In a recent Writer’s Digest piece, author Julia Kelly talks about “How to Create the Mental Space to Write.” This is something I struggle with, and I know I’m not alone. My career (which is not in creative writing), my family, and just the everyday humdrum of life often seem like they’re conspiring to keep my creative well dried up. In fact, it was only at the end of 2020 that I had a “Come to Jesus” moment with myself and decided my writing needed to be a priority again—after years of letting it fall to the wayside.

I feel like Kelly and I are cut from the same cloth, because among her revelations is this gem:

“Creating mental space for your writing to thrive is about giving your mind the chance to clear and reset, while also letting your subconscious get to work in the background. For me, that can mean a few different things, but the most reliable is running.”

Ah, running, the one exercise I would engage in every day if I had the time. I am an avid long-distance runner, and I often say I run “for the good of humanity” (I am a much more pleasant human being when I can take my frustrations out on the pavement), but it’s really for myself that I slip into my running shoes, put in my earbuds, and take off while listening to the latest episode of my favorite podcast. Running is the only activity that clears my head completely, something I desperately need in order to be even remotely creative.

“Those moments that are empty of thoughts,” as Kelly puts it, are when the ideas seep in, quietly, settling to the bottom and waiting for me to be ready for them. Then, when I sit down to my computer for a solid session of writing, I poke around the littered ground of my mind and the ideas float up, sometimes surprising and always helpful.

I can’t always go running, and I find that reading (“read everything you can get your hands on” is common writer advice, and it really is the best advice) can provide similar results by forcing my mind out of my own brain and into someone else’s for a bit, but running…that’s my go-to.

How do you create the mental space for your writing?