Meditation and writing

H/T to Mystery Man for rustling up this article on screenwriter Bruce Joel Rubin:

It’s a constant in screenwriter Bruce Joel Rubin’s life, something that happens every day without fail. It’s the time he reserves for meditation.

Without it, he doubts whether his Oscar-winning script for Ghost would have happened. And now, without meditation’s soothing influence, his new challenge of turning that hugely popular 1990 movie into a stage musical might prove too much.

Certainly, it helped him immeasurably when he took on the job of adapting Audrey Niffenegger’s best-selling novel, The Time Traveler’s Wife, to the big screen.

“I meditate,’’ Rubin says simply. “I sit for about an hour every day in a state of real stillness. That stillness is terrifying to most human beings. But when you break through to it, it is a portal to something remarkable.’’

I have a good friend who has practiced “sitting meditation” for years. I do it on a semi-regular basis. I think it’s a great practice for writing. Rubin sits for an hour per day, but even 20 minutes can be beneficial. 

Mediation has been described as “being where we are without thinking about it.” I think it’s that last part which is a stumbling block for many people: How to engage in non-thinking? This is especially so because when we do sit and stop doing, the mind becomes flooded with thoughts. That can lead to trying to will oneself away from thinking, but in my experience, the precise opposite is the trick: Let your thoughts come. Acknowledge them. Then let them go. They are naturally a part of your consciousness, so why fight them? Experience them. Then release them. If you don’t stress about it and be mindful of some focus point, I find it’s possible to go into whatever that meditative state is, then emerge refreshed.

For more on meditation, you can go to The David Lynch Foundation. Here is a message from David Lynch.

I’ll post an interview with Lynch tomorrow that goes into more details about his views on meditation and the creative life.

Comment Archive