Here are my notes on Stephen King’s On Writing.

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Art supports life — not the other way round. “Put your desk in the corner, and every time you sit down there to write, remind yourself why it isn’t in the middle of the room. Life isn’t a support-system for art. It’s the other way around.”
Art is telepathy. Transmitting thoughts (× music improvisation) — letting others make love to themselves as we made love to ourselves, creating the piece.
- “Let’s assume that you’re in your favorite receiving place just as I am in the place where I do my best transmitting.”

Making art works best when it’s inspired play with oneself.
- One’s personal interests, thoughts, concerns. (× How to Know a Person) “You undoubtedly have your own thoughts, interests, and concerns, and they have arisen, as mine have, from your experiences and adventures as a human being.” (× The Erotic Mind)
  - Your own unique knowledge, sensibility. “John Grisham, of course, knows lawyers. What you know makes you unique in some other way.” (× Naval)
  - “Write what you like, then imbue it with life and make it unique by blending in your own personal knowledge of life, friendship, relationships, sex, and work.”

Consume a lot & create a lot — to become a good writer.
- “I don’t read in order to study the craft; I read because I like to read.” “Yet there is a learning process going on.” 70-80 books a year (as a “slow reader”).
  - Enjoy everything — take inspiration from everything (that you enjoy). “Chris and I liked just about any horror movie.”
- You cannot wow unless you’ve been wowed.
- It doesn’t feel like work if it’s your calling. “Four to six hours a day, every day, will not seem strenuous if you really enjoy doing these things and have an aptitude for them.”
- “Working hard and having fun.” “Practice is invaluable (and should feel good, really not like practice at all)”
Construct your toolbox and build enough muscle to carry it with you (× drumming).

Write with the door closed, re-write with the door open. Your work starts being for you, then becomes for others (gets “released” — × Creative Being).
- Put your energy towards creating — not explaining yourself or your choices.
- Create fast — use the momentum, revisit later. Seeds of great ideas.
  - Create every day. Make room for good ideas to emerge. Daily quota.
    - Recognize good ideas, don’t find them. Creativity is not finding good ideas; it’s recognizing them when they show up. (× Creative Being — making space for good ideas to emerge; creative routine.)
      - Symbolism as found, not crafted.
  - Keep the ball rolling. Don’t stop or slow down once you’ve started (× drum practice.) “If I don’t write every day, the characters being to stale off in my mind.” (× making music; working on a track.)
  - Do not plot — let the story unfold.
    - Develop characters — not plot. (× The Art of Gathering (prepare people, not things))
  - Don’t stop work just because it’s hard. “Stopping a piece of work just because it’s hard, emotionally or imaginatively, is a bad idea.” Show up. Complete.
- Let it rest completely (six weeks).
- And revisit it.
  - It will feel like reading a stranger’s work — better so. Easier to kill someone else’s darlings than your own.
  - Begin with a story, end with a theme.
    - Rewrite, having understood what your piece is actually about — and double in on it. (× Creative Being (distill))
  - Leave out the boring parts. (× Creative Being (remove to perfection)) (× Made to Stick (high-concept pitches)).
    - “Everyone has a history; and most of it isn’t very interesting.”

Find niche places to publish your work (or show yourself — communities, × TPOT)
- (“…publishes mostly mainstream fiction, 2000-4000 words, steer clear of stereotype characters and hackneyed romance situations”) — like a dating website, what people are into.

Writing tips

You cannot turn a bad writer into a competent writer — though you can turn a competent writer into a good writer.

No passive voice.
No adverbs.
No fancy words. Use the first word that comes to your mind, if it is appropriate and colorful.

Life

“Good talk is part of seduction. If not so, why do so many couples who start the evening at dinner wind up in bed?”
- Behaviour is unwittingly revealing. “What people say conveys their character to others in ways of which they — the speakers — are completely unaware.”
“Our marriage has outlasted all of the world’s leaders except for Castro, and if we keep talking, arguing, making love, and dancing to the Ramones, it’ll probably keep working.” (× Aligned spirit/mind, Pavlina)
People seeing your potential, and changing your life.
- Somebody believing in you can be enough encouragement. “Writing is a lonely job. Having someone who believes in you makes a lot of difference. They don’t have to make speeches. Just believing is usually enough.” (× How to Know a Person — to truly see someone is a creative act)
- Coaching — getting corrected. Mentoring.
Grow enough and you change the story. How much the characters grow (× LIFE). “What happens to characters as a story progresses depends solely on what I discover about them as I go along — how they grow, in other words. Sometimes they grow a little. If they grow a lot, they begin to influence the course of the story instead of the other way around.”
Pre-mortems. Project yourself on your current trajectory. Adjust your priorities accordingly. (“Things that will never happen at this pace.”)
“The most valuable lessons are the ones you teach yourself.”