I Almost Did Drugs to Keep Track of My Writing Ideas. Then I Had a Midlife Crisis Instead.

I Almost Did Drugs to Keep Track of My Writing Ideas. Then I Had a Midlife Crisis Instead.

Maybe you are one of those writers obsessed with a single topic.

That's all they ever want to write — one genre revolving around a central theme.

Some of my favorite writers do this. Some of my friends do this, too.

If that's you, maybe this is not for you.

What I'm about to talk about is for the writer or storyteller who is fascinated by many themes, topics, and genres and wants a chance to explore them all.

If that's you, then I'm like you.

Throughout my writing life, I have struggled to keep tabs on everything I've wanted to write. I did everything other writers suggested. I tried all the different software.

I even considered using mental performance-enhancing drugs to keep tabs on all the ideas coming my way. I thought that maybe drugs and giving my brain a boner would help with that.

Luckily, I didn't have to because, instead, I had a good ol' midlife crisis.

It is a well-documented phenomenon — people tend to have a crisis the year before the turn of a decade and not at the turn of the decade itself. So, I had one when I was 39 and not when I turned 40.

I didn't do anything terrible. I didn't acquire any exotic cars. I couldn't afford it. I didn't go out and start a second family. Who has the energy for that? Besides, I want to spend all the time I have with the family I already created.

And most importantly, I did not join a cult.

The only thing I did was become a minimalist by throwing away a lot of my wife's possessions.

Oooooff... she wasn't happy.

Once I was out of the crisis, I spent some time reflecting and thanking my guardian angel that I didn't decide to grow a mustache or, worse, a man bun. And I thought about how I wanted to live my life.

For the most part, I was really happy with how things were going. But I knew I wanted to write more personal stories, explore different topics, and not get stuck in one.

Right before my 40th birthday, I publicly challenged myself to write forty stories in forty days, with the 40th story published on my 40th birthday.

Boy, was that dumb.

Did I mention I have a full-time, traveling sales job and two little girls at home? How little? Little. Five and two.

Most days, when everything was firing on all cylinders, I could write without a hitch. But one bad night of sleep, a weekend, or a virus, and I was really stretching to get any words on the page.

Some nights — including most weekend nights — I would put my daughters to bed, kiss my wife, sit on the couch, power up my computer, and go at it.

Eventually, my birthday arrived. I had written and published one story every day for forty days. Then I kept going and published daily for another 100 straight days.

I don't publish every single day now. But my writing commitments are still demanding. I write two weekly storytelling lessons for this newsletter, one column a month for my local newspaper, and updates for my performer's page.

That is roughly 25,000 to 30,000 publishable words every month.

I couldn't do any of it if I didn't have a clear idea of what I wanted to write next.

The way I manage my workflow was born out of that 40-day challenge. Regardless of how hard things got, whenever I opened my computer and looked at my workflow, I knew immediately what I needed to work on.

Maybe you are like I was before I had a system.

You have one or two documents with an ongoing list of everything you want to write. You've tried most of the writing platforms. But somehow, you always find yourself opening your computer and not knowing what to write. By the time your available time is up, you haven't even chosen something. Then you are back where you started the next day.

Here is something writing platforms don't want you to know — they are great for writing, editing, and archiving. But they are terrible for managing ideas, tracking what you want to write, and keeping your body of work moving forward.

That's what a commonplace is for.

Not a writing platform. Not a running document. A dedicated system for capturing ideas as they surface — from your journal, from your life, from a conversation you overheard at the grocery store — and organizing them so that when you sit down to write, the decision is already made.

This is not for you if you already have a system that works.

This is not for you if you love to write about one single thing.

This is not for you if you secretly enjoy opening your writing list and not writing anything at all. There is an emotional payout for never finishing. An unfinished piece will forever have potential. A finished one might not have the reception you are expecting.

Such is the life of the artist.

This is not for you if you have a man bun. I'm sorry. I have to draw a line somewhere.

This is for you if you are constantly frustrated by all you want to write but can't seem to get it together — and you are always wasting time trying to figure out what to write next.

The commonplace solves that problem. Not by giving you more ideas. You already have enough. By making sure you never lose the ones you already have.

Happy telling!

-Carlos

P.S. I just updated my Story Frame cheat sheet — the full structure, the drafting sequence, and a prompt you can paste directly into any writing session. Reply letting me know you want a copy and I'll send it to you.