Proposal Update 2

The first draft of the lit review is done. The intro to the essay comes in at about a page and a quarter and the lit review is coming in at just under three pages. The proposed model begins near the top of page 5. I’m using the length requirement for the SSRC as a guideline. Currently, the font is Times New Roman 11-point, but the spacing is still double-spaced instead of space-and-a-half. I feel that I’m on track for length. Now for the model.

I have two sections done and ready for editing. I got stuck a while back while free-writing when I realized that I needed more data. I spent all of January and a good part of February reading. I wanted to just “skim and get what I need quickly” for these sections—anything to avoid plodding and losing “writing momentum.” I’m coming to realize that for someone with lesions in his frontal lobes, there is no such thing! There is only “charting momentum” of the type you see on this blog. Writing cannot be experienced as a flow. I need to work section by section, toward a single draft. I can't just bash out a rough draft at a single shot. Baseball. Writing is baseball—162 games. It’s all about consistency. Instrumentally rational production. No charisma.

Here’s the reading that needs to be finished for the model:

Part of the trick is to stop being perfectionistic about efficiency. I need to focus on comparatively efficient but still withing the realm of the possible. It was always my goal to see it in my head and then make it happen. That led to fast, good drafts when I had working frontal lobes. Now I must embrace what under the old system was gross inefficiency. When reading, I must take in a gross oversample of information, rather than triage reading and distilling what I need from the text “on demand.” Next, I must write a rough paragraph that is likely to also be disorganized and contain to much information. This is simple “journaling.” Then I distill and reorganize by hand, using the paragraph rewrite exercise. No skipping steps and trying to do it in my head. It’s plodding, pure and simple. I do not fly. I plod. I’m the fucking turtle. I need to embrace it.