Confessions of an Outlaw: Chaos and Order | Philippe Petit

I kind of welcome chaos at first as the power of my creativity, and then by itself, with a little help from me, the chaos becomes order. And then, of course, I have a plan, and I acquire the ingredients that the plan needs, like you know making a dish.

One good way to put chaos into order is – and it works for me, and one should try it - maybe it works for you too – is to make a list. A list of subjects, for example, if I’m about to write a book or a chapter of a book on something, I’m going to put a list of the thing that I have to talk about, and then the list becomes unbearably long, of course.

And how can this stupid list, which is unedited, how can that list be distilled and help you as a writer, in my example, to arrive to starting to write clearly and succinctly a passage of your book?

Well then, there is the process of editing. So maybe it’s not editing. Maybe it’s more compressing or revisiting. So I take this ridiculous list, and I start scratching things that really came from my mind but are to be deleted. Or I start associating those three items; actually, they’re only one.

So I compress. I associate. I cancel certain things. Also, of course, more words or more, you know, thoughts would come. And then, at the end, that list becomes very naturally a blueprint, a synopsis, a guideline, and if you have a blueprint for an architect, you can start doing a three-dimensional model to show the constructor how you want your house built.

So as a writer, if you have a synopsis, you can start writing because it’s a skeleton of your thoughts. It distills things. I think personally my head is really exploding in all directions when I am about to embark into, let’s say, a piece of writing.

You can hear in my voice I am getting excited talking about what people sometimes fear, which is a blank surface or a blank calling and what can you do. So that list and later on the arrival of reflection moment is what I need to start being intelligible on the page...