Monday 6 December 2010

Daydreaming and creativity

Maybe it was because it was Monday, maybe it was because it was a grey December day that leads to melancholia, or because Christmas is coming, or for another reason, but I daydreamed quite a lot at work today. This is something I have done since childhood, when I was at school and bored stiff: I used to invent myself stories, sometimes very complex ones. Some of them we ended up playing them my brothers and I (in teenage and later I got a fair deal of D&Dr material through this), some they were just left in my head.

I guess I never quite grew up and my imagination has always been vivid. I mentioned it before: I am very conscious of my "Don Quixote" side(and I never read Don Quixote). It is strange because my daydreaming did not prevent me from being a good student, neither is it now a hindrance at work. I can have very good, productive days, yet daydream during a fair deal in them. But I sometimes think that I waste what could be good writing material. If I was putting on paper all of what I think about (a character, an image, a certain scene with atmosphere, a good line, what have you) when I should be doing something else, then getting rid of the bad stuff, then working on the good stuff, then trying to organise this into a whole that stands together, maybe I could write a good play, a good crime novel, maybe even the great Québec expat's novel. Well, one can dream. I would need first discipline, I think.

2 comments:

PJ said...

Hébert Métellus, ce vieux con, nous demandait d'écrire trois phrases par jour (pour ensuite nous accuser de plagiat sans fondement... en passant, bonjour monsieur, au cas où il lirait ces lignes). Tout ça pour dire de prendre le temps d'écrire un petit quelque chose régulièrement. C'est comme se raser et se brosser les dents, il faut en faire une habitude quotidienne.

Anonymous said...

Daydreaming is the fuel that feeds the fire that always burns in the creative mind. To the artist it is as essential as breathing...happy daydreaming :-)