the dick cavett test

Have you ever dreamed of writing a nonfiction book? Before diving in, take a moment to visualize the path clearly. Don't let a formless urge to "be published" quietly nag at the back of your mind. Why? Recently, a prospective author reached out for help with

putting technique before the horse

As a music student at Juilliard, composer David Lang was told by a professor to "write some melodies." As Lang later recalled in a conversation with fellow composer Steve Reich: [My teacher] went into my music notebook and drew it in pencil: "Write a melody that goes

on price, word count, and the beauty of short books

Obviously, publishers charge more for thicker books. They cost more to make. It's only fair. That said, the figure we landed on when I was an editor always felt like a guess, at least when working for certain publishers. You know how monkeys throwing darts outperformed professional stock

in sequence

I love it when a plan comes together. —"Hannibal" Smith, The A-Team Sequencing is an essential skill and one of the unsung benefits of real-world experience. Take cooking: If I'm following a recipe, I have to understand how the whole process works before starting at "

watching the clock

Earlier, I shared my journey learning Transcendental Meditation (TM) but left out a surprising tip: “Don’t set a timer,” my instructor advised. “It’ll snap you out of meditation. When you think twenty minutes have passed, check the clock. If you’re early, close your eyes and keep going.

lost in ideaspace

When you're writing about a topic that fascinates you, it's easy—too easy—to zero in on the most interesting (to you) bits. Rabbit holes are fine for the casual newsletter or social media post, but in most cases, we owe our readers a comprehensive look

find a new way of working

Since I planned to discuss a recent documentary about Brian Eno, I began writing this by drawing an Oblique Strategies card. Lo and behold, I pulled the most famous one of all: I shuffled pretty thoroughly—what are the odds? This is the card everyone mentions when they explain these

knowledge of the instrument and an imagination

"Most of the other guitar solos that you hear performed on stage have been practiced over and over and over again," Frank Zappa complained to an interviewer. "They go out there, and they play the same one every night, and it's really just spotless."

imperfect and unpretentious

Getting started is the hard part. When I sit down to work, I'm uncomfortable. Itchy, antsy, easily distracted. I know why, too. For some reason, I'm convinced I need to know what words I'm going to write before I can write any words. Convinced,