Writers approach Stream of Consciousness writing strictly as a personal exercise. This literary phrase means different techniques of discovery to different writers. Some students of writing believe it is somewhat kin to Psychic writing, or Automatic Writing, when a foreign spirit inhabits the writer's body. (Twilight Zone theme music in the background?) They find themselves saying all kinds of things on the page, most of it unrelated and scattered in concept.

Truly, much of the text in Stream of Consciousness writing, however weird or silly it becomes, may not be of much use. But somewhere within the Stream of Consciousness experience, there is a phrase or thought, which piques the imagination and proves curiously inspiring.

Another thing can occur: Stream of Consciousness writing, if it comes on strong, with a peculiar tone that does not flake out but remains consistent, can be highly accomplished and fascinating work. The sentences may be fragmented, but that seemed to help Harlan Ellison's early novels in the Science Fiction genre, which flowed in the spirit of Stream of Consciousness, to create a totally new area of fiction.

If a character or a voice wants to be heard, and wants to use you a vehicle, and you agree and enjoy the exhilaration of moderate or questionable control in the writing of that voice or character, you should go ahead with it.

You don't have to be a vehicle for Seth, the main character in the series of fabulous nonfiction Spiritualist visitation books that took the world by storm in the 1980's. Seth first came to the nonfiction writer through a Ouiji Board, but soon he would enter her body the moment she removed her reading glasses. It appeared that Seth himself, the visiting entity, did not need the reading glasses.

The correct term, among Psychic circles, for this experience is Automatic Writing. In strict definition, the subject and writer, must experience a trance state wherein they write. When the writers exit the trance, they do not remember any of the writing of the visiting spirit. Houdini would say, "PURE HOKUM!" But Sir Authur Conan Doyle of Sherlock Holmes fame was a pure believer of Automatic Writing and all things mystical.

Most Stream of Consciousness exercises require that you be truly conscious, and not in a trance state. Actually, the more active your imagination is, and the more flexible it is, with a fully functional right brain/left brain balance, the more useful the exercise will be for you.

Some contemporary board members of project committees embark on Brainstorming sessions. A mass of high-speed generated ideas and concepts bounce off one another creating friction and newer brighter ideas. Brainstorming is not the same thing as Stream of Consciousness composition, which is a solitary endeavor.

One of the first things for you to forget about in Stream of Consciousness writing is form.

Do not concern yourself with sentence patterns or grammatical correctness. This exercise is all about Ideas and the development of unexpected, unplanned content.

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