A Free Tool for Problem Solving

Whether your problem is related to business, your personal life, or just a bad case of writer’s block, I’ve created a tool that I’d like you to try.

It’s a writing tool to help you start freewriting (you can read more about freewriting here).

I started freewriting after reading Mark Levy’s book Accidental Genius. Levy says freewriting does the following:

1. It acts as a problem-solving tool, which helps them think through business problems.

2. It serves as a tool of thought leadership, which enables them to write one-of-a-kind books, posts, speeches, and anything else they need to stand out.

It’s a great tool for beating writer’s block, developing innovative ideas, and general problem solving.

How it Works

1. Decide what you’re going to write about. Having trouble at work? Need an idea for a blog post? Wondering what you should do with your life? Anything is fair game.
2. Set the timer. (I usually freewrite in twenty minute blocks, but you might want to start with something shorter, or you may want to experiment with freewriting for an hour.)
3. Choose whether or not you want to see the timer as you write.
4. Click start.
5. Write nonstop without editing yourself.

The key to freewriting is this: DON’T STOP WRITING.

Here are some things to write about if you can’t think of anything to write about:

• Write about how you can’t think of anything to write about
• Write gibberish
• Repeat the last thing you wrote over and over again
• Write about why you’re writing

You can write about anything. Just DON’T STOP.

When time is up, have a look at what you wrote. Combine anything repetitious and delete anything irrelevant. If there’s a gem in there, you might want to set the timer again and freewrite about that specifically. Or maybe you need to hit the clear button and start fresh (if you do that, make sure you save what you wrote first if you want to keep it).

The Tool

Here’s what you need to know about the tool:

• Start: Starts the timer and makes it so you can’t see what you’re writing (this helps avoid editing yourself).
• Pause: Stops the clock, but you should try not to use it.
• Resume: Starts the timer again.
• Clear: Clears the text area and resets the timer to 20 minutes.
• Show Timer?: If the timer is distracting, you can hide it by selecting “No.”
• Save: This will save what you’ve written to your computer.
• Character Counter: Below the text area there’s a character counter so you can see how fast you’re writing (the green number gets brighter the faster you write).

What’s Next?

1. If you’d like to try out my freewriting tool, here it is.
2. You can read more about freewriting here.
3. Learn more about how to generate ideas for blog posts here.