I haven't done a lot of improv in my life - my first time ever was last September doing the car with Cassie in STAC - but today was the first time that I really couldn't do it. I had felt tongue tied, even though I had nothing to say. Reflecting back on today I realize what stopped me is the same thing that ruins my writing. Thinking.
I first started thinking because I didn't want to curse or be too obscene. I was trying to filter everything so I wouldn't let something slip tomorrow in STAC Live. Then Luke started giving advice -really good advice, at that- and I started thinking too much about incorporating what Luke was saying into my own improv. I was thinking so hard that I didn't even end up incorporating any of it. I wasn't some one doing improv, I was some one thinking about doing improv.
The relationship between thinking and my writing is the same. My natural voice in writing was always carefree, bold, and hardly grammar conscious. It was sassy and truthful. I never say things like this about my own work, but, it was good. But most of these works are pre eighth grade. By mid eighth grade I had learned the names and definitions of most of the writing techniques that I had been doing my whole life without realizing. All of a sudden I was no longer writing metaphors, but I was adding metaphors. I was constantly thinking and I couldn't let myself just be. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe thinking like this is supposed to make you a good writer and it just had some crazy opposite effect on me. All I know is that prior to September 2007 it was never hard for me to get into that mindset where all my writing becomes good.
This is a very good post, and it points to a real connundrum that all creative people run into. We need to discuss this in class, perhaps on Tuesday. But bear in mind that incorporating new knowledge into creative work is always very difficult and problematic, and no one is immune from the effect. However, no real growth is possible unless new knowledge is incorporated.
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