Writing In the Dark

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“Go into yourself and see how deep the place is from which your life flows.” – Rainier Maria Rilke

This post was originally published on 4/12/2023. Heads up – you may have already read this.

I wrote this post early Monday morning. Around 3:43am that is. I have all sorts of things I do in the middle of the night when I can’t sleep. Mostly worry. Then I review my to-do list. Then I go back to worrying some more. Usually after about a half an hour of tossing and turning, I remember to start meditating and praying. After a few minutes of meditating, I kinda just flow into writing.

It’s all in my head in the dark. I know that there’s a lot of sleep wisdom that says to keep a notebook beside the bed for writing things down. But this composing in my head works for me. It’s not that I remember everything I write, it’s just that it slips me into a different mode. Eventually I’ll write myself back to sleep. The best part is that I even retain some of it when I awaken.

I recently learned of some interesting research from a Ten Percent Happier podcast with Professor Lindsey Cameron. She studied whether meditation helps at work, specifically focused on customer facing jobs, and the results were fascinating. She found that traditional breath work meditations helped with centering the person in a bigger perspective so that the ups and downs weren’t as jarring. And she found that loving-kindness meditation increased the ability to place ourselves in other’s shoes.

There’s research that shows loving-kindness practice reduces activity in part of the brain that’s active when we are anxious. And a study that showed we don’t want to practice mindfulness when doing emotionally taxing work. The example I heard in that case was a flight attendant who is having to pleasantly telling people to buckle their seat belts over and over again does not benefit from being more mindful in those moments.

Back to the point about writing in the dark. It seems our brain research is catching up with what our spiritual traditions have taught us for millennia. There are practices that help to literally change our minds. They’ve given us a tool set that we can use to help put ourselves in the best frame of mind to create, to understand, to be less anxious, to change, to be more altruistic, and so on. It’s no wonder I start writing in the dark after I start meditating, because the practice helps to shut down worry, and then I open up to creativity.

And it matches what works for me during daylight hours. In my post When I Write, I looked at what time of day works for me and it’s always after I’ve done the work to be quiet, to meditate, and to get a little perspective on life.

It feels a little clinical to separate out the meditation and prayer practices from the spiritual traditions and beliefs that tie us to a Higher Power. But in the middle of the night as I’m settling into a rhythm of breathing and repeating “faith over fear,” it’s also kind of fun to know I’m setting up the conditions for calming my brain. And that I might even get a post out of it.

(featured photo from Pexels)

56 thoughts on “Writing In the Dark”

  1. Pingback: Bravery, One Publish at a Time - Wise & Shine

  3. “..loving-kindness meditation increased the ability to place ourselves in other’s shoes.”

    Thanks Wynne. Imagine the transformation in our dark, divided so if we all committed to “Writing in the Dark” meditating with loving-kindness.

    Be blessed and . . .

    Keep Looking Up ^ . . . His Best is Yet to Come!

    Liked by 1 person

  6. There are practices that helps to shut down worry, and open up creativity. When our mind calms down, we are open to a calm that opens up our plethora of creativity. Good message Wynne! 🥱🎆✍🏼

    Liked by 1 person

  7. I agree with Jane. There is a lot of goodness in your post, so thank you for reposting. I’m like you, composing ideas in my head and only writing them down when I have formed about 70% in my head. My process is weird, but I guess that is part of being an introvert; I’m in my head all the time. Unless something is urgent and demanding a quick decision, I’ll take my time looking at it from different angles and rehearsing it in my head.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Oh, the zone! I love those moments – you’ve captured it perfectly. There’s a lot of situating to get there though! :) Thank you, dear Cheryl!

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  10. You’re also actively creating g more neural pathways that sustain you in a very positive way. Eventually those pathways become so many and so deeply etched, they become your subconscious go to! Yes! Keep doing this!

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  11. You amaze me, Wynne! If I wrote in my head in order to foster sleep, I’m sure the opposite would occur. My mind would get fired up, not calmed down! What works for me is reciting scripture. I think the rote-ness (Is that a word?!) of it as well as the calming effect of the text’s meaning are what help to settle me down.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Thank you, Rebecca. But I think it’s harder to do single parenting when it’s because someone is gone on a trip. That’s a whole lot of change whereas I got to work up to it! Hope you and Eagle have a good week!

      Liked by 1 person

  13. Funny how I recently mentioned a bout of middle-of-the-night worrying. Fortunately, that very rarely happens to me. Usually I sleep like a baby (which irritates Tara, who is much more prone to insomnia than me).

    Liked by 1 person

  14. Yet again we learn that anything can be turned into an interesting blog post if we just allow ourselves to do so! And the irony is that I’m reading and commenting on this post in the middle of the night because I cannot sleep tonight.

    Liked by 1 person

  16. One of things I admire most about your approach to life is being intentional about carving time for personal reflection, quiet meditation and self renewal. Doing it when you have the quiet and not the in midst of the tasks and the stress.

    It’s such a winning approach to life. And yes, work place culture and practice can benefit from this wisdom, Wynne!

    Liked by 2 people

  17. Thanks for the wisdom, Wynne. In the last year, I’ve dealt with some new health issues, so focusing on staying calm and breathing have been on my radar. This is because stress can trigger pain, and a lot of ailments, so the calmer the better. I keep forgetting to keep a notebook by my bed, so thanks for the reminder. There’s nothing worse than a lost line or phrase that could find their home in a post or poem. 🙂

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  20. Excellent advice Wynne. Indeed to be able to get work done, one must first calm down and think clearly. It is better to make decisions when you are not in a rush. Also, avoiding fear and procrastination can get you far because usually what holds us back as people, it is FEAR.

    God can help and I am a huge advocate of prayer💖🙏🙏

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  22. Thank you , need to put a notebook next to my bed as well. Ive notice lately my thoughts flow out of me when its completly quiet. And when im taking awalk along the river and the only noise is nature.

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  23. I practiced both focused attention meditation and compassion meditation, though I mainly practice open-monitoring meditation. It’s the one which I found most conducive to creativity! But I find I use writing meditatively, in my many types of writing. My writings have different structures that tend to make archetypes emerge, that release unconscious possibilities into awareness. Incidently, there’s a lot of star-imagery in my stories, possibly because the constellations against a black night is close to how I conceive archetypes: clusters of human potential.

    Anyways, these were just a few thoughts haha. Thanks for the text!

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