins this way (spelling in original):
I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.
Walt was on to something, namely, it is much better to observe grass than to smoke it. Loafing is not about psychoactive stimulation. It’s about inviting your soul.
Which is exactly what we should invite as writers. It is what makes our writing, our voice, unique. It is what a machine does not, and can never possess.
So just how do we invite our soul? We can practice creative loafing.
I had the privilege of knowing Dallas Willard, who was for many years a professor of philosophy at USC, where your humble scribe studied law. Willard was widely known for writing about the spiritual disciplines, e.g., prayer, fasting, simplicity, service, etc. I once asked him what he considered the most important discipline, and he immediately responded, “Solitude.”
That threw me at first. But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. Solitude, which also includes silence, clears out the noise in our heads, the muck and mire, so we can truly listen.
“In silence,” Willard wrote, “we come to attend.”
Our world is not set up for solitude, silence, contemplation.
Boy howdy, how hard that is for us! According to a recent survey, Americans check their phones 205 times per day. Further:
- 6% check their phones within the first 10 minutes of waking up.
- 76% check their phones within five minutes of receiving a notification.
- 7% use their phones while sitting on the porcelain throne.
Needless to say, this doesn’t “invite your soul.” Loafing, even boredom, does. As one neuroscientist puts it:
Boredom can actually foster creative ideas, refilling your dwindling reservoir, replenishing your work mojo and providing an incubation period for embryonic work ideas to hatch. In those moments that might seem boring, empty and needless, strategies and solutions that have been there all along in some embryonic form are given space and come to life. And your brain gets a much needed rest when we’re not working it too hard. Famous writers have said their most creative ideas come to them when they’re moving furniture, taking a shower, or pulling weeds. These eureka moments are called insight.
Learn how to loaf, I say! And it is a discipline. I take Sundays off from writing. It’s not easy. I feel myself wanting to write a “just a little” (which inevitably becomes “a lot”). I have to fight it. If I win the fight, I always feel refreshed and more creative on Monday.
Try this: Leave your phone in another room and sit alone in a chair for five minutes and don’t think about anything but your breath going in and out. You’ll be amazed how hard that is. But it’s a start. If you’re working on your WIP, take a few five-minute breaks to loaf and invite your soul. You’ll get better at it. And your work will get better, too.
I will finish with this moving story about silence.
A fellow enters a monastery and has to take a vow of silence. But once a year he can write one word on the chalkboard in front of the head monk.
The first year goes by and it’s really hard not to talk. Word Day comes around and the monk writes “The” on the chalkboard. The second year is really painful. When Word Day comes he scratches “food” on the chalkboard.
The third year is excruciating, the monk struggles through it, and when Word Day rolls around once more, he writes “stinks.” And the head monk looks at him and says, “What’s with you? You’ve been here for three years and all you’ve done is complain.”
How are you at creative loafing?
Interesting post. I am very good at creative loafing. This blog and a weekly newsletter about writing are the sum total of my daily online reading, though I do some research when needed. My husband has finally accepted that I sometimes check out of the present and disappear into the 1870s or 1970s, to another state or country. This happens a lot when we travel, but also when I’m in the same room where he’s watching TV. I’m in the process of rearranging my office and it’s taking a lot longer than it should because I keep finding scraps of paper with story ideas on them, which prompt a scene, and then I go there for a while. It’s honestly a wonder that I function at all in the real world. 🤣
Many of us feel exactly the same way from time to time, Becky. And, of course, sometimes our spouses feel that way about us, too. 😁
I live in a relatively remote area. I have no trouble sitting around doing nothing, maybe for too long at a stretch. My phone is on my desk, but unless someone initiates a text or a rare phone call, I don’t use it. I’ve got a 27 inch monitor and a 21 inch monitor. Why use that tiny screen for anything that’s not critical. (Like my son telling me the UCLA/SC game is on NBC.)
I like solitude.
USC-UCLA is always critical. Correct outcome last night
From long practice I can say I am a journeyman loafer. My wife reminds me of that accomplishment from time to time. Solitude has never been painful for me as long as it’s found at opportune intervals. As you and Walt say, Jim, it soothes and invites the soul–which actually needs no invitation as it is always present. Only thinking makes it seem otherwise. The challenge is to stop indentifying with thoughts. A writer’s mind is fertile soil for invention, preoccupation, rehearsal.
Discovering Walt Whitman my junior year in college was an epiphany. I wrote an essay contrasting his identity with nature and Ernest Hemingway’s belief that honest writing could only arise from lived experience.
Thank you for this early reminder to stop bending into the story for a while and just listen and feel closer to Big Soul.
I like that, Dan. “Journeyman loafer.” There ought to be a trade school for that.
Cool idea for a college paper, too. Whitman and Hemingway were both quintessentially American, though from different angles.
That essay was an American Lit final prepared in an all-nighter on a Smith-Corona electric and dropped in the door slot 30 minutes before deadline. Aced it. You remember those days.
Walks are my creative loafing time. Fresh air, moving stiff muscles, and getting blood flowing all contribute to a reenergized mind, body, and productivity.
But it’s getting harder and harder to find quiet. Jim, where’s that monastery located? 😉
Certainly not in the greater Los Angeles area, Debbie. And walking here can also be hazardous to your health!
The phone stats are sad and I’m so guilty.
Adjacent to that, I read that “Large Language Models (AI) trained on the same viral, low-quality internet junk we consume every day are experiencing rapid cognitive collapse — reasoning plummets, long-term memory vanishes, and even dark, narcissistic traits emerge. Worst of all? Even when scientists try to “detox” the AI with high-quality data, the damage is permanent.”
I think I also read that internet scrolling changes the brain’s chemistry/wiring. I need more loafing and less scrolling in my life.
How frightening that AI might be training itself down, not up.
Loaf more, scroll less!
I like being alone. Come to think of it, it’s hard—maybe impossible—to be creative when I’m in the company of other people. For me, the most productive time is when I’m outside running/walking alone while listening to a good book or a lecture on creative writing.
I think I’d do pretty well in that monastery (if they improve the food.) 🙂
Funny, but I can be creative in a busy coffee house. I often write with coffee house noises via Coffitivity on my computer. But when I love, I want quiet.
The one time I had monastery food it was as that fellow suggested on the chalkboard.
Great post, Jim. I don’t loaf as much as I might. Mostly I loaf by taking a walk, like Debbie. I do find tasks like doing the dishes, taking a shower, and exercising (including yoga) can help prime the creative pump.
One thing I really want to return to is having an internet free hour or two first thing each morning, to get in my initial writing as well as little reading, and to let myself bask in creative solitude (my wife gets up a bit later than me). It’s too easy for me to hop on the internet first thing.
Yes! Get words done right out of the gate. I also get up before my wife, and love that first cup of joe and some writing in the quiet darkness.
I’m great at goofing off. However, if I’m working through a writing problem or thinking about the next book, mindless chores like mowing work much better.