About a blank sheet.

I would add - about kings and about cabbage, if this quote were not so banal, but everyone is free to think it up according to his taste. Or not, your will.

A clean slate. What you see when you open your favorite text editor program or notepad, sketchbook, album....anything. They compose successful and not very funny jokes about him, draw memetic pictures.

They scare newcomers)

A blank sheet, where the thought should be placed - in text, or in a drawing. At the same time harmless, inviting and frightening

So what's wrong with him? And what to do with it?

The simplest answer is to take it and fill it out. That's why you took him, isn't it? Only, it turns out in practice, it is often not so easy. This post for the most part will not be about recommendations, advice or anything like that - but simply about how we do it when we see it - a blank slate.

In fact, almost all people experience a second (for some people longer, for some less) stupor in front of an empty sheet. This, by the way, is normal.

And this second is the last moment to gather all the ideas and thoughts in a harmonious order. An important, necessary and useful second. It seems to be. So why is there so much trouble with her? Maybe it's just because for many, many years we have all been taught to be perfect - there are many problems lurking in this, not only this, but the conversation is still not about such distant depths.

Don't let yourself be confused by yourself - we say, and we just write the very first phrase that is born in your head.

Any one. Even the wrong one. Not even perfect. Even the one that will have to be erased and written something else.

The main thing is to write what sounds brightest in your head at the moment.

A dialogue or some kind of joke, or a short description. Even the notorious "it was getting dark" or its wonderful English counterpart "the night was dark and stormy" - will do! Oh, horror, but it's true. To write, highlight with color, write further in the usual way - the most beautiful thing in texts is that you can always go back and write a new beginning. What appears on the sheet first will not be unique and unrepeatable, without the right to change - that's what we need to remember, as to our taste. The text is born from a draft, the drawing is born from an outline. Draw a line or write any phrase - and the sheet will cease to be "clean". It's never too late to erase a line or phrase, we always remember that.

And you can also just put a meaningful ellipsis at the beginning of the line - and write on. Then we will also remove it, of course - it is not needed in the final text.

There was such a joke on the Internet - "if you need to write some document, and you don't know where to start - write the phrase "In general, this is % y &n", and then the text will go by itself" - honestly, we haven't tried) But it will probably work too.

And the most important thing that works best in our relationship with a blank sheet is to try to imagine everything you want to write about as vividly as possible before actually sitting down to work on the text. Not globally present, but some very small piece. Detail, landscape, weather-whatever. The first pebble that gives rise to an avalanche of harmonious words can be anything at all, in our experience.

So there will be only one piece of advice: listen to yourself.

And the first phrase or the first line - what's there, after all, it really won't be carved in stone. Correcting and rewriting is normal. And sometimes even this process brings no less pleasure - comparable to the final polishing of a wooden product, when the forms finally acquire perfect completeness.

Yes, and finally - we know that there are two extremes in relation to writing texts of any degree of artistry: "I write as I breathe" and "it's hard work and inspiration has nothing to do with it"

So, like any extreme, each of these expressions, in our experience, suffers from one-sidedness and incompleteness.

"It is difficult to resist the suspicion that the statistical nature of this theory is due, apparently, to the incompleteness of the description...." (c) one good musician.

It's the same here. Inspiration is an important thing. Absolutely necessary. And the fact that writing is hard, difficult, serious work is also true. What to do? How to reconcile the extremes?

For us, the solution looked like this: succumbing to a wave of inspiration, do not let the stream of consciousness rush like a river in flood: pass through the filter of work and critical gaze. Only the first phrase is allowed to be "unfiltered". She, as a capricious princess, can do anything - simply because it will be followed by slender and well-adjusted rows, charmed by her spontaneity and looseness. And then we will also wash this "princess", comb her hair and dress her up properly)

The ability to work productively is the ability to balance, as to our taste. Between passion and pickiness, between freedom and a plan. The art of balance is the main thing for us, it turns out.

Actually, a lot of attention is paid to this topic in our books.

And we wish everyone who writes, draws, composes or creates in some other way to find their personal "balance of power".

Well, a beautiful picture to attract attention is included) Artist Andy Kehoe, by the way, we recommend his works for acquaintance, they are remarkably good.

your E.G.