Exploratory writing by Alison Jones is a self help book within the theme of writing.

I found it randomly in my local bookshop. When I saw it I thought it would help structure and motivating my writing. But as I read it I realised that this is a concise exploration on how writing for yourself is a way to bring attention to your thoughts, which ultimately is what most self help books are trying to accomplish.

Writing down your thoughts seems to be prevalent in these thoughts. Triggers by Marshall Goldsmith featured writing down daily questions in a more structured way but to similar effect.

The structure is relatively simple:

  • The first part is the pitch on why is it important to do exploratory writing.
  • The second part is a collection of approaches or prompts for writing
  • The third part focuses on things to do beyond your own notes like writing for others

I believe this approach for self help is particularly useful. It proposes to lower the difficulty of writing to almost 0 by rejecting structure, and instead proposes either a certain amount of time or very simple prompts like “My work is…” . Another book with similar simplicity and therefore efficacy is “Pomodoro technique Illustrated” by Staffan Nöteberg.

Jones’ style is concise and engaging. It didn’t feel as repetitive as other self help books like Triggers. In fact it reminded me to the Fieldstone method by Gerald M. Weingberg in the way it connected writing with the personal.

This book was a pleasant surprise and I would recommend it to people that want some inspiration to write or to unblock themselves through writing.