The sculpting method for writing

Get your chunk of clay on the wheel.

It doesn't matter at all how ugly it is in the beginning.

You can't improve on nothing.

You have to have something to work with.

Use the ugliest big boulder to break through that wall of writer's block.

Just get it all out.

My preferred method for doing this is transcription.

It's easier to get the words out when you're talking.

You’ll often express aspects of the ideas that you didn't even realize were in your head.

Turn on the transcription software and speak everything you know about the topic for at least five minutes.

Then copy and paste that transcript into your blank doc.

Now you have a mass of clay to work with.

The intimidation of writer's block is over.

You just started and now you're already 80% of the way there.

There's already a momentum to it.

Now it's time to sculpt.

Sculpting is just removing some excess.

You'll probably cut more than half of the word vomit.

It's much easier to sculpt than to create from nothing.

The creative act is the hardest.

So don't be too hard on yourself when you're doing the raw creation.

Suspend your judgment.

Don't take the time to consider whether it's good or not.

Just get it all out, all of it, no matter what.

And then only when you switch to sculpting mode do you start to be critical.