This summer break from my CEU PhD studies, I set myself a deadline: finish the first draft of my young adult-style memoir.

The manuscript is based on my experiences as a teenager battling anorexia nervosa, bulimia, and self-harm. What enabled me to undertake such a project is that I had a solid plan. Part of that plan involved another writer helping me with aspects of writing that do not come naturally to me, particularly voice and scene-building.

I finished the manuscript as planned.

But I could not have done so without respecting the unique way my creativity works—or perhaps more accurately, respecting how intuition works in me. As a writer, I am not typical. I am not naturally gifted at “voice,” describing scenes, or the famous “show, don’t tell.” If my writing were a television program, it would probably resemble a documentary on the Discovery Channel rather than an episode of Friends (the 90’s sitcom).

Honoring how my creativity works went hand in glove with understanding intuition in the first place. In a previous blog post, I wrote about the importance of incubation in the creative process.

In this essay, I want to share three things. First, what Jung meant by intuition and why understanding it helped me become a better writer. Second, why I “write hot and edit cold.” Third, how a coaching personality framework enriched my memoir writing experience.

What Jung Really Meant by Intuition

All writers exercise creativity when they write. Writers are creatives, so I have always been interested in the mysterious notion of creativity itself. All I knew was that it seemed connected to intuition.

The eminent psychologist Carl Jung—whose work I follow as a therapist—described intuition not as a gut feeling or some vague notion of inner light. In his theory of psychological types, intuition is a function of perception. It influences how a person recognizes what is significant in the narrative of their life.

In Jung’s book, if you are an intuitive type (versus a sensing type), you home in on emergent truths. Your eye is toward the future. That makes a lot of intuitive types spiral toward anxiety when stressed.

By contrast, if in Jung’s book you’re a sensing type, your focus leans toward what is concrete and immediately observable. In short: data, data, data.

Jung believed that psychological health requires both functions. While intuitive types can become lost in possibilities, sensing types can become so absorbed in details that they lose sight of the big picture.

Highly intuitive introverts have a tendency to extract the essence of a situation—to identify what is at the core of the issue.

It so happens that I am both introverted and intuitive in orientation. Consequently, I have a natural tendency to distill events into their essential meaning and reduce them to factual accounts. This is very useful when writing a legal document, a psychological report, or a case file, but not so useful when writing a memoir for readers who expect to be transported into a story.

A savvy writer once told me that a memoir must read like a novel. To do that, one must supply the details: the sights, sounds, textures, and emotions of a moment. Such details often come more naturally to people who are highly attuned to sensory experience, which brings us back to the sensing function described by Jungian theory.

As I became more aware of my limitations as a writer, I acknowledged the need for help—of the professional kind. Yes, I needed the help of another writer! One who was more attuned to voice, atmosphere, and sensory detail. These are the things I am inclined to dismiss as flowery words, decorative flourishes, or mere trimmings rather than the meat of the meal.

Beyond furnishing the “minor details,” I also needed someone who could help elaborate on the emotional texture of events; somebody with a knack for making readers feel what it was like to be there. After all, these are young adults I am writing for. In marketing lingo, I must appeal to the audience.

My writing process is frankly: write hot and edit cold.

Writing Hot, Editing Cold

Even though I have just spent several paragraphs describing my limitations as a writer, I do write from feeling. My natural inclination, however, is to approach experience through analysis first and emotion second.

When I write hot, I do not worry excessively about details. I write quickly and get the material onto the page. Later, I revise.

I love revision because I enjoy precision.

As a writer, I suspect that a substantial portion of writing is actually rewriting. I dislike obscurity, lack of clarity. Every sentence should serve a purpose. I am also something of a schoolmarm when it comes to grammar.

Writing With Different Parts of Myself

I always find it amusing that I do not necessarily begin with an outline when writing, but inevitably, at some point, I create one. Then I proceed not to follow it to the letter. The body of the text changes as I fill it in. I leave room for spontaneity.

I think this has something to do with different cognitive functions taking precedence at different moments.

Jungian typology places me in the INTJ category, and in some coaching and self-help circles there are several INTJ subtypes. At one point or another, I have identified with all of them. Since not many writers discuss these ideas, and since they helped me immensely during the writing of my second book—I will mention them briefly here.

I identify with the Magician subtype when I am trying to see the whole picture of the book, especially where it belongs in my life and career as a whole.

I identify with the Industrialist subtype when I focus on efficiency. This is the part of me that checks whether details are logical, factual, and internally consistent. It is also the reason I appreciate structures such as the three-act format.

I identify with the Missionary subtype when I focus on the central message of the work. In the case of this memoir, that means advocacy, awareness, hope, and help for those affected by eating disorders.

I identify with the Anachronist subtype when I insist on resisting certain pressures of contemporary author life. In particular, I don’t find the allure of constant self-promotion, especially on social media. Consequently, I often feel like an outsider in a publishing culture that expects writers to act like influencers.

Of course, all four are me. Depending on the stage of the writing process, one simply takes the lead over the others.

Finding My Own Flow

Looking back, I think the greatest lesson from writing this memoir was gaining a deeper understanding of my own creative process.

I am happy that the result was not only a completed manuscript, but also a more lived-in understanding of intuition itself.

For years, the mystery of creativity taunted me. Now I know that, to unlock my creativity, I must cultivate a healthy appreciation of my own nature.

Understanding intuition helped me understand how I naturally perceive, process, and organize experience. It reminds me of the Tao Te Ching’s advice not to force things unnecessarily, but to move with the current rather than against it.

Be like water. I used to wonder what that meant; now I get it. It is not about being soft and flowy. After all, what if your tides are raging? To be like water means finding your own rhythm and moving with it.

Another lesson was more humbling: I could not have completed this manuscript alone. Without the deadline, the subtle presence, and the promised assistance of another writer, I doubt I would have finished the draft this summer. I cannot do it all myself; I must ask for help. There is maturity in that.

Lastly, writing this manuscript and delving into the topic of intuition added a few coins to the bank of self-compassion. Effective sa akin yung may deadline—even one that is self-imposed and negotiable.

Well, I am not like most writers, and I never will be. I am simply my own kind of writer.