The power of constraints

Last week I wrote about how the pressure to write can sometimes be paralyzing. This week I’ll tell you about a positive motivating force: constraints.

A challenge

I had heard about NYC Midnight’s writing challenges from friends and on social media: you get three prompts, a word limit, and a time limit (there is a fee but there are also prizes!). I signed up for the Flash Fiction Challenge - write an original short story of 1000 words max within 48 hours using the assigned genre, location, and object. Who doesn’t like a challenge? 

Within specified boundaries

At 11:59pm on Friday, June 10, I received my assignment: 

Genre: Spy

Location: A Fighter Jet

Object: A Rubber Band

Immediate intimidation. I don’t read in the spy genre and I certainly don’t know anything about fighter jets! Luckily, NYC Midnight provided some explanations, examples, and definitions for me. Though I haven’t read any spy novels, I have seen movies based on well-known specimens of the genre, such as Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy based on the novel of the same name by John LeCarre, and more recently All The Old Knives based on Olen Steinhauer’s book. I read some synopses and descriptions and used the “Look Inside” feature on Amazon to get a sense of the writing style.

Then I moved on to fighter jets. I’ve seen some in museums, and I’ve seen some flying, but I’ve never been in one nor do I know anything about them. So I Googled. I read articles and looked at pictures and found a company locally that provides a “fighter jet experience” where you can get a ride and instruction in a real fighter jet! If I had had more time, I’d do it and call it research.

My husband happens to love military history and aircraft (among other esoteric things) so he sent me some links to intriguing stories about fighter jets as spy craft… I spent a couple of hours reading and taking notes and, with the clock ticking away towards the Sunday-at-11:59pm-deadline, turned to writing.

Releases creativity!

I wrote about 500 words on Saturday. Sunday I wrote another 500 words, asked my husband and a couple of writer friends for feedback, revised, and sent off my story before dinner. What a rush! Is it the best story ever? No. Was it fun? YES! I felt creativity flowing while playing around with the object, location, and genre. I’ll find out where I placed in my group in early August before round #2 begins with new constraints. (Everyone who enters can participate in the first two rounds, but then only the highest-scoring participants go on to the next two rounds until one winner emerges. Here’s my favorite past winning story - I can’t get it out of my head! It’s so good.)

Last year, I attended a panel where the writer Helen Phillips talked about the process of writing a book. She was struggling with it, so she applied a constraint:  

“In my first book, And Yet They Were Happy, I gave myself the constraint that each story had to be 340 words. It can be anything else that it wants to be, but it needs to be 340 words. And I found that very liberating, even though it’s a ridiculous constraint, because I gave myself total liberty within it.”

Constraints can be freeing! I think of constraints as providing a safe sandbox to play in. We all have constraints in our lives. Helen Phillips also said: 

“The circumstances of everyone’s life are a constraint. How much time you have, how much money you have, how much energy you have. And you have to work with that. The fact that you have constraints doesn’t mean you can’t be a writer, or that you aren’t a writer.”

So what if we use constraints to our advantage? 

If the goal seems overwhelming, or the big picture is paralyzing (I have to write a short story! I have to write a book! I have to revise my whole manuscript!), think about adding some constraints to make it “safer” to play: 

What if you committed to a NYC Midnight writing challenge?

What if you only had two 25-minute blocks a day to write?

What if you gave yourself a word limit?

What if you found an opportunity to submit to with a firm deadline?

What if you combined those?

Let me know if you try a constraint - and what works for you!