I’m using a piece of software called Scrivener to write Lichtenbergianism: procrastination as a creative strategy, and a very good piece of software it is, too.
One of the many tools it offers is the ability to project word count goals and to see how you’re doing in the current session. If you tie your session goals to your putative finish date, it will tell you how many words you need to rip out in that session in order to stay on track.
Because of one Camping With the Hippies™ or another, I’ve been a bit slack in writing:
::sigh::
7,500 words for today in order to “finish” by tomorrow. That’s okay. I have to reset my total word count goal upwards anyway: each chapter is working out to be around 2,000 words, and that’s before I go back and work in charming illustrative anecdotes from all the Lichtenbergians.
N.B.: I could too do it, if I wanted to. So there.
There are two kind of pitches: 1) the elevator pitch, which is over by the time the elevator gets to the next floor, and 2) your long-form pitch. [p.70]
I keep trying to come up with a snappy elevator pitch:
“Art & Fear only funny”?
“How to Write a Novel in 30 Days for slackers”?
“Twilight, but well-written. And no vampires”?
Perhaps, as the authors1 also suggest, my subtitle is the elevator pitch: “procrastination as a creative strategy, or how I stopped worrying and learned to love doing it wrong.”
“The Mouse Whose Name Is Time,” by Robert Francis—click to read the whole amazing poem
The long-form pitch is no less simple. It’s supposed to be a paragraph or two, but still under a minute.
How about:
In 2007 a small group of creative amateurs founded a society dedicated to celebrating their procrastination and found, to their amazement, that their productivity improved. Now they share the secret of their success with nine “precepts,” ways to re-organize your thinking about how you create and why. Sometimes counter-intuitive and usually amusing, their strategies distill some of the most obvious secrets of the creative process to free you from your own mindblocks.
Hm. How about:
Sure, you can buy a book to help you cure your procrastination, but why would you? Lichtenbergianism: procrastination as a creative strategy frees you from the worry and the guilt—and shows you how to use your bad habits to become more productive in your creative life. No matter whether you’re a writer, an artist, a composer, a programmer, a gardener, or any other creative type, the Nine Precepts of Lichtenbergianism will give you ways to rethink your creative habits and give yourself permission to succeed—by failing!
That’s better, and more in sync with the tone of the book.
Tomorrow is better! That’s the motto of the Lichtenbergian Society, a group of creative men who bonded over their shared tendency to procrastinate and found that they became more productive because of it. Now Lichtenbergian chair Dale Lyles shows you how you, too, can stop worrying about your bad habits and learn to love your own creative process. Whether you’re a frustrated writer, artist, composer, gardener, or programmer, you’ll find new ways to think about how you create and why, from Task Avoidance to Successive Approximation to Ritual to Abandonment—if you give yourself permission to fail, you give yourself permission to create. It’s that simple!
One more:
Are you a creative genius? No, only Mozart is a creative genius, and you are not him. But you are creative—yes, you are, admit it—and you want to overcome your fears and your bad habits so that you can write that novel/paint that painting/compose that song/program that app. Lichtenbergianism: procrastination as a creative strategy gives you nine Precepts, ways to restructure your thinking about how you create and why so that you can just get to work and create the work of your dreams. But not today. Tomorrow is better.
And I’m spent.
—————
1 I keep saying “the authors” because it’s easier than typing out their names: Arielle Eckstut and David Henry Sterry.
Yesterday, I tackled the Dill Plant That Ate Newnan again.
Before:
After:
This is the third time I’ve done this since it sprang back from the freezing cold this winter. It is irrepressible. And it’s trying to colonize the butterfly garden in front of it.
No lie, I had to get the pruner to cut through the stalks, and the frondage I carried to the street weighed about 15-20 pounds. I suppose I should dig the whole thing up, but I don’t have the heart. All I can do is cut it back down so that the sprinkler can get to the rest of the garden.
From The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published [EGGYBP]:
A common mistake authors make is choosing a title that has a particular meaning to them but that no one else understands.
Well.
I mean to say. Lichtenbergianism. What could go wrong?
I will admit to having been told already that the title sucks and won’t survive an agent/editor/publisher. I will resist while I can, of course, because the whole core of the book is how the Lichtenbergians became more productive through the use of the Nine Precepts (although of course the Precepts are ex post facto developments).
The subtitle of the book, I would hope, makes the purpose of the book clear: Lichtenbergianism: procrastination as a creative strategy. My feeling is that the silliness of the main title becomes attractive when attached to the subtitle, i.e., the browser is distracted by the weird, incomprehensible title, then sees the subtitle and laughs, yeah, I need this book.
