Rituals and Torture Porn

The topic of "How do you write?" comes up on AW time and again. And I don't mean the "computer v. paper" argument, or outline v. pantser. I mean in the sense of "What's your ritual?" I usually answer with some variation of: I sit down, boot up Word, and start typing.

Putting yourself into a ritual can be a dangerous thing, especially for new writers. It gives you the perfect excuse to not write. "I'm out of tea, I can't write." "The radio is broken, I can't write." "I only have five sharpened pencils, instead of six, I can't write." Chronic procrastinators know these tricks well.

I'm thinking hard about this today for two reasons.

First, a conversation I had yesterday with Serenity about procrastinating. She knows she can't read my next novel until she shows me pages of her own. Our conversation went something like this:

Her - Once my room is finished, I'll start writing again.
Me - Unpacking is a process that could take another week. Instead of saying 'I'll do this when this is done,' say 'I'll unpack an hour, and then write an hour.' Don't set yourself up to not write.
Her - I hate it when you make sense.

Don't worry, though; I don't make sense all that often. :)

The second reason I'm pondering the ritual thing is that I just put my DVD of Saw III into my player (don't judge me for liking torture porn, this series has Donnie Wahlberg!). I'm not sure why I picked this one, considering I own about a hundred and fifty movies. I wanted something on in the background for when I started writing. Doesn't matter what, because I won't really pay attention, anyway.

Actually, this particular movie might be inspirational. Evy's about to hit up a Halfie hideout and kick some ass for answers. Maybe it wasn't such a bad choice, after all.