Song Writing Tip: Start a Journal Today
Winning the war with your critical inner voice is one of the main keys to getting the most out of your composition, and starting a journal is one of the best strategies for doing so.
However, there are some conditions attached to this journal writing exercise.
1. It has to be done every day.
2. Set a minimum number of pages or words to do every day (say three pages or 1000 words)
3. It doesn’t matter what you write as long as you write the amount of pages and/or words that you said you were going to do.
4. Allow your writing to be good, bad, or indifferent.
5. Pay attention to your inner voice, maybe write what it says.
6. When you’re done, stop and move on to something else.
The way this exercise helps you in your battle with your inner voice is that you will eventually break down the walls it puts up against your creativity. You will be amazed at what your inner voice will tell you as you type.
Instead of succumbing to the temptation to stop, however, keep going until the doubt is eventually released and in its place will be a flow of ideas, confidence, and inspiration.
I’ve been journaling for years, but haven’t really experienced the real benefit of journals until I read Julia Cameron’s “The Artists Way” (a must for any songwriter. If you don’t have it, GET IT).
In the book he talks about the ‘morning pages’. Three pages of automatic writing first thing in the morning and boy, what a powerful tool is that.
It was that book that allowed me to piece together all the loose ends in my own composition efforts, and therefore I base this journal writing exercise on the concept of morning pages.
I can’t stress you enough, it has to be done every day. You need to make time for it. It’s a great investment in your songwriting process.
By doing this every day and setting a productivity goal, you’ll establish the discipline you need to be a prolific songwriter.
By allowing what you write to be good, bad, or indifferent, you will stop assuming that everything you write has to be perfect, and by paying attention to the noises in your head, it will help you recognize your inner voice for what it really is. an inexhaustible source of negativity.
What’s next? Well, here’s a songwriting exercise for you.
Start writing in your journal for a week. That’s seven days to write down your thoughts, feelings, hopes, dreams, fears, aspirations, inner conversations (whatever you want, write it down) and see how you feel doing it.
I think you’ll feel like a weight has been lifted off your shoulders.
At the end of the seven days, I can guarantee that you won’t have so much going on in your head because everything will be written down and who knows, maybe there are some songs in there too.
We’ll get to what happens next later.