The Five Co-Pilots

The trusted friends I invite on every creative venture.

One of the questions I hear the most is about the writing process. What does it look like? How does a project come together? I love this topic, but mostly because I’m still searching for the answer.

Some writers are wonderfully regimented. For me, it varies from day to day, project to project. There are a number of factors at play — the genre, if there’s a deadline, my mood, my hunger level, if someone is jackhammering just outside my window. I am easily distracted and prone to procrastination. I often fight the urge to delete everything, give up, and start all over again.

On the best days, I emerge from work as if coming out of a trance, not remembering anything I’ve just typed, nor how it found its way onto the page. But that’s not to say I haven’t developed something resembling a method. (And most of the time, it really helps.)

These are the five key elements I’ve come to rely on, the trusted copilots I always invite along for the ride…