One essential key to a productive journey through prison—and I suspect through life—is creativity.  Through creativity, the mind is challenged to read the world, to evaluate strength and weaknesses, and to focus energy on adding some kind of value.  Some people find creative outlets like drawing or music, but for me writing has always helped.  Currently I have the challenge of collaborating on a new manuscript, and I’m pleased to have reached a milestone toward completion of the project today.

Embarking upon a long writing project requires substantial thought. I begin the project by thinking of my intended audience.  Then I think about the message I want to deliver and creative ways to express it.  I spend hundreds of hours on that creative process, staring at the wall for hours, writing notes, researching other books.  I run around the track and I think about how I will open the story. I write drafts and then I throw the pages away.  In time, the process brings more clarity of thought and I begin to see the project in my mind, from start to finish.  That vision gives me the energy to complete an outline, and the outline becomes the blueprint for the rest of the project. Once I have the outline, I write the first chapter.  That chapter begins in the same way, with many drafts. 

Today I finished a draft of the first chapter for the new manuscript. I use it as an introduction for the work that will follow.  To collaborate on this project requires more research gathering than I did for Earning Freedom, my previous manuscript.  But even the research gathering is creative. 

To complete my portion within the time line I’ve set (by June I expect to finish my part), I’ll begin my workday every morning between 2:00 and 3:00 am. I’ll break my work between 6:00 and 9:00 for exercise. Then I’ll spend the afternoons gathering content through research and interviewing other prisoners.  By completing a draft of the first chapter today, I’ve taken a significant step forward, and I’m eager to continue progress in the days, weeks, and months ahead. All of this work contributes to my preparations for success upon release.

This morning I ran 10 miles. I followed the run with 100 pushups.

Saturday, 30 January 2010

[Consecutive running log: 3,680 miles over the past 414 days]

[pushups in 2010: 10,000]

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