Morning Walks

I'm quite bad at a lot of things. And one of those things is a morning routine. Despite the preponderance of writing advice suggesting creating a daily routine and sticking to it, I've never really been able to make it work. Something in my brain just craves a little more variety, and I've learned to give into it.

Because of that, how I write changes from day to day. Somedays I type at my keyboard like a fairly normal author. Other days I write by hand. But more and more often, I've found myself going for walks while dictating.

I'm very fortunate to live in a place where there are plenty of green spaces nearby, and I've found that I really enjoy going on short 2-3 mile hikes while dictating my stories. It gets me out first thing in the morning, and I enjoy how the scenes and sensations I experience on my hikes work their way into the stories.

Generally, I'm pretty happy with my set up. I have a small voice recorder connected to a lapel mic, so I really can just walk and dictate.

The only downside, of course, is that now I'm that guy wandering through the woods who everyone thinks is talking nonsense to himself.

And depending on how well the scene is going, they're not wrong!