Mining the Mind: Freewriting, Creativity, and the Relentless Pursuit of Ideas in the Ocean of Time

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Wow, really excited about a lot of things. Things are looking pretty good right about now.

It’s times like these to be present and enjoy, but also to prepare for the worst so that when change comes—and it will—you can weather the storm, your vessel prepared for the barrage. Nature will ultimately prevail.

I do want to reach out more to people and get the garage in better shape. But it’s a little cold at the moment still. Maybe it would warm up with the heater, not sure.

I’m falling a little behind with work and not making enough sustained progress, although taking more advantage of headphones and mobility and double-tasking was a great time saver. Every meeting where I’m just sitting around should be like that.

I like when I go to lunch—it is my time. And I decide how I’m going to use it in between my workday.

It’s very dry in Sparks, in the winter in particular.

If I work for two hours every day at ten minutes a page, in a year it is estimated that would be over 1,000,000 words. Is that for real?


I hate doing math, so I just asked AI to figure that out for me based on a pic of my journal to get a sense of general word size for a page of writing. I timed it, and it currently feels just like when I’m running—at a comfortable 12-minute-per-mile pace.

Although, I’m now starting to notice how quickly I run through ink—about two pens a week.

If you took away the act of my handwriting, saw just my thoughts laid out in a line by artificially creating a result, the raw nature of the person is removed and replaced with an algorithm.

By writing a journal, it is both an outlet and a self-reflection tool—a way to discover who one is and what one is doing.

And, hard as I try, creating gentle, uniform handwriting is not an easy task, although there are some ways in which this is made easier.

I seem almost afflicted to write and continue to write.

Anything that is difficult and creative like that should absolutely be pursued.

Both on the intake—you want to read a lot, get a lot of input coming in.

You need good routines to create structure and balance in an environment you create that is appropriately structured.

Part of the writing process is in the ink on paper, the artistic aspect, along with the inclusion of emotion.


Even playing with the slant of the writing adjusts the feel for the wrist, thus allowing a more steady flow of lettering to issue out from one’s inking device.

The forward slant causes the wrist to shift into a more neutral position and also requires a straighter pen.

A faster mode is to loosen the wrist entirely—and probably not write too small.

So, bigger letters make it easier to write? Not always, considering the nice rhythm one can come into when letters run together smoothly in long, alliterative streams of English garble.

As a writer, you need something as your source of fuel.

For the first, it is a difficult journey enough as it is—working through the landscape of the mind, fishing awareness for some potential treasure.

New discovery being that which is the most exciting of all.

The discoverers.

In many cases, these discoverers were writing and discovering, and more than anything, that is what is ultimately so enjoyable about freewriting.

And I’m a better writer for that practice and exercise—but particularly for building the familiarity with words and also wanting to learn more and unique forms of expression.

Even on a lunch break, you never know what gems lie beneath the surface.

What are all the components to a happy and successful life?

Keeping the home we have clean and nice is of importance.

I feel my role plays into that, and I feel I can contribute and help others in more grateful and compassionate ways.


There are different areas in life, and how time is perceived are themes which strike some chords with my current thinking.

And what can I get from something if it were not MVP → rather, maximal?

What is the ultimate?

The mind is an amazing tool.

We live in an amazing world, and we have to keep it amazing—bring it, slow up, prepare for the worst, train to always be ready.

You will get caught when you are in the beginning.

Remember Tai Chi, circles, meditations—to complement whatever other philosophical learning is being conducted for spiritual growth.

With growth, you also need sustenance.

Think about what it is you need to be maximally productive.

Even on a bad day, it is hard not to write or create, but so easy to have zero days.

Today I get to be an artist, a writer—two of my favorites.

And a mentor. A helper.

And a worker.

Some random oracle of advice.

There is beauty in what is new and novel.

Much of that is about set and setting—and boundaries, real and virtual.

One can never say what hasn’t been until it has, and so it always was.

Are all ideas recycled? No. Impossible.

There are as many ideas to mine from the mind as there are atoms and molecules in the elements which comprise our entire universeexisting and yet to be created.


Sometimes I’m very thankful for a change of scenery, and I have to wonder:

What is my direction?

Where are my seeming shortcomings?

How do I want to spend my time?

What do my values mean for me, and do they hold weight and ring true for me?

How much do I believe in my values and keep them in mind for the work I materialize?

That is what truly matters.

And doing the work.

There is always that.

For every tortured soul, starving artist, up-and-coming whatever, there is someone out there working harder, doing more, stopping at nothing.

Can you develop the same resilience?

The resilience to keep it all going, setback after setback.

In the end, the setbacks are like the waves in the ocean of time, and all hurts eventually wash away as we become infinite.

The waves will always come, but you can step up and be captain of any ship.

The song is the choir, which your life capacity should not contain and can only be measured in the presence of doing—with the focus on the active, the moment, truly seeking magic.

To birth new ideas and thought into the world, it may take a million words to find the new idea.

And it excites me.

Looking for it.

Mining until my hands can write no more.

Mining the vast ocean—the depths in which most never go.

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