ON WRITING 14 SONGS IN 28 DAYS

Hide a pen in the pocket of every jacket you own.
Keep inscribables on your person at all times.
If feasible, get a portable voice recorder and aggressively befriend it.
Find a quiet or private space to call your own.
Gather each unused title, tailless phrase, and rickety stanza from your mental attic, and take inventory.
Sweep every melody from under the bed and suck it onto tape.
Keep these things safe and organized.
Get silent, get still.
…
Notice all the things that task your attention.
Turn off all screens and speakers.
Find a phone that won’t ring.
Turn off the lights.
Acknowledge that part of you is thinking ‘I can’t,’ and turn that off too.
Look through your lists, your thoughts, and your fingers to find an idea that wants more.
Follow it all the way down.

Wake without the radio.
Walk without the walkman.
Underindulge, overinterpret, and break the pattern of numb routine.
Start conversations, overhear conversations.
Get lost in your home town.
Eat foods you don’t recognize.
And no matter how incongruous or repetitive your instincts seem,
When they call, answer.