The Most Practical Thing a Writer Can Do? Make Room to Dream

5 gifts to creativity and mental health from David Lynch | Creative Confidence for Life, Work and Art | Write with us this week (scroll down for calendar)

For David Lynch, creativity was a man with a jigsaw in another room.

The man would post a jigsaw piece through a letterbox in the wall.

The job of the artist was to take that jigsaw piece. To notice what was beautiful; what was interesting.

The job wasn’t knowing what it was going to look like when the jigsaw was complete. It was working with the piece you had, then the next; trusting, knowing, that another jigsaw piece would be coming along if you worked from a place of curiosity.

For me, one important letterbox to discovering Lynch’s world and, through it, the best creative guidance I ever received, wasn’t film but music. Before I knew anything about his mysterious storytelling, what spoke to me through the theme tune to Twin Peaks – one of his many collaborative partnerships with composer Angelo Badalamenti – was so clear it felt like words. It was not simply the most beautiful thing I’d ever heard but – especially in visual context, in front of that waterfall, robin, factory, wood and now-instantly recognisably Lynchian title sequence – the most articulate expression of awe at the interweave of sadness and joy; the celebration and terror of existing in a world that was magical and terrible. I would discover Lynch’s surrealism to reflect exactly that psychological reality: a profoundly accurate response to being a human being amid the inexplicable, the often overwhelming, often cruel yet compellingly beautiful.

Here are five gifts from David Lynch that changed my life and will continue to change my life, every day, for as long as I have one:

• Take the jigsaw piece

  It might be beautiful. It might be strange. It might be sinister. But whatever it is, it’s a piece of something bigger. And it’s ours. We might have no idea how it connects, or what to. So instead of ‘But I don’t know what it’s going to look like finished’ we can put that energy goes into imagining, enjoying, exploring. That’s the permission he gave himself and that’s the permission we can commit to giving ourselves.

• Go where the fish are

  David Lynch talks (I cannot touch past tense here) about ideas being fish. There are bigger, more beautiful ones in the deepest waters, but there are smaller ones too. It’s not about catching a good or bad idea. It’s all about getting into the habit of being there to catch them. In my interview with Maura McHugh, author of PS Publishing’s book on Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, which you can find here on Substack, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you find most convenient, you’ll spot the little hearts coming out of our heads as we discuss Lynch’s Catching the Big Fish, one of my top five guides to the creative mindset and how to liberate, exercise and maintain it.

• Make Room to Dream
  Room to Dream is so much more than the title of Lynch’s 2018 autobiography written with Kristine McKenna. It is method, manifesto and subject matter. It’s the heart of everything, from how he worked to what his work spoke about. No simple, definitive answers. No answers at all. An appreciation of the mystery, which Lynch particularly made room for through Transcendental Meditation. Room to Dream. Into the Night. Now it’s Dark. We can sit in the desert wondering why we’re not catching fish, or we can take ourselves where the fish are. It might mean walking. It might mean shutting the door. It might mean saying no to being available at certain times. But as with any Writers’ Gym habit, starting is the hard bit. Acknowledging it’s a healthy idea, to make space instead of waiting for time. That gets you thinking with curiosity – ‘how do I make this happen?’ instead of ‘what does it say about me?’ or ‘what if it goes wrong?’ – instead of channeling energy into defensiveness against the possibility of going deeper. Possibility becomes a friend. It becomes a corner it’s a privilege to turn.

• Fix your hearts or…
  … the ‘or’ isn’t always a literal death. But death is the literary and literal opposite of growth; of change. In its least cryptic outing, ‘Fix your hearts or die’ was what Lynch’s Twin Peaks Gordon Cole told the bullying, unaccepting colleagues of Denise, the police officer who had transitioned (David Duchovny). This scene is a bullshit-free reminder it’s up to us to be about authenticity in ourselves – and even more to be about authenticity for others. Even when – and especially when – we don’t understand it. It’s not for us to know how one jigsaw piece fits into the whole picture in our own work, let alone anyone else’s world. It’s not for us to know how things connect. So supporting others who dare to explore their own authenticity is a damn fine place to start.

• Create your world

  With a new writing group, or new client, I’ll occasionally see someone respond to a writing prompt (either one I’ve provided, or one that’s swum past them in their wider world) by telling me why the prompt itself was no good. My reply, if they seem to invite one, is to write through the not-writing. To dream through the boredom. To ‘what if’ around the next corner. You don’t need to have experienced the David Lynch Foundation’s work with TM, self-esteem and creativity to know the dangers of how easy it is to stay busy, to have no time to see what’s in the deeper waters, or to dismiss the potential of going there at all. But any dive, literal or otherwise, is about seeing what’s there when we arrive and responding authentically, as only the strange, beautiful, weird individual each one of us is, ever could.

  Today would have been David Lynch’s 79th birthday. His children invite fans worldwide to join in a 10-minute mediation at 12 noon EST (8pm UK). Read about it here or visit the David Lynch Foundation for more.

  In love and gratitude. David Lynch, 1946-2025.

  

Come and write this week:

If you’re a Writers’ Gym member or paid subscriber and unsure of your discount codes, just ask thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com

The Writing Room | 2-4pm Monday 20 January
PLEASE NOTE UNUSUAL TIMES FOR THE WRITING ROOM THIS WEEK! Free for everyone on my mailing list (if you’re reading this, that’s you!). No expectations, no readings, just an open chat box and ten minutes’ (totally optional) chat together at the end. Click here.

Your Creative Writing Toolkit (3 of 4): Structure and Setting | 12-1.30pm, Tuesday 21 January
Based on my book of the same name, this is the third of four Creative Writing Toolkit workshops solidifying the key skills of writing creatively – whether you’re focusing on fiction, memoir or any other genre or audience. Click here.

Coffee & Creativity | 1-2.30pm Wednesday 22 January
Quality writing time and excellent company! Grab a coffee and have a mid-week chat, a write and then another chat with your fellow creatives. Free for members: type your discount code where indicated. Click here.

Writing Room EXTRA | 3-5pm Thursday 23 January
Members only: please psychological check Voxer messages.

Realise Your Writing Resolutions | 6.30-8.30pm, Thursday 23 January
Don’t just make a commitment to your writing for Christmas and New Year: show it your love throughout 2025. If you’re ready to create more time with and space for your writing, and identify the places you and your writing want to go together, this is where to begin your strongest writing year yet. FULLY BOOKED: JOIN WAITING LIST

If you’re not in the UK, find your timezone here.

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