What is Nick Cave's writing process?

He has written that the most important undertaking of his day is simply to sit at his desk and pick up his pen, and through The Red Hand Files he answers one reader's question at a time during office hours. He treats order and routine as what frees the work, not the enemy of it. This Burst turns that disciplined, devotional approach into four steps you can keep.

Is this Nick Cave's actual morning routine?

No. It is a Bearmore Burst composed from practices he has described publicly, including his desk discipline, his reading life and ending at the piano with old songs. He has not laid these out as one set routine.

Do I need to be a songwriter to do it?

No. The point is doing one real piece of writing on a question that matters to you. A few quiet minutes, a passage worth sitting inside, then writing and a little music will work for any kind of writer.

Nick Cave’s Writing and Devotion Morning

Quality: Exceptional· 100%Effort: Manageable· 01h 40m

Inspired by Nick Cave

The work that matters most to you might just be the work that you keep pushing out.

End better than you started, with great work done. Inspired by Nick Cave's Brighton writing life: a few minutes of prayer, a poem or psalm, writing on one meaningful question, then time to play the piano.

The runsheet

1
A few minutes of prayer
Mantra
Nick writes about church as a kind of liberation and treats prayer as a serious practice. Take a few quiet minutes sitting with a single phrase or intention. If prayer isn't for you, repeat one word instead.
10 min activitySetup 1 min · Reset 1 min · 12 min all-in
Bearmore’s thoughts on doing mantra before reading (mindful)
This works well because any focused calm from mantra can carry into mindful reading and sustained attention.
2
A poem or a psalm
Reading (mindful)
Nick reads widely and seriously, from Trakl's poems to Pinocchio to scripture. Choose one short passage you can really sit with and get something from it. A poem, a psalm, or a few pages of a novel all do the job.
15 min activitySetup 1 min · Reset 1 min · 17 min all-in
Bearmore’s thoughts on doing reading (mindful) before creative writing
This is an excellent pairing because reading primes the rhythms and patterns of language, which writing then draws on without needing much warming up.
3
One meaningful question
Creative writing
This is the engine of The Red Hand Files: Nick sits at the desk in office hours and answers one question from someone who writes into the Red Hand Files. Pick a question that matters to you and write until it feels answered.
35 min activitySetup 3 min · Reset 3 min · 41 min all-in
Bearmore’s thoughts on doing creative writing before creating music
This can help because music-making can express any insights and emotions from writing in a different way.
4
Piano
Creating music
In his 'Describe your day' file Nick often ends up at the piano singing old religious songs with his son Earl and an Omnichord. Close the morning with music rather than words, playing or humming a few chords with no audience required.
20 min activitySetup 5 min · Reset 5 min · 30 min all-in
Time well spent.
1h 40m that belonged to you — not the inbox, not anyone else.

The breakdown

Burst evaluation

QualityExceptional· 100%

Sequencing100%

Logistics100%

DifficultyManageable· 0

Total activity100m / 149mManageable

Physical0m / 29mGentle

Mental stillness60m / 119mManageable

Introspective55m / 149mManageable

Creative55m / 59mGentle

9 conditions evaluatedHow we assess →

Wellbeing focus

The relative wellbeing focus of this Burst.

HighEmotional

MedPhysical

HighSelf

MedSocial

HighIntellectual

About this Burst

Nick Cave is an Australian musician, writer and frontman of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, based in Brighton, England. Across four decades he has made albums from Murder Ballads to Wild God, written the novels And the Ass Saw the Angel and The Death of Bunny Munro, and the grief memoir Faith, Hope and Carnage with Sean O'Hagan. Since 2018 he has run The Red Hand Files, an unmoderated newsletter where he answers readers' questions one at a time.

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Nick Cave’s Writing and Devotion Morning1h 40m · free in the app1h 40m · 4 activities · Exceptional 100%