What If Distraction Is Fine?

We complain about distraction and actively avoid it, but what if it's a way for your brain to wander?

This might be cope. Let’s get that out of the way first. You all might read this and be like “bless his heart he doesn’t know what he’s saying.” Very possible. But as I write my new novel—my first attempt at a mystery/thriller—I find myself wandering in the middle of the scene.

I will write a few sentences and then I’m drifting. It’s not quite like falling asleep at the wheel. It’s more like floating in an ocean. One minute you’re in one spot, the next minute, you’re a hundred yards away. But you remember how to get back, and you might have found something new along the way.

I’ve set the audacious (for me) goal of ten pages per day on this first draft. So far, I’ve been able to hit it. But if this were Strava and someone were mapping the run of how I finish a block of ten pages, it might look like this:

I didn’t have this same wandering problem (opportunity?) with my previous novel. That novel came to me pretty well formed, and there wasn’t anything in the way of mystery. That novel was a escape-the-bad-guy type thriller where I could run straight ahead from point A to point B. With this new novel, I generally don’t know where I’m going.

I will write a paragraph and then I’ll realize I’m not quite sure where to take it. So, my hands travel from the keyboard to the mouse. The mouse clicks away from my writing window. I find myself reading articles, scrolling Threads, anything but writing. And then, just as quickly, I find myself back on the page and I’m writing again. It’s half conscious, half sub-conscious.

Taking walks and working out work equally well for this, but I generally can only do each of those things once per day, not every thirty minutes.

My wandering thus far has propelled me forward. As long as I always wander back, I think it’s fine.