But I am not the expert, the authors of EGGYBP are, and they suggest a couple of strategies here. The first is to create a “title pool” of words that could go into your title:
procrastinate, procrastination, procrastinating
create, creative, creativity
put off, hold off, postpone, protract
don’t start, tomorrow…
finish, finished, finishing
Then somehow you’re supposed to find that perfect title out of all those terms. (They also suggest checking Google Adwords to see what will result in your book being found, but that involves creating an account which involves “budgets” and “payment” and all that stuff.) Here are ten:
Don’t Create, Procrastinate!
Never Finish Today (what you can put off tomorrow)
A [Poem]* Is Never Finished: *painting/song/novel/garden ( a riff on the Paul Valery quote)
Be Creative… Some Day
Be Creative… Tomorrow
Hold That Thought! : a guide to creative procrastination
Lord, Make Me Creative, But Not Yet (a riff on St. Augustine’s sly prayer about chastity)
Tomorrow Is Better: procrastination as a creative strategy
Back Burner Creativity, or Creativity on the Back Burner
Moseying to the Finish Line: creativity is not a race
Okay, there are a few in there that I could tolerate were an agent to hold a book contract to my head.
Another strategy from EGGYBP is to “get lots and lots of opinions.” I realize that anyone reading this blog has already had their brains infected by Lichtenbergianism, but try to forget that perfect title and give me your opinions in comments. Who knows? This could be that moment when Bugles Sang True finally became Gone With the Wind.
Ignoring the scrawny citronella on the far left, there’s mullein and the acanthus-like cardoon, and in the back is the buddleia.
You will recall that previously I had purchased and planted new herbs, expanding the old herb garden. (RIP, little borage, we hardly knew ye, and we certainly waited too long to ask Growers Exchange for a replacement…)
This batch includes two each of Buddleia, mullein, and cardoon, plus a freebie of citronella.
Mullein is one of those medieval medicinal plants, and it and the buddleia (aka butterfly bush) will go over at the side of the house where the privet hedge used to be. They’re hardy and almost invasive, and that’s exactly what I need over there.
The cardoon, all of which is edible, will go in the new herb section. They tend to become invasive as well, so a) I’ll transplant new ones over to the hardy area; and b) I’ll start giving them away to you people, not that you’ve been any help with the Dill Plant That Ate Newnan.
This is one of those posts I do after I’ve been away for a while, either vacationing or Camping With The Hippies™, in which I don’t really have a lot to say because I have too much to say.
Needless to say, I am behind in nearly everything: Lichtenbergianism: procrastination as a creative strategy, blogging about Lichtenbergianism: procrastination as a creative strategy, the Carnegie summer reading Minecraft party, visualization of William Blake’s Inn, labyrinth maintenance, all musical projects, and a couple of new projects: the Artist Trading Card Gang and looking at scoring a web animation series called Medievilry.
Euphoria, which is what the spring burn is called, was everything I needed it to be. The saying is that you get the burn you need, not the one you want, and that was particularly true this time. I know that it’s hard to explain the atmosphere of the burn—it’s part revelry, part journeying, part art, part music—and it’s especially hard when to explain since I tend not to share details, but I spent the five days more journeying than reveling, and it was a good thing. Burning is not for everyone—I tell people that I go and camp with people “who are not like you and me”—but I find that the experience enriches my life.
I can share a couple of images, of course.
First, the labyrinth:
3 Old Men had a primo spot. It is so prime that other theme camps did not bother to hide their jealousy of our cool arboreal arcade entrance, our shade, and our space. I have told everyone that if I’m found dead in an alley, then the police should start with a list of TCOs1 as prime suspects.
Me, wearing a cool t-shirt:
This t-shirt is from a young friend, Brett Felty, for a movie he made called The World is Big and Scary. (His production company’s website doesn’t seem to exist anymore.) I bought the t-shirt as part of his Kickstarter project; I was struck by the monster’s resemblance to the Wilder Mann creatures—he has since told me that he had never seen the book or heard of the creatures. I knew immediately that it would be one of my burn shirts, and so I took a photo to send to Brett.
I also got some work done. I needed to get ahead of the production curve for this new Artist Trading Card Gang, and so I cranked out a handful of ATCs in my “Indeterminate Object” series. Here is Indeterminate Object No. 4:
I liked this one so much that I decided to place it on the altar in the center of the labyrinth, where the hippies can take and leave gifts. When no one had taken it before the Effigy burn on Saturday, I retrieved it for myself.
