Up all night

How many other writers here pull all-nighters. I don't like to do it often, but sometimes it happens. Here's hoping the payoff for this one is good. But I'm way too old for this and do need sleep. Anyone else stay up all night writing? Have you done it in the past? It's such a bad practice to fall into, but sometimes I just can't fight it. Will someone pick me up a coffee?

 

Always. I'm slowly dying, of course,but it's always fun. Especially when you come up with some bomb-ass idea and it ends up making it all worth it, anyway. What comforts me is knowing Tolkien pulled all-nighters writing and just went straight into work the next day. What a legend. Also same.

I've never quite been able to do the get-up-at-6-go-to-bed-at-9 thing. I'm a totally useless functioning adult, but hey, I'm self-employed so it doesn't matter, and anyway, my writing and other stuff more than makes up for it.

Sometimes if I can't focus enough on /serious literary writing/ then I write poetry or lyrics or come up with new music, etc. It's pretty cool, but you can't show anyone your work, either, because it's like 4am.

Am currently up late again tonight, but managed to get a bit further on the chapter I'm working on. Have you ever actually calculated how many all-nighters you've ever pulled in your life? I think mine's probably into the hundreds by now.

 

I used to write and do other creative stuff all night long. I was almost totally nocturnal. It made me feel like shit sleeping in the day, and I had insomnia really bad.

But I saw a youtube video recently (not sure if I watched it, but I saw the title) saying that if you're nocturnal you're actually way more creative at night, and trying to write (or whatever) in the day won't work nearly as well.

Now I've got myself on a daytime schedule and I'm getting old, so it's hard to stay up past bedtime, but sometimes I do anyway, usually if I get caught up in something fascinating. Then I suffer for a day or 2 afterwards. I wonder if I had remained on a nocturnal schedule if my creativity would have been better? It sure seemed better then, but I also wasn't working to high standards like I try to now.

 

I'm weird, I absolutely cannot do all night, at 11-11:30pm my brain crashes no matter what. However, for some bizarre reason 7-10pm and 3-6am are some of my most creative times. One of the best things for me about having a more flexible work schedule is the ability to take advantage of the 3-6am period when it hits, rather than trying to sleep through it because the alarm will go at 7.

 

Yeah, those twilight periods at the fringes of sleep. I'm most productive/alert in the morning, most creative at night.

 

Yeah, my favourite is when I have a brain dump of ideas in the early hours sitting with my phone or laptop in bed, then have time to make something structured with them once I get up.

 

Usually, I only work through the night when I'm off the next day. Mornings are torture for me, so I'll sleep through them when I can.

 

I can't pull all-nighters. I need to sleep.

 

I'm not sleeping. I should be writing or something, but I'm just not sleeping.