Good Writers are Hot
But their Tools are Cold
Here we are…
at the top of 2025, a fitting time to talk about BEGINNINGS - although many think the incoming president is the end of something; more on that in my next post: DONALD TRUMP IS PERFECT - If Only He Were a TV Character and not the Leader of the Free World.
How the hell do you begin?
It’s one of the most commonly asked writerly questions along with:
“How do you keep going?”; “How do I know when it’s done?” and “Does this suck?”
Each person has a unique creative process and approaches projects in their own way. I have more than one piece of advice about this, but there is one constant in my creative process: I take advantage of hot writing.
What is Hot Writing?
Hot Writing inevitably touches the Thing that inspires you to write in the first place - the deep, mysterious spark hoping to be ignited, the uncomfortable longing in your belly. It’s impulsive, chaotic, unorganized - like the person you fell in love with in your 20s. But unlike that person, you should wholeheartedly embrace Hot Writing for the rest of your life. Go ahead and settle down with Hot Writing. Get married and have kids with Hot Writing.
But How Do I Do It?
Don’t wait until you’ve got a belly full of gin or whisky to start ranting. Go ahead and rant on the page. What’s the risk, other than the FBI sharing it after your ‘incident’.
One way is this: set yourself up for your next writing session and think less. Hot Writing plugs into your Stream of Consciousness, and when done with your project in mind, will provide you with beautiful, unpredictable raw material: preachy, pretentious claims, surreal imagery, dogmatic dialogue, raging monologues and hopefully a few confessions.
Hot Writing should be free from judgement, and if you’re lucky, free from Self. For me, these are the moments that make writing feel like meditation, moments when I find myself rocking in my chair as I type - yes even in public. I said free from judgement so the guy on the Zoom next to me can go shit in his hat.
Your Hot Writing will make sense only occasionally, but that’s part of the point; you spend so much time making sense every day - how about letting that go for a minute? I promise you some of the best moments in your writing - novel, screenplay, play, pilot, ad campaign - will come from this part of the process.
Speaking of Process…
I occasionally step back from the Hot stuff to organize the material - a decidedly cooler process - assigning categories to the writing that came out of me: DIALOGUE, CHARACTER, THEME, SCENES, whatever categories organically surface from what I’ve written. Then I do more Hot Writing inside those categories as ideas, characters and story take shape. Eventually, thanks to my set of Cold Tools, Im able to guide the molten lava until it hardens into the rock of a finished story.
Cold Tools?
Cold Tools are more complicated than Hot Writing. Hot Writing does whatever it wants - remember your 20s? But Cold Tools require meticulous effort and time. I’m talking about things like STRUCTURE, CHARACTER CHANGE, GROWTH, THEME - my god, it’s like a bunch of adults just walked into the room. But seriously it’s important for me to say this: Hot is Not better than Cold
Over the years I’ve met a lot of writers who are stuck in one temperature or the other. They end up with a hot mess or a cold fish. Obviously you should not share an incoherent hot manuscript, but neither should you deliver a cold, lifeless manuscript like the Flat Rats covering the streets of Brooklyn. Actually, that’s not a great metaphor because I would quite enjoy reading the written equivalent of a Flat Rat with its jelly red guts in a frozen explosion on Classon Avenue.
Hot Writing & Cold Tools are equally important.
For me, it’s all about timing and being light on my feet so I can step in and out of the hot and cold. Perhaps there’s a ‘cold plunge to sauna’ metaphor to be had here, but not for me. I tried that fucking cold plunge and crawled out after 15 seconds. I walked away feeling like a weakling which is not what the experience promises.
Even in writing this post I had to allow myself to madly (and hotly) record my most excited ideas after which I - like a cold killer - organized and revised it as much as possible before Tuesday which, again, is the day Wimpy promised to pay for all those damn burgers. An important point here is: please, for the love of all that is sacred, do not think the right words flow in the right order from brain to pen to paper.
And herein lies one of the most important goals of…
Screenwriting is Writing (with me, Bill Gullo)
Screenplays, poems, novels, short stories, songs, Shark Tank pitches all share so much DNA because they are all creative endeavors and the best of them are connected to something Hot. So no matter what you’re working on, find a way to honor and harness the electricity in you.
Some will say
this is just a matter of RIGHT BRAIN v LEFT BRAIN. Yes, that too. Hot & Cold is just the language I’ve come to after many years of writing and thinking and talking about writing as I try to help myself and others in storytelling efforts.
Besides I can’t actually use the Right Brain/Left Brain concept because I inevitably hesitate on which Brain does which Functions which slows me down when I don’t want to be slowed down. I prefer my metaphor because even babies and dogs know the difference between Hot and Cold
Sharing is Hot
So jump in now. Share anything you want because the adults aren’t here, but if you want to share on this topic, let me know any rituals, habits or tricks of mind that help you get started on a new project or even keep going on a project because that’s a thing too. Thank you so much for reading.
I like to compose in my head, especially while moving- walking, biking, running, if I’m lucky the composition and even whole sentences that were stored in May mind pour out hotly when I sit down to write. Sometimes these hot thoughts add up to fast pages of writing
I'll read this two or three times. Am halfway there, finding myself nodding and agreeing with some things, of which I had a vague understanding.
I used to think that it would be best to have a rigid, daily timeline.
Of course, there is no, one size fits all, approach.
That was quickly abandoned.
After three weeks without serviceable laptop access, scribbling on notepad, I dived straight back in.
The result was pleasing plot progression but, more importantly, ruthless editing.
"Too many words in that sentence. He's stating a fact, not making a speech .
This may be nice to read, but remember...THE AUDIENCE."
As you can see, I've never done this before.