For most writers, when the writing is going well, technical questions such as Am I adequately controlling the evenness of the tone of this passage? are not what is most likely going on in their heads.
Their heads are simultaneously very full (with all the verbal events to come) and very empty (except for the sentence that is halfway through arriving).
When anyone is very good at anything, they perform with grace and fluidity. An improvising musician, say. They don’t need a checklist and they don’t refer to textbooks or guides. They do the thing.
In an essay titled ‘Writing’, I had my best go at describing how I experience this —
When the writing is going well (I am avoiding the word inspired) it feels as if someone has taken my brain out and filled my head with a very cheap and chemical-heavy soft drink – orangeade or cherryade; I call it this state ‘headfizz’. The bubbly liquid being shaken up behind my eyes is brightly-coloured, almost day-glo (this brightness is the manifestation of a kind of internal embarrassment: I want to say to myself ‘go away and leave me alone’); I would assume, if at this moment brainscan were to be taken, the synapses would be seen to be getting themselves in something of a lather.
Yes, but headfizz can be elusive.
It may be that in doing the thing right to the end, and beyond it, a writer faces a collapse of confidence, and has to relearn their entire way of working.
This happening repeatedly is part of developing as an artist. (Yes, an artist, though writers are often wary of calling themselves that.)
However, the best writing can often be done with an ease that makes the writer suspicious of it.
When writing seems to be coming too easily, the temptation is to stop — because it’ll be easy to pick it back up, at the same level, whenever you want.
This is rarely the case.
Better to cancel the date, switch off the phone, ignore the hungry cat and keep going until you are forced to sleep — or finally feed the poor thing.
There has been a lot of thought gone into analysing human performance.
If you are interested, and don’t think it’ll make you too self-conscious, I’d recommend you watch of the documentary Being in the World which gives examples from flamenco, cooking and other artforms.
The whole film is about the way the American philosopher Hubert Dreyfus understood the thought of the German philosopher Martin Heidegger. It is very much to do with apparently thoughtless performance at a level of mastery.
There’s been even more thought gone into efficient training.
For a rigorous examination of the simplistic version of the 10,000 Hours (to Become Expert at Anything) Rule, see The Sports Gene by David Epstein.
But I think we all have to find our own language for what goes on in our heads.
Headfizz or otherwise.
I love it when the words are unstoppable. I'm in a headspace like the one I would get into when I used to act. After all the line-learning and rehearsals, I'd be on stage, in the moment, and it's just *flowing*. I was consciously doing things, but also not; to an extent, I was watching it happen. The same would sometimes happen when I was in a band - it would occur on stage, but also when writing or recording. Just right in there mentally, and everything blissfully rolling along. It's like having a really fun conversation with a very good friend. There's a certain comfort and lack of self-consciousness, I think.