For this article, I'm probably one of the LAST people that should ever claim to be an expert on this sort of thing! LOL! My room is a hot mess! And probably always will be! But I've got a few goodies to pass along your way, if any of you are interested! Hopefully, I can drop a few gems in your lap, and it'll help in the long run!

So let's travel back down the rabbit hole, shall we?

The thing is, most (if not all) think of writing as merely being a cerebral experience. And in a lot of ways, it is. You sit down at a desk, you stare at your keyboard, and the rest of the world is supposed to disappear for a little while so you can focus on what you're doing, right? But...the question is...does it though?

A majority of psychologists say that your current home environment is often a reflection of your current state of mind. The bedroom being the most intimate. And I have to admit...for me, personally...I'm willing to bet that this is the absolute truth. If any of you ever wanted to look at what's going on in my brain all day, every day...hehehe, just look at my bedroom! That will tell you everything that you need to know.

One of my major issues is that I am practically a religious fanatic when it comes to being a full blown insomniac. Like...I don't have a 'bed time'. Never did. I actually envy people who can stick to something like that, even if only by habit, to be honest. I can't. I literally stay awake as long as humanly possible and watch movies, or read books, or write stories...until my body completely shuts down and it simply can't take anymore. If I had a dollar for every night that I fell asleep at this keyboard and woke up a half hour later to see "zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz" typed out on my laptop screen...I'd be a millionaire! LOL!

Unfortunately...that makes for a perpetual mess in my room. It really does. I write down notes on scrap paper and put it on my bed next to me. I eat dinner, and put the plate on the bed next to me. I drink my Powerade drink, enjoy it, and set it down on the floor next to me. And I eventually go back and clean everything up...but since I sit at this keyboard until I'm literally passing out from exhaustion...I just take whatever few seconds of consciousness that I have left to simply crawl into bed and go to sleep. EVERYTHING else can wait until tomorrow. Right now...I need to faint out of existence. And then I wake up and move everything back on the bed to make my desk clean, and then move everything from the bed back to my desk because I'm about to faint from exhaustion...and this continues as the mass grows until I end up having to take a whole weekend to balance things out again. And then...the cycle repeats itself. Hehehe! It's weird.

You'd be surprised how quickly the mess from my bad insomniac habits pile up. it's really bad, trust me. It can be exhausting. And just thinking about it is a variety of distractions that I can truly do without.

The point is...my workspace when I'm writing my stories and all quickly becomes cluttered and unmanageable. I look around me, and all I see is a procrastinator's unfulfilled promise when it comes to fixing things up so I have room to move around again. And I've found that this doesn't just affect me physically...like, I need to clean all of this shit up! But it affects me mentally as well. And that quote about it affecting my current headspace couldn't be more true. I'm trying to write a story, but I'm moving papers around, looking for notes that I wrote down weeks ago, stepping over things, thinking about how I need to vacuum the carpet sometime soon...

...My brain looks exactly the way my room looks. Crowded and disorganized and void of any real rhyme or reason at all.

BUT...

When I do dig my heels in and clean everything up...it's almost like my mind relaxes a little bit more. Like it has more 'room' to create and spawn new ideas. I know that it sounds weird, but if you're anything like me, and have been piling up scrap paper and notebooks and beer and soda cans and other stuff in your room...take a break. Just one day. And dedicate that time to cleaning everything out of your room. Get it out of your vision. Get rid of it! Everything that you have to step over, everything that you have to 'move aside' to put something else down, every over crowded dresser drawer that won't close all the way, every closet full of clothes that you can't wear anymore...and would no longer be fashionable even if you could...detach yourself from it, and free up some much needed mental real estate so that you can create without restriction. And without a bunch of junk weighing your spirit down.

It sounds weird right? Like some kind of metaphysical bullshit? I know it does. Hehehe! How can creating a simple change in my environment have any real effect on my writing? Well, I dare you guys to give it a try. It works. At least for me, it does.

Look around you right now as you're reading this. Take a moment to think about a story that you've written or are writing now. Look at your writing environment. Is it jumbled? Messy? Full of things that need to be done, but you're taking a break to write instead? Is there noise from the TV or the radio in the background? Are the kids running around screaming and having a great time just outside of your door? Do you have a dog or a cat that suddenly decided they needed love and attention, and want to play at THIS particular moment while you're trying to focus? Do you think that all of these things aren't subconsciously pulling on your mind in one way or another? They are. Trust me.

Or...we can go the other way with this too. Is your room sterile? Blank walls? Super clean? Glaring white shades and curtains? You know...in my bedroom (where I do all of my writing), I covered my walls with comic books that I collected as a kid. Hehehe, it's true! And sometimes, I look up at them randomly and they give me some much needed inspiration. Don't know why, but they do. A quick example, my very first fantasy story ever, The Plateau, I was trying soooo hard to come up with a name for the mischievous scamp that was running through the marketplace during an action scene. And one of the comic books on my wall just above my laptop was "Wolverine #8". Hehehe, and after thinking about it for a few quick moments...I took the letters from the middle of the comic book title, and came up with the name 'Verin' (From Wol'verin'e). It's a small thing, but it worked. I liked it. And he was one of the X-Men...so the name 'Verin Hax' was born. Lord knows how long I would have tortured myself trying to come up with a fantasy name if that didn't happen to just be right there staring me in the face.

