The Writing Process

In the first blog assignment, students are responding to Anne Lamott's essay, "Shitty First Drafts" by reflecting and discussing their personal writing process and how it aligns with or differs from Lamott's. You will find as many different processes as you will find writers. Each of us has strengths and weaknesses that we need to recognize in order for us to succeed in any kind of writing assignment and not drive ourselves crazy in the process.
Everyone's process is different. Some writers slowly work through each word, sometimes taking hours just to write an introduction. Other writers speed through a first draft, but spend more time revising. Personally, I do both. It depends on the day and what I'm trying to write. Recently, my writing is limited to literary analysis and research papers.
For a term paper in one of my Literature classes, typically I begin by typing out notes, quotes, and ideas that I want to include in the final essay. Usually, at the end, I delete almost an entire page of quotes and notes because they no longer fit into what is important for me to say. I try to ignore the feeling that all that initial work of finding and typing out the notes was essentially a waste of time and effort. I try to remind myself that it's all part of my journey towards the final product.
The bulk of my time and brainpower goes towards making the connections between all my ideas and the ideas of others that I use to support my thesis. Throughout this whole process I am returning to the question: "SO WHAT??????". (The number of question marks, exclamation points, and creative expletives varies according to my frustration level). At this point I usually face an existential crisis, which involves but is definitely not limited to doubting my ideas, my discoveries, my voice, and even doubting my purpose in life.
After I calm down a bit I usually make a discovery. I have an "a ha" moment. This moment isn't usually quite as dramatic as the more popular "eureka!" moment, but still very fulfilling. The last two areas I work on are the introduction and the conclusion. I save them for last because I rarely know exactly what the point of my paper is until the end. Some of you might think this is crazy and counterintuitive, but I've heard from very successful and respected professors that this "backwards" process is pretty typical, especially with women. I still wonder how my gender can influence my writing process, but after seeing that this is my way of writing, I really don't care if it's because of my gender or not.