I’m sure that if mental physicians everywhere had their way, I (and many other writers) would be diagnosed with something serious. I’ve been writing Serious Character Bios (read: three handwritten pages per main character, which so far is six pages and will eventually be 15), and this has caused me to love my characters. Even my antagonist. Which is good, because even villains have mothers who love them (or something).
Anyway, now that I’ve fleshed out Cleo and George, in particular, I’ve started to have conversations with them. Sometimes this involves acting like I’m listening to said fictional entity telling me about themselves or a situation; sometimes I take on the role of the character and monologue to myself while in the bathroom (no, not while it’s otherwise occupied, I’m not that confident in my ability to prove my sanity). It’s actually a helpful exercise, because it plays on my one strength as a public speaker: spontaneity. I like to connect dots that were never supposed to be connected, and this happens best when my brain is in GO mode without the ability to censor a connection before I can see where it goes. Having conversations with myself is kind of my version of freewriting, especially because I’m slow to write by hand and typed freewrites feel like cheating. Weird quirk, right?
What kinds of quirks do you indulge in as far as your writing practice?