Sometimes, just surrounding yourself with the things that you love can inspire you and ignite your personal muse in ways that you never thought possible. And at a moment's notice. But...clutter and disarray can end up influencing you in another way. A negative way. And you want to avoid as much of that distraction and chaos as possible when it comes to anything that you're trying to do creatively.

Now...I completely understand that some of you writers have other responsibilities that take a priority sometimes when it comes to your stories. And that's totally fine. Some of you guys have jobs that might tire you out or have an effect on your mood. Some of you have families, kids, pets, shows on Netflix that you want to binge before the internet spoils the ending for you! Hehehe! I get it. There have been times when I was having a good time with my family or have had my little cousins spend the night and I still felt like..."I wish I could be writing right now." Maybe that's just me. Hehehe, after 20 plus years, I'm a bit of an addict! But noise and distraction is just as much of a creativity killer as anything. Don't try to write in front of the TV screen. Even the commercials are designed by highly trained professionals who get paid a LOT of money to steal your attention. Don't try to write with your cell phone next to you, buzzing every time you get a text or a news message. Don't write with Facebook or Twitter opened in another tab if you have alerts on. The noise pollution is also a major factor when it comes to your work environment. You need to find a way to get some time to yourself, and let your passion flow while your responsibilities rest for a short while.

That's not easy. And I don't know if I can give you guys any really good advice on that part of the process, because it's different for everybody. What I would advise, from my limited insight on your situation, is this...

Find a balance.

Priorities come first. Always. Always take care of the most important parts of your life, and THEN find time to write. I think you'll enjoy it more if you do it that way. So have a decent sit down dinner, watch your favorite TV show, take the dog for a walk, give the kids a bath and put them to bed for the night, spend time with your significant other...whatever. But...then just let the world know that you're going to go to your room, you're going to write or be working on something that's important to you...and unless it's an emergency, you'd prefer to not be disturbed. Even if it's just for an hour or two...take it. You've done your duty for the day, you've been responsible, the house is at rest...now take some time for yourself. You might only be able to get a little bit at a time, but whatever private time you're able to squeeze out of your day...be selfish with it. I don't think it's too much to ask for an hour to just do something for yourself. One hour. The rest of the world and work and the kids and the pets and the entertainment industry can HAVE the other 23 hours! Hehehe, just keep one for yourself. Every day. Just something to say, "Hey, I was there for everybody else, and I got everything done. Now leave me alone. For one hour. Let me get my release for the day and I'll be back tomorrow. Promise."

I used to have a really bad habit of always trying to do everything for everyone else, and the insomnia didn't help, because I would keep giving and giving and giving until I had nothing left for myself, and then I go to sleep. My room's a mess, my body's fatigued, and everybody else got what they wanted...and all I got was more 'tired'. But I wasn't balancing things out like I should have. So now, I clean, I call my friends up, I take breaks to get out of the house or drop in to the chatroom every now and then. Spend quality time with the people I love and care about, you know? And then...(Even though, for me it's easier because I do it in the middle of the night) I go to my room. I shut my door. No noise. No disruptions. No doorbell, no phone calls, nothing. It's just me and my thoughts, in an environment of peace and quiet, surrounded by the very things that ignited my passion to write in the first place. It's beautiful! That's my safe space. Hehehe! That's my personal paradise.

Anyway, it's something that I think you guys should try some time. It actually made me feel more 'free' when it came to my writing to be existing in a more inviting environment. If you have a number of other people in your living space...try writing when they're asleep or at work, or just busy with something of their own. If you're the kind of person that takes a bunch of notes, and is constantly turning pages in a notebook or searching for scraps? Do what I did. I went out to a local store and bough a dry erase board. It cost me like three bucks and came with its own markers. Write the notes you need right then and there on the dry erase board, and when you're done, wipe it clean, and you have another blank slate for the next batch. If you live in a busy city or have noise going on in your household grab your headphones...go to Youtube...and look up 'ambient music'. There are plenty of instrumental collections that you can listen to that are not distracting at all, and you can listen to them at full volume and block everything else out without being disturbed. And you can even find them in different categories like 'dark horror ambient', 'fantasy ambient', 'rain storm ambient', etc. Find ways to isolate yourself from everything else for an hour or two a day, and let your creative mind do what it does best. K?

As always, I hope this helps you guys a little bit. I had to learn the hard way that work environment was as important as it is. Maybe this will give you all a bit of a head start. Seezya soon! And happy writing!