Word Vomit: Learning to Let it Flow, Ugly Chunks and All

It could very well be that the last thing the world needs is another how-to blog article on writing.

Then again, despite all of the courses, structural models, writers-on-writing, and “Here’s the Secret to crafting the perfect story!” proclamations and prescriptions out there, it seems that many writers find the act of Writing—the mystical, alchemical act of getting words on the page—to be SO HARD.

Now… don’t get me wrong—the total process of Brainstorming, Writing, Editing, and Revision IS hard. Pulling a story from the ether (Elizabeth Gilbert) or like a fossil from the ground (Stephen King) is not for those given easily to Frustration. But it is not quite the war Steven Pressfield would have us believe, nor is it simple as making a ham and cheese sandwich.

All around me I see writers struggling for daily word count. They read Stephen King’s how-to books and try to emulate his technique; they hear that walking helps, that even when a writer is mowing the lawn or lounging in a hammock, they are working. They learn about history’s most prolific authors and how, if you write just 200 words a day, you’ll have a 70,000-word novel every year. 

200 words a day. That doesn’t seem like much. As a matter of fact, it’s the exact word count of the first four paragraphs of this essay. The first draft of those four paragraphs took me about 15 minutes to write.

“Wait… what?” some of you are asking. “I can write a 70,000-word novel every year in just 15 minutes a day?” 

NO. It doesn’t work for six-pack abs and Master Gardening, and it doesn’t work for writing. Well… let me flip that. Yes… if you want to write a very BAD novel.

Because novels (or short stories, poems, screenplays, and so on) aren’t made in first drafts, 15 minutes a day, in 200-word chunks. They are crafted over time through a lot of patience and process. The hardest thing about “writing” is actually not writing at all. It’s Revision. What to leave, what to take out. What’s too much description, what’s not enough. Refining dialogue so it SOUNDS REAL when it’s actually, when done right, as carefully controlled as a orchestral piece of music, complete with subtext, efficient and exacting use of punctuation (a subject of a future blog), and encoded information for the reader about the character.

But this is an essay about Writing. “Where’s the Vomit?,” you ask. It’s most likely the reason you clicked on the link in the first place.

One step back. Brainstorming is where we are, all of us, Writers. I get emails and phone calls several times a week that start: “Dear Writer Guy [that’s the subtext]: I have this Really GREAT Idea: can you help me get it on the page?”

(I CAN!: see my Writing and Editorial Services here: https://joeymadiastoryteller.blogspot.com/2025/02/writing-and-editing-services.html)

Really GREAT Ideas are the seeds that grow the garden of humanity. Despite how you feel about Technology, Social Media, Self-Driving Cars, and Artificial Intelligence (I am thoroughly Skeptical and very nearly Cynical—see a previous essay on this blog for the difference), they have all begun with Really GREAT Ideas… or, more accurately, Really BIG Ideas. Think about Einstein and Tesla, tapping away with their pencils, letting the Universe speak both to and through them. 

(Sketicism vs. Cynicism: https://joeymadiastoryteller.blogspot.com/2025/02/writing-from-place-of-skepticism-versus.html)

And society needs writers to modulate their work. To comment on it and make sense of the ramifications of it through the Art of the Story. To create an array of characters that represent—subtly (subtly)—the myriad  points of view and aspects of the Really BIG Ideas about which they are writing.

Seeds breed seeds when they aren’t overwatered, through the intermediary of beautiful things (like flowers) in the process.

“Joey,” you say, glancing at the side bar for other reading options, “What about the VOMIT?!”

You’re reading it (well, the bones of it). The first draft of this essay took all of 38 minutes. To get down on the page. In a first rough pass. Letting it flow. Not judging, not agonizing over the difference between Mark Twain’s right and wrong words (the Lightning and the Lightning Bug), not wondering: “Am I any good? Am I a fraud? Should I be doing something else with my time?”

But I Brainstormed it—on walks, washing dishes, driving to and from the grocery store, while enjoying a pipe or cigar, and as I was drifting off to sleep and waking up—for about a week and a half.

(and made some further revisions from one it was first posted on LinkedIn 7 years ago)

Because the total process of writing (Brainstorming, Writing, Editing, Revising) takes A LOT of time. When you are in the zone, letting the Vomit flow—great gushing chunks of ideas and characters and situations and descriptions—all of Time and Space breaks down and you are no longer governed by the physics of THIS world, because you’re creating your own.

Gay Hendricks, in The Big Leap (highly recommended) calls this Einstein Time. 

Did God VOMIT for six straight days in the story told in Genesis? [Creating a whole planet full of newly made things: now THAT’s a Really, REALLY BIG Idea… and it’s prompted a commensurate amount of writing]. Is that how the Story of Us was Created? Judging by the myriad changes in the arc of our story over the past who-knows-how-many thousands of years, I’d say yes indeed. The Editing and Revising will continue.

But if God (and let’s agree to be broad in our use of the word here) had fretted,  hovering, shaky-handed over the tabula rasa of the world about to be created, questioning every choice, every color, every nuance, every species, genus, family, order, class, phylum, kingdom, domain, well… we might not have happened at all.

So let it flow. VOMIT all over the empty space—that staring-back boogeyman of a blank page. Spill it out upon the tabula rasa of the paper or PC of pure potential with your Really GREAT (or not so great, because when you are vomiting, you don’t really know what you have, no matter how great your previous work) and Really BIG Ideas… and just let it flow. Gush. Pour forth, splashing in the alchemical porcelain bowl of Creativity like rancid oysters or too much brandy and eggnog.

Let the need to be Awesome go. No one is awesome when they vomit. It’s humbling. It’s ejection of something that needs to come out. But it’s not Rejection. That comes later, while you’re weeding through the mess, wondering why there is corn and tomato in there when you didn’t eat either (that’s the “Muses,” the magic that comes with not being a gate-keeper but a door-greeter).

Alchemy, like I said.

Now go get to it. Take your Really GREAT and BIG Ideas and use this blog entry as the virtual finger down your throat and let it all flow. Don’t wipe it up as it comes. Don’t try to suppress the groans and aches that accompany it (hey—I never said it was painless and easy).

But you do want to lock the door. No parking lot vomiting—promise? Parking lots are for brainstorming, people watching, eager eavesdropping… This is a personal, personal act. But also be kind to yourself… a wet washcloth pressed to your head every now and again is a blessing and reward.

The first draft of this essay? 38 minutes, over 1200 words. Locked away in the quiet of early morning (groans and aches minimal, but there).

The Editing and Revision?… Hours and days of trading the Lightning Bug for the Lightning over and over again.