My writing ganglion

I find it fascinating to read about our brains—don't you? I am by no means an expert in this field, so I love to be reminded about things like how habits work.

I am still establishing my writing routine to be consistently productive. My work as a narrative designer in games is more sporadic—there are days for writing, for outlining, editing, researching, scripting etc. So I don't get to just write every day. So, still not a full-fledged habit!

Yesterday I picked up "Optimal" by Daniel Goleman and Cary Cherniss, after watching Goleman's talk on Big Ideas on Youtube. I thought this book was something I was looking for—and I was not mistaken. Many books on self-help, especially those based on sociology and behavioural studies, I noticed, focus on the negative, on how not to think or do things. I found that extremely damaging. Here I am, trying to establish a good habit through positive thinking, only to read hundreds of pages ingraining negative thoughts on my mind as poor examples and never really getting down to instilling positive thoughts or tell me how they might sound like. That's where "Optimal" trumps over those. It encourages me to think positively. So the book was an accidental brilliant find.

Just started reading it and decided that I could just keep it open and read whenever I need that positive loop reestablished. Coming back to the habits—the first chapter explains, gently, that the ecstatic sought-after "flow state" might be rare, but what is much more achievable is having a good day by doing what you do best and having small wins. So how do you know you are using your skills effortlessly (one of the "flow" attributes)? Here's a quote:

“The science of habit formation tells us this effortlessness marks a neural shift, where the sequence of actions involved has become a habit, one that happens automatically and unconsciously. Such habitual sequences are activated in the basal ganglia, one of the more primitive areas toward the bottom of the brain. Once the basal ganglia takes over a learned sequence, we can perform that new habit effortlessly, without having to think about it.” — From "Optimal" by Daniel Goleman.

I can only guess that writing every day should help me feel such effortlessness —no matter if I'm writing poems, fiction, or personal thoughts. In the end, it's partly a mechanical skill, so typing out will help transfer the writing effort to the basal ganglia area–into the unconscious. Let it sing its ancient chants while I'm writing about robots and stuff.

Fun Fact: the Greek word "γαλγλιον" (ganglion) originally referred to a swelling or knot. Today it describes a collection of nerve cell bodies, particularly in the peripheral nervous system (hence basal ganglia = located more centrally). Within the central nervous system, these nerve cell clusters are more accurately termed "nuclei." There are, apparently, academic fights about this (Sarikcioglu L, Altun U, Suzen B, Oguz N. The evolution of the terminology of the basal ganglia, or are they nuclei? J Hist Neurosci. 2008;17(2):226-9. doi: 10.1080/09647040701236586. PMID: 18421638.)