ChatGPT - Day 1

Day 1: 10-minute nonstop free-write — no editing.

Anything that comes to my mind? What if I have been practicing not letting anything come to my mind. What then? Does pressing the italics button count as editing? Does it count as stopping? I could have a million things hit my brain at once, especially since it's almost time to make supper, but will I let something slip through? What will it be? There are a few things that I don't really feel like talking about out loud at the moment. Are these free-writes supposed to be about writing? Or can they be like journal entries? I think that I have been using them as journal entries which aren't particularly productive as far as material for writing goes. This stream of consciousness has been extremely useless and that's the way I am deciding that it has to be. Otherwise, I will talk about things that I don't feel like talking about. It feels like I am one strong wind away from a total collapse of my delicate card tower.

Maybe the real point of this is to allow myself to see just how fragile and scattered my mind can be, without trying to hold it together in a neat little bow. It’s like watching leaves fall into a river. Some get swept away quickly, some spin around in eddies for a while, and some just sink before I ever get a good look at them. Have you guys ever seen that? I really like watching leaves fall. I don't know why. Did I show you the video of my crazy oldest daughter when we were catching leaves in the park? Maybe my thoughts are like that. The funny thing is though, I try so hard to control what comes up, and I think that ultimately leads to not having any control at all. Even when I tell myself “don’t think of anything,” suddenly the word nothing becomes a giant, blinking billboard in my head. The kind that are annoying to see as you're driving down the highway.

I wonder if this useless writing is secretly useful. Maybe not in the sense of producing paragraphs I’ll ever want to share with anyone, but in loosening something... unclenching a fist I didn't even realize I’m squeezing most of the time. When I write like this, I notice how much I want to steer. I want the words to make sense. I want them to go somewhere. And when they don’t, I get impatient. But maybe the real exercise is just sitting in that impatience? Yeah, maybe. 

I'm thinking about card towers again. It wasn't a bad analogy. Some days I do feel like I’m balancing an absurdly delicate structure that could collapse at the slightest touch. But what if instead of protecting it, I just let it fall? Maybe the mess of cards on the table would be easier to look at than the constant strain of keeping them upright.

And now I’m thinking about supper again. How much of my brainpower goes into food, (and not even in an enjoyable way) just the constant thoughts of what’s next, what’s thawed, what needs to be chopped, who will eat what, what time do I need to do everything so it appears ready on the table at the right time? It’s never-ending. Maybe that’s fine. Maybe being pulled in several directions at once just means that I'm alive and my life is full.