Chained to the Desk: How I Wrote a Book Using Self-Imprisonment
I had the pleasure of watching a film called Colette yesterday. It’s the story of Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, a French country girl who ghostwrites novels for her gambling, cheating husband, eventually finding a way to break free and find her own voice—with new novels as well as by fighting for the rights to the ones her husband appropriated. A riveting film from start to finish which shows the strength and endurance it took/takes for a female to be recognized for her talents—with one of the main obstacles being herself.
There was a scene in this film where the husband locks Colette in the study for four hours, forcing her to write after a few weeks of “shirking” her duties. At first I thought, ‘That’s horrible! No one should ever be subjected to that, least ways by someone who is supposed to love them. Plus, it won’t work! You can’t just trap someone in a room and force them to write brilliant prose. It just doesn’t work like that, or everyone would be doing it.’ And then after a moment of recollection, I realized that I’d been doing that exact thing for almost an entire year.
AN AUTHOR IN A BOX
There is nothing quite like forcing yourself into a small rectangular room with dim lighting and a lock on the door with nothing but a notebook. I’m referring, of course, to the study room at my local public library. Why? What were you thinking of?
It began with my best friend coming to me with a book proposal. I would write a book of short stories and poems for her artwork. It was a collaborative project that we had been planning for many years but had never gotten around to doing. I had tried a few short stories in the past, but there was a fatal combination of high stakes (to please my bestie and to make money) as well as my never having written in the genre before which effected my ability to jump in happily with both feet. I needed to approach this from a different angle, and the only solution I could think of was to lock myself in a room for a couple of hours and see what would happen… she said playfully one evening, never thinking it might actually be necessary to implement.
My husband and I were at the library one evening and I noticed the study rooms in the very back of the building—the quietest part, subsequently. I thought, ‘How convenient,’ booked one of them for the next day for the maximum two-hour stretch and haven’t looked back since. I book a study room every weekend now, and if I’m unable to lock myself up for a couple of hours to write every week, I feel like something is very wrong.
I’m sure you’ve often heard that forcing creativity can only lead to stagnation, lack of will or at worst the death of the creative dream. I haven’t found this to be so, and I’d even go so far as to say that forcing myself to write is the only time that I can get any halfway-decent writing accomplished. Allow me to explain why I think this is…
HOW CHAINS CAN SET YOU FREE
For those of you familiar with submission/dominance, there is freedom in the act of servitude which allows for surrender. When we surrender to our creative genius by being submissive to it, we’re engaging with it in a way which obliterates choice from the equation. This frees us from obligations and responsibilities (grocery shopping, tidying up, laundry, etc.) which would otherwise hinder our creativity. This is why creativity is so addictive in its nature—we’re enthralled by it because it’s our choice to submit and to serve, and our focus is bound, entirely fixated on the task, not subject to the everyday chores we tend to label with more priority over our writing normally. The chains create a space and time period where we are open to the surrender which produces some of our best works.
In your self-imprisonment, you are free to create. For now, ignore the fact that you’re essentially confined to a little box. Instead, think about the fact that within the walls of this little box, you are a god. You get to create characters, cities, landscapes, worlds! You are the master of the page and you have all the creative freedom that you can allow yourself, and even those limitations can be broken should you wish! Use this god-like power to your best advantage in the time you’re allotted. Storytelling is next to godliness, and once you slide back into the real world, you’re going to miss your chances to create without constraints. You’ll soon wish you were back in your little box.
It may take a few times to really get into it, but it won’t take long for you to realize that you are giving yourself a gift by confining yourself for creativity’s sake. The interesting thing about self-confinement is that you can leave at any time. The time you choose to stay is more precious, then, because you have submitted to the captivity, surrendering fully to your muses, of your own free will. The freedom you have to leave is much less important than your willingness to stay, giving yourself the chance to create your masterpiece.
THE LOGISTICS OF CAPTIVITY
There are a few important coordinating efforts you must make to ensure that self-imprisonment is right for you.
1) Make sure you choose a place where you feel safe and comfortable.
Personally, I find that this has always been the library. I met my husband at the library, have made many wonderful friends working in a library, and always felt like I could be efficient, productive and creative (or all three together) in a library more than anywhere else. I need the quiet, the stillness, and the expectation that things will remain quiet and still from everyone in the building (like a silent, shushing cult; sidenote: The fact that librarians rarely “shush” anymore is a little disappointing for me. I feel that if you go through the library doors, you’ve entered into a contract to be quiet—unless you enter the Children’s section, in which case, all bets are off.)
2) Make it an enticing experience.
Wear your favorite sweater, buy yourself a Starbucks coffee on the way, wear your glasses instead of contacts—whatever helps make you feel more like a writer, and a pampered writer at that. In a phenomenal book by the name of Atomic Habits, the author dedicates a chapter to the dynamics of making your habits enjoyable and easy. This is a key factor to ensuring that you’re going to keep putting yourself in prison for your art. (Comfort can be a powerful motivator, but it's sustaining powers can sometimes be used for evil. Check out my upcoming article Miserable Familiarity: Breaking the Link Between Comfort and Unhappiness)
3) Make it simple.
Pack all the gear that you’ll want to use the night before you use it, if you can—your laptop, notebook, lots of pens and pencils, making sure the clothes you want to wear are in an accessible spot, and put your phone on Focus mode for the hours you plan to be incarcerated. Make the possibility of you making an excuse not to go so unreasonable that you can’t easily back out (at least not without massive guilt).
4) Give yourself a set amount of time—and don’t deviate.
You can set a timer or check out a study room for a certain amount of time in order to achieve this goal. It’s always easier for us to do something when we know when that something will end (even things we want and love to do), especially if we’re not entirely thrilled to be doing it in the first place. Keeping to this agreed-upon timeframe is essential for our own self-trust. If we break that trust early on, it may cause trust issues with the time limit later on, and you could become unwilling to dedicate so much time to your craft and give up altogether. If you find that your initial agreement of 45 minutes is too short or too long, re-evaluate and set a new timeframe. Don’t give up based on uncertainty. Having a plan is necessary, especially in the beginning.
Sometimes being put in a box is incredibly freeing—if you put yourself there, that is. Under the right—dare I say, perfect—circumstances, you may even find that your box becomes your happy place.
