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A Writer Is Only as Good as His or Her Notes
The other day I had the best idea ever while taking a shower. An idea for writing about…something that I can’t remember.
Against my better judgment, I told myself I’d remember the thought and write it down when I got out.
But that’s when my mind pulled a shab-lah-goo! onto it’s next thought and left my undoubtedly brilliant idea three sheets to the wind…aka GONE.
Our brains are awesome at many things. Unfortunately, on-demand sorting and recall of complex ideas is not one of them. It’s fantastic for GENERATING those ideas, but when it comes to storage and retrieval…fuhgettaboutit.
One minute after you think of an idea — a concept worth writing about — your brain’s already forgotten about it. And even if you do remember it, the idea will never quite be the same shade as it was when you first thought it.
That’s why a writer is only as good as his or her notes. A writer’s notebook acts as an extension to his brain, where his ideas can be captured, stored, organized, and retrieved at a moment’s notice.
A good, old-fashioned pen and paper notebook is better than nothing, but for sure it has its obvious limitations.
As a writer of the future, and if you want to be the best writer you can be, your best friend needs to be…