I spent today packing for the burn, which means I went to my database and printed out a five-page list of over 160 items that I have to pull from here and yon and get them ready for transport.
Since I’m using Craig’s trailer, everything has to fit onto a 6×8 rectangle. Behold!
If you look carefully, you can see the blue rectangle I chalked down to plan ahead. Up at the top of the driveway you’ll notice the trailer backed into the carport—a feat so impressive that I had to put out a call on Facebook to beg someone to come do it for me. Even after practicing for 30 minutes in a large parking lot on Bullsboro, once I got to College Street I could not get the thing even to approach the driveway. So much for Radical Self-Reliance!
Let’s look at it from the other end:
All the stuff in front is going in the car. The tools and bamboo will go between the tubs, cushioned by multiple tarps.
First of all, I’ll be gone until next week Camping with the Hippies™, and I really ought to post something before I leave.
Secondly, this is a new section for the herb garden. I’ve taken over what used to be a bed of day lilies until some landscaper or other —not me!— replaced it with nothing. Ugh.
There are four plants in the picture. At top is lemon verbena, which I have planted before. It has a gorgeous smell.
At the bottom left is horehound, which I’ve never planted before. It’s good for coughs, etc.
In the center is borage, which I have planted but it’s been a long time. You can put it in salads—mild cucumber flavor—and its flowers are edible as well. It repels insects from the garden, and it apparently self-seeds generously.
And the tiny little sprout above the shrub is bergamot, aka bee balm. I’ve had it before for the flowers, and here’s what my source The Growers Exchange says about it:
Bergamot has a long history of use as a medicinal plant by many Native Americans, including the Blackfeet. The Blackfeet Indians used this hardy perennial in poultices to treat minor cuts and wounds. A tea made from the plant was also used to treat mouth and throat infections caused by gingivitis, as the plant contains high levels of a naturally occurring antiseptic, Thymol, which is found in many brand name mouthwashes. Traditionally used to ease bloating and digestion because of its carminative properties, as well as to treat headaches and fevers, Bee Balm makes a strong and slightly spicy tea, tasting of mint and oregano.
I post the photo because the horehound and borage are supposed to spread wildly, so in a couple of years this patch may look like the Dill Plant That Ate Newnan.
I ordered more from Growers Exchange, and in looking up all the plants to see how high they would get and how I might arrange them, I discovered that all of them are rapacious spreaders, perhaps even invasive.
But all of them (and the ones above) bloom and attract bees and butterflies, and that’s my main goal here. Except for the cardoon (arriving soon). That’s for eatin’.
Go support the artist from whose website I borrowed this image.
from: Dale Lyles
cc: Sam Anders, Mike Crane, Drew Ferguson, Chip Flanegan, Richard Mix, Jim Pace
Dear Candidates for U.S. House of Representatives, Third District:
Stop trying to get me to vote for you by trumpeting that you are a Washington outsider. I do not want a Washington outsider representing me in the Congress. I want someone who understands how the system in Washington works and who will make it work. I don’t want a chimpanzee with a spanner. That’s who you’re replacing, and the results were completely predictable and completely deplorable.
Sincerely,
Dale Lyles
P.S. Tamarkus Cook and Angela Pendley: I know the Democratic Party is not funding your campaign, but you really ought to get something on votesmart.org.
P.P.S. Richard Mix: I don’t think an Instagram account is the same as a real campaign site. Especially when you haven’t posted anything.
I am trying to sketch a visualization of William Blake’s Inn nearly every day, but what that means is that I’ve been staring at a collection of raw materials on my drafting table every day, and today I was forced—forced, I tell you—to create an Artist Trading Card [ATC].
Here’s the main idea, from a post I wrote several years ago. (tl;dr: 2-½ x 3-½ cards, decorated and labeled, then traded or given away.)
I doodled with some a couple of years ago:
These were labeled as Destructive Series; there were more, but I’ve given them away. The concept for these was to splash out some kind of Abortive Attempt onto the card, then “destroy” the image by blanking part of it out with glued-on paper. (The third one turned out so nicely that I didn’t destroy it.)
Today I started a series called Indeterminate Objects:
So, a great way to waste a half hour while avoiding work on Lichtenbergianism: procrastination as a creative strategy—or greatest way to waste a half hour while avoiding work on Lichtenbergianism: procrastination as a creative strategy?
I will admit to having been told already that the title sucks and won’t survive an agent/editor/publisher. I will resist while I can, of course, because the whole core of the book is how the Lichtenbergians became more productive through the use of the Nine Precepts (although of course the Precepts are ex post facto developments